Update 03/02/2022: Brisbane’s Citipointe Christian College has withdrawn its sexuality contract after backlash and Pastor/principal Brian Mulheran has stood aside to take extended leave.
On Friday Brisbane’s Citipointe Christian College emailed parents an updated contract for them to sign on behalf of their child. If left unsigned it meant the student would no longer attend the college.
The email was sent without any discussion with the faculty and was sent days before class was to resume for 2022. It was sent with approval from Principal Brian Mulheran.
In the updated contract, it is stated that students must live by the ‘Declaration of Faith’. This declaration is provided for reference at the end of the emailed contract.
It is openly anti abortion, homophobic and transphobic.
I’m a 35-year-old, gay male, who lives in Brisbane. I attended a Catholic high school. I’m no longer religious, and while I understand the importance of religion and appreciate it, I also understand how it can have extremely outdated views that no longer reflect the time we are living in.
These views have real world consequences and effects on the students who attend not only Citipointe but many other deeply religious private schools. This language has been around for 50 years, it is now at a point where a school thinks they can put it in a contract and not face any repercussion.
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When I posted about this on Facebook I was met with many questions about why I care and why should I say anything at all if I’m not a parishioner of the church.
I’ll try to break this down for you as best as I can. Here are my answers to the many questions people have raised with me.
“If you don’t agree then don’t send your kids here”
As a proud member of the LGBTQIA+ community I have an obligation to stand by my friends, brothers, and sisters, and fight the battles that they can’t. Such open discrimination against them in their formative years has deep psychological effects. They carry these effects with them for the rest of their life
I have had countless messages sent to me from people in the 40s and 50s telling me their stories about Citipointe and about many other private religious schools in Australia.
They share with me deep mental anguish, not understanding the world they live in and in some cases how they entered into marriage thinking that would solve the problem.
For me this is a clear-cut case of brainwashing; being told one thing over and over until you yourself believe it to be true. I have been told stories of how people cannot cope and ultimately end their life.
“Can’t a church teach what it wants to?”
No it can’t. We have laws to protect us for this reason.
We have the Sexuality & Gender Discrimination Bill 2003 which prohibits discrimination on the grounds of sexuality, transgender identity, or intersex status.
I also want to highlight the fact that in 2019 the State and Federal government provided Citipointe Christian College with 13 million dollars of funding. It also provides tax cuts to the Citipointe Church. An organisation with approximately over 10,000 Australian members.
This funding is paid for by you and I. This is why Australia has a say in this issue.
Many of these organisations don’t believe that mental health exists. I have had countless DMs telling me how teachers have denied that a student is suffering from depression or anxiety. One parent even telling me the school’s solution to her child’s mental issues was to perform an exorcism.
Is this something we really want to be funding?
“What is the impact on you personally?”
Students who are fed the anti LGBTQIA+ rhetoric grow up believing it. They then enter the workforce and hold positions of power and make decisions based on their faith.
An example being our current Prime Minister, a member of the Hillsong church. A church that isn’t as openly homophobic as Citipointe but nonetheless a homophobic organisation.
According to the PM, the church doesn’t dictate his policies. However, last year he introduced a bill that allows Religious Freedoms. It claims it will protect Australians from discrimination on the basis of religious beliefs and activity.
This bill means Citipointe can make parents sign a contract with openly homophobic and transphobic language.
It also means the church is free to discriminate however it pleases.
How, in 2022, are we creating more archaic laws than ever before? Our Prime Minister hasn’t shown any leadership over the last four years.
His holiday to Hawaii during the worst bushfires the country has ever seen. His mishandling of the Brittany Higgins sexual assault case. Covering for Christian Porter and countless other ministers in his cabinet. Not to mention the lack of leadership during a global pandemic.
Does he just sit back in his office and say “It’s what the lord wanted”? Because it sure seems that way.
Sign the Change.org petition to get the school to change the current contract.
See The Project discussing Citipointe Christian College:
