TORONTO (LifeSiteNews) –– Archbishop of Toronto Francis Leo has thus far refrained from publicly weighing in on a brewing issue involving three Toronto Catholic District School Board (TCDSB) trustees who have publicly rejected one of their fellow trustees proposed pro-life initiative for all schools in the district to fly the pro-life flag in May.
As reported by LifeSiteNews this past Friday, no less than three TCDSB trustees, Kevin Morrison, Maria Rizzo, and vice-chair of the board Markus de Domenico, have all made comments to the legacy media in which they voiced their opposition to fellow trustee for Scarborough—Agincourt Catholic Michael Del Grande’s pro-life motion.
Del Grande recently introduced a motion which, if passed, will mandate that every school in the district, as well as the school board’s head office, fly the international pro-life flag every year for the entire month of May.
LifeSiteNews contacted the office of the Archdiocese of Toronto, asking if Archbishop Francis Leo would comment on the matter.
Neil MacCarthy, Director of Public Relations & Communications for the archdiocese, replied that there “has not been any public comment by His Grace to this point.”
However, MacCarthy did not rule out that the archbishop would speak on the matter eventually, telling LifeSiteNews that any “public statement on this matter” will be made known.
Del Grande’s motion would also mandate that each TCDSB school spend the day of the Canadian March for Life, which will be held on May 9, studying a special pro-life curriculum.
His motion will soon be debated at a public meeting scheduled to take place on April 23.
LifeSiteNews has yet to hear back from trustees, Morrison, Rizzo, and de Domenico, after asking them a series of questions regarding their apparent opposition to having the pro-life flag flown at Catholic schools in May. Some pro-life advocates have said that the trustees apparent opposition to Del Grande’s motion, makes it appear they do not support the Catholic Church’s teaching on the sanctity of life from conception to natural death.
Campaign Life Coalition (CLC) Director of Political Operations, Jack Fonseca, said in comments to LifeSiteNews that Del Grande’s motion serves to “symbolize the Catholic Church’s defense of the sanctity of human life,” and that the trustees going against him are “heretical trustees.”
“Disgracefully, three of the heretical trustees on his board have mounted a media campaign to oppose the pro-life flag and to paint a false narrative about it being ‘an American style political maneuver that has no place in education, as a cover for their wicked voting intention, which will essentially be a vote in support of abortion,” said Fonseca.
Pope John Paul II’s pro-life encyclical Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life), affirmed the Church’s constant, as well as traditional and historical teaching on the sanctity of human life and the gravity of the crime of abortion.
As for Del Grande, in a statement sent to LifeSiteNews, he noted that to “vote for this motion is a public affirmation of integrity and loyalty to the religious teachings of the Church, which is the fundamental reason why Catholic schools exist.”
Del Grande said that a vote in favor of his motion is “not a matter of politics but of faith in action.”
As reported by LifeSiteNews, the TCDSB in recent months has seemingly had no issues with promoting a pro-LGBT agenda, as can be seen in an instance from earlier this year when it recommended its staff watch a pro-LGBT play about a little girl who thinks she is a boy.
Del Grande has been facing ongoing legal battles after being canceled for going against the LGBT agenda. He was tried before a tribunal of the Ontario College of Teachers (OCT) for objecting to the addition of transgender ideology into the Toronto Catholic District School Board’s policies and for defending the Catholic Church’s teaching that abortion is morally wrong.