“That’s so gay:”
A Narrative Vignette of My Experience as a Lesbian in Catholic School

Tonya Callaghan
Graduate Student
Master’s of Education Program
Department of Educational Policy Studies
University of Alberta, Canada.
Email: tonya.callaghan@ualberta.ca

     I was born into an Irish Catholic family in a rural community on Prince Edward Island, the smallest maritime province in Canada. Both my mother and my father come from large Irish Catholic families that count nuns and priests among the siblings, uncles and aunts. The promise of a better economic future convinced my parents to move our young family to western Canada. In Calgary, Alberta, my sister and I both attended Catholic school together from kindergarten to grade twelve. We attended church regularly and assisted with minor tasks during Mass.

     As an upper-elementary student I can remember paying close attention to the priest’s homilies every Sunday. They made me uneasy. I didn’t like the stories that portrayed women as temptresses of men, as weak and punishable, or the idea that women should obey their husbands. As a young girl I learned very early what it means to be an ideal Catholic woman. Catholic doctrine’s patriarchy and sexism were reinforced in the day-to-day operations of the Catholic schools I attended as a child. Boys were held out to be leaders and girls their followers.

     In upper-elementary school I developed crushes on the few other girls who, like me, did not fit in to the Catholic ideal of female behaviour. It was on the elementary playground that I first heard the word “lezzie,” and the scrapes on my knees from being pushed to the ground taught me its meaning. In junior high I learned I could be safe from such assaults by being tough and by tossing around homophobic phrases like the best of them. I regularly uttered statements like: “That’s so gay,” “He’s such a fag,” and “Don’t be a dyke.” No adults ever reprimanded me for saying such things, and my peers either feared me or thought I was cool. In high school I made the mistake of acting on one of my crushes and lost several friends when others found out about it.

     Later, when I became a teacher and taught for some years in international schools in Europe, I came back to Canada and was drawn to teaching in Catholic schools, primarily because public schools were not hiring at the time, and my Catholic background qualified me for teaching in a Catholic school. The longer I taught, however, the more I recognized versions of my own experience among the students I was teaching: the closeted students, the tentative students who still weren’t sure, and the students who teased and punished each other with the phrase: “That’s so gay.” Well, as a Catholic teacher, I was “so gay.” So, what’s a good Catholic girl to do in a situation like this? I made a conscious decision to stay. I wanted to be there for the queer students because I knew how important it would have been for me to have had a positive role model. Of course, I couldn’t be “out” to my students in a Catholic school but, as an English teacher, I could inform my students about the backgrounds of some of the writers anthologized in the government-approved texts. I told my students, for example, that Audre Lorde was a lesbian and that Tennessee Williams was “so gay.”

     Working with the students in the classroom was the least of my worries as a lesbian teaching in a Catholic school system. The heterosexist culture of the entire organizational structure and the regular homophobic comments of my colleagues were constant sources of anxiety and stress. I was frequently asked about my marital status and why I did not have a boyfriend. On the topic of one of the greatest joys of my life – my life with my partner – I had to remain silent. I was “out” to some select colleagues, but for the majority of the staff the truth of my life was so distorted and censored that I came across as a boring straight person who did nothing of any interest on the weekend. I regularly witnessed homophobic jokes or comments on current events such as same-sex marriage during staff room conversations at lunch or during meetings. I started to grasp the full, institutionalized nature of the homophobia when I made an anonymous call to my union representative to inquire as to what would happen if it became known that I was co-habiting with my same-sex partner. I was told to keep that quiet as I could be fired if anyone found out, since having a same-sex partner is contrary to Catholicity. I didn’t bother asking my second question about getting my partner signed up on my benefits package. I was ultimately “so gay” I could not bear teaching for the Catholic school system anymore, and I decided to pursue graduate studies as a way out.

     Years of practice meant that I had developed sophisticated coping mechanisms for functioning in such a repressive environment. This was not the case for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans-identified and queer (LGBTQ) students I was encountering in Catholic schools. Sensing that I would be sympathetic, some of these students came to me with their stories of bullying and more subtle forms of mistreatment. When a promising drama student in the Catholic high school where I taught committed suicide in 2004 after suffering several months of bullying due to his sexual orientation (as was confided to me by his friends after his death), I felt compelled to take action regarding the Catholic school system’s sanctioned and institutionalized homophobia by engaging in research designed to expose it.
     Institutional churches have been among the most invasive cultural forces in making certain that there are negative consequences for living queer. Contrary to a commonly cited Catholic value to treat all individuals with dignity and respect, officials in Catholic schools are doing a disservice to vulnerable queer youth and staff whom they regularly demean, dismiss and fail to keep safe. The pervasive heteronormativity of the Catholic environment encourages homophobic attitudes in staff and students, and alienates some LGBTQ students to such a degree that they drop out of school or, like the gay drama student, commit suicide.

     There is a growing number of queer youth, however, who are reacting to homophobia in proud and positive ways such as establishing Gay/Straight Student Alliances in their schools. Some, such as Marc Hall, the young gay student in the province of Ontario, Canada who refused to stay silent when his request to take his boyfriend to his high school prom was denied, are forcing the larger issue of individual rights versus institutional rights. The tragic death of the promising gay drama student compelled me to expose the fact that many Catholic school districts in Canada ignore their legal, professional, and ethical responsibilities to protect all students and to maintain a safe, caring, and inclusive learning environment. The brave activism of Marc Hall reminded me that taking a stand can affect change, and his heroism has inspired my research into the Catholic institutionalization of homophobia in publicly funded Canadian Catholic secondary schools.