A Christian school board member traces their journey to an affirming stance and describes the harm being done at Christian Schools — to people in the queer community and to other students.
Are Christian schools safe for queer kids? Are they safe for straight kids? Should we care?
Hesed Project is working to make Christian churches and Christian families safe places for children growing up LGBTQ+, which also means we care a lot about Christian schools.
What we are noticing is that some Christians schools are becoming less safe, not more.
What follows are two letters written by the same ally, to two different Christian schools at two different times. The author of both letters is Syl Gerritsma, a retired businessman who served on the boards of two Christian schools and who was and is a member and donor to many other Christian schools in Canada and the US.
Gerritsma’s membership at one of those schools was revoked after he spoke publicly against a policy change that made agreement with a traditional interpretation of scripture a requirement for society membership. The new policy also requires that teachers not allow instruction, curriculum, resources or discussion to contradict the board’s view of human sexuality and gender (which defined marriage as between one man and one woman, and gender as being binary and assigned at birth).
In January 2022, Gerritsma wrote a letter in objection.
Two years later, Gerritsma wrote a second letter, in April 2024, to another school, after it held a membership meeting at which a plan to restrict that school’s membership to include only those who agreed with a traditional interpretation of human sexuality was narrowly defeated.
Why are these letters important to share?
- They document a sincere Christian’s journey from a traditional stance to one of full acceptance of the dignity and image of God in everyone.
- They illustrate how Christian school boards are quietly tightening the rules for membership, employment, enrolment, and instruction.
- They show us the harm that is being done to students – both those who are members of the LGBTQ+ community and their classmates.
- They show us the risk of liability.
- They show us what’s at stake if we don’t want Christian schools to simply become places where students are shielded from sex ed or what some parents consider troubling developments in public schools, instead of places where students are taught for transformation: how to think, love and act with discernment and with the mind of Christ.
(Both letters have been edited to remove information which would identify the recipient schools.)
Letter to a Christian High School
January 12, 2022
Dear fellow board members,
In any group like a board, it’s good to have differing opinions so that the group can seriously consider alternatives. It’s obvious that on LGBTQ+ issues, I have been the differing view! This issue will be with us for a long time, so it’s important that we carefully consider the path we have traversed, where we are now, and what path this high school should take in the future. Because I will not be with you in the future, and because I have not been able to share a lot about much of this in the past, I want to offer a cursory examination of just some of the considerations.
No doubt it is surprising to many that a person as conservative as I am in so many ways has come to depart from it on LGBTQ+ issues. At the same time, it will surprise no one to hear that I did previously hold the conservative position. In fact, not many years ago I wrote a letter to rebut a pro LGBTQ+ article written by a fellow Christian and have contended for the conservative position of my church in various venues and discussions. So, how did this change in my convictions occur? Was it that I surrendered to secularism and abandoned commitment to Scripture? No.
Rather, it was a long process that started while I still argued for the conservative position. It became painfully difficult to suppress the evidence that this conservative tree was bearing very bitter fruit.
It started with a couple of friends in university. A few years later they had married, he had gone through Calvin Seminary, I had come back from Viet Nam, and, to my surprise, they were in St Catharines teaching in the Christian School system. He was widely considered to be one of the best teachers. Their family became best friends with ours.
A few years later, they moved to teach in a Christian school in another province. To my stunned surprise, I later heard that he came out as a person with a different sexual orientation, left his family, and lost his job. He became actively involved in the LGBTQ+ rights community and worked to move the provincial educational curriculum in that direction.
Tragic. At the time I had no better framework to deal with this than the conservative one I had always held: “Love the sinner; hate the sin.” I had a long conversation with him, but my “love the sinner” was not strong enough to maintain the friendship. But it’s not just the loss of friendship that I mourn. The Christian community lost perhaps forty years of service from this highly talented leader. And the best I could come up with was a weak dismissal of this as merely and simply a matter of his sinful choices. I thought the Bible was clear about that.
Over the years I have encountered many who have been deeply wounded by the way God’s people cruelly mangled and rejected them.
Syl Gerritsma
Bitter fruit. If only he were the only, or one of a few, similar cases. But over the years I have encountered, personally or indirectly, many of God’s LGBTQ+ children who have been deeply wounded by the way God’s people cruelly mangled and rejected them. Sadly, some of those were at this school and other Christian schools. Many turned their backs on Christian education, on their churches, and, worst of all, on God. Some were even driven to suicide. A few, like the gay alumnus who spoke to us, somehow retained, or recovered love for God, despite rejection and cruelty from His people. What a loss for the Christian community.
The effect of all of this on me was also disturbing. It slowly dawned on me that I had descended into a rather chilly indifference toward my sisters and brothers who were created with different orientations from mine. I continued to justify that with the interpretation of Scripture that seemed to tell me that God regards homosexuality as a particularly odious sin. But the dissonance between my chilly indifference to the suffering of LGBTQ+ people and the love God says I should have for the outcast became increasingly difficult to suppress.
So I could no longer evade the ominous, but obvious question: if the fruit is so bitter, is the conservative interpretation tree that bears that fruit really a good tree?
That question forced me to open my ears and my mind and start to seriously listen to my LGBTQ+ sisters and brothers and their allies. That drove me to the deeper need to listen anew, with slowly opening eyes, to what the Bible really says and doesn’t say. As I listened and read, the troubling truth became inescapable: my conservative hermeneutics on this issue were at least dubious, and, more likely, wrong.
So, what should this school and its board do? We should become an affirming school in policy and in practice. I expect that it will eventually happen. Some of our supporters and graduates are already going in that direction. Many Christian pastors, theologians and other scholars are voicing their support. Right now, these changes may be far from their conclusion. But we are in a time of change on this issue, as we changed just during my lifetime on issues like worldly amusements, divorce, and the roles of women, issues on which we also thought the Bible was clear. Are we changing because the Bible is changing or because we are abandoning Scripture? No. Rather, it is because a careful reading of Scripture is leading the church to a better position. Such change is a slow and painful process.
So what should the board do NOW? Our unity in the cause of Christian education is too important to squander over issues like this. We have had too much bitter division in the Christian institutions many of us support even just during our short lives. For the sake of our children and the Kingdom of God, we must learn from that bitter past and not repeat it. I know that the board will not quickly and soon announce the replacement of our present policy in favour of affirmation. But even though most of us don’t believe the school should go in an affirming direction at all, I would plead that we be at least open enough to the possibility that it will happen that we do not plant land mines that will keep destroying people on all sides of this issue for decades. Even if we are not ready to make the change right now, we need to prepare for it in ways that do as little damage as possible to LBBTQ+ students and to the school. As a minimal beginning, we have to stop threatening and intimidating staff and others who may be supportive of God’s children who are gay. Doubling down on a failing policy is not a good path forward.
As trustees of the school, we also have to consider carefully the liabilities (ethical, legal, financial, and reputational) that our actions and inaction now may have in the future. Planting land mines around us, thinking that we can safely survive, encircled and protected by our mines, will make it very difficult to change direction later or for our successors to even try to defend our actions. And, although the worst of possible outcomes are unlikely, we need to at least consider them. For example, should there be an inquiry some decades from now into the abuse suffered by LGBTQ+ students in Christian high schools, will our school be seen as one of the worst homophobic schools? Residential school operators, mostly Christian, also should have, but didn’t foresee what their behaviour would look like fifty years later. Can we do better?
A lot of this is about policy. But at the same time, it’s really about people. The meetings we had with two different groups of supporters can be seen as a microcosm of this. The most powerful moment in those meetings was our principal’s tearful apology to the alumnus for the way we have treated him. Powerful as it was, it stopped a long way short of what should have been said. He should have been able to go on to say that, while this happened thirty years ago, it doesn’t happen now. But, of course, he couldn’t say that. We are still treating God’s children who are differently oriented than I am in ways that drive them out of Christian schools, threaten to drive them away from the Christian community, and, too often, away from Christ. The principal should also have been able to say that the board has specific policies now that prohibit what happened to this student. But he couldn’t say that either, because we don’t. He also should have been able to say that the board is at least working on such policies. He couldn’t even say that. As an aside, it should be obvious that this is not our principal’s fault. The board should at least start to edge toward genuinely inclusive policies to reduce harm in this process of change and support staff in implementing such policies.
How many more gay students will have to suffer before we change?
Syl Gerritsma
Letter to a Christian Elementary School
April 12, 2024
To the board of directors,
Many of you may have heard the saying, “It’s hard to remember that the goal was to drain the swamp when you are up to your neck in alligators.”
I don’t envy you as you experience the pressures of the immediate and urgent at the same time as you work on the more important role of guiding the schools for the long-term goal of providing Christ-centred education for as many of God’s children as possible both now and far into the future. A part of good leadership is working in such a way that, as a minimum, our actions on the short-term and less important issues do not impede us in working toward the more important long-term goals.
From that point of view, it may be helpful to analyze the dynamics at the April 8 meeting. Most notable is the inescapable observation that virtually no question or observation even alluded to our big picture calling to provide Christ-centred education for as many as possible for as long as possible. By contrast, virtually every speaker spoke in ways that undermine that goal. The ambiance of the evening focussed on how we can erect impenetrable walls to KEEP OUT members whose life and/or commitments, particularly on LGBTQ+ issues, may be different from those some of us hold. Worse, the call was to keep out their children. Even worse, was the not-so-subtle suggestion that we have to get rid of some existing members and staff.
While predicting the future in detail is impossible, the board has to carefully consider the likely outcomes of the paths we embark upon today. So, let’s consider where the anti LGBTQ+ path is likely to lead us.
Despite our claim that we love the “sinner” they feel the hate — not the love. So many leave — leave Christian schools, leave churches, and, worst of all, too often leave Christ.
Syl Gerritsma
- What will we be saying about Christianity to those around us? We know the answer to that already. Our anti-LGBTQ+ stance is seen as discriminatory, and, increasingly, as hateful. It is not seen as Gospel—good news.
- What will we be saying to God’s children among us who are oriented differently than I am? We know the answer to that too. For decades already they have felt, and have heeded our “KEEP OUT” signs. Despite our claim that we love the sinner and hate the sin, they feel the hate—not the love. So many leave—leave Christian schools, leave churches, and, worst of all, too often leave Christ.
- What will we be saying to our children who are heterosexually oriented? We know the answer to that too. As they have and acquire openly gay friends and acquaintances, they have rising discomfort with our stance. Some of them leave too. It’s a dribble now, but the number of departures and/or dissenters is rising—even children of the most fervently anti-gay parents. We can be thankful that many are still with us for now, patiently waiting and hoping that we will change. How much patience will they have?
- Where are we legally? I will let those legally trained add the nuance and precision, but, as I understand the broad outlines of the law, our present policies, in the big picture, are already legally questionable, the proposed ones more so, and, if we implement them, for instance by firing staff members, we are still more clearly engaging in discriminatory behaviour. But we can do it. Why? Because there is a “carve out” in the law that allows some otherwise discriminatory behaviour if we can persuade a court that we do so on the basis of religious convictions. That “carve out” is a bit tenuous, as the twenty-five-year-old case of Delwyn Vriend at King’s College in Alberta, and the Christian Horizons case in Ontario indicate. So, it is understandable that some of our members ask the board to get legal advice so that we can come as close as possible to illegal activity without legal liability. Let’s imagine, then, that we fire an employee for her convictions on LGBTQ+ issues. It is likely that lawyers can give us (expensive!) advice that will increase our chances of prevailing legally. But that may be a pyrrhic victory. It can be extremely expensive, financially and otherwise, as our partner secondary school experienced in their efforts to get rid of their principal and many members and potential members. And there are already calls for the restriction or elimination of the “carve out,” asking, essentially, why society should allow some people, like Christians, to violate human rights laws. A victory could increase those calls, with results that we may not like. We have already lost the public relations battle on this issue. We are seen by a rising number of Canadians as discriminatory and even hateful. Do we really want to double down on failing and failed policies like that?
- The traditional response to all of the above is that none of it really matters. We stand for obeying the teachings of Scripture. It doesn’t matter that society considers us discriminatory. It doesn’t matter if we are (almost or even largely) on the wrong side of the law. It’s too bad if our attitudes and actions cause little ones to stumble and others to be alienated from Christ. All of this is evidence that we are being persecuted for the sake of the Gospel. Scripture is clear.
What are we saying to our children? As they have and acquire openly gay friends and acquaintances, they have rising discomfort with our stance. Some of them leave too and the number of departures and dissenters is rising — even children of the most fervently anti-gay parents.
Syl Gerritsma
But that argument is also rapidly evaporating. There is an avalanche of books by Christian authors who carefully examine Scripture and come to a different conclusion. A rising number of Christian scholars are similarly abandoning the “traditional” views on sexual orientation and gender identity issues. When I was young, I could not have named one pastor in my denomination who leaned toward affirmation. Now I know many pastors and church leaders who have similar views. They are not raving secularists and Bible-denying fanatics. They are serious students of the Bible, graduates of good seminaries, who are listening carefully and respectfully to God’s word. So, the contention that Scripture is clearly on the traditional side is clearly not true. But the direction of the graph of change is quite clear: we are changing and will continue to change.
So, what should the board of directors do? One way of structuring and evaluating an organization is to see if it is centre-focused or boundary focused. If parents marginally acquainted with Christianity would visit our schools, they would experience a centre-focused organization beautifully focused on the central task of nurturing children in Christ-centred education. By dramatic contrast, if those same parents had attended our last membership meeting, they would have seen us as a boundary-focused organization, concerned with defining exactly where the boundaries are so that we can strictly decide which sinners are in the boundaries, which sinners are out, and which sinners are so close to the boundary that we need an inquisition to decide whether to let them in or push them out.
What kind of school do we want?
Syl Gerritsma