Bethlehem College Indicates They Won't Change a Goddamn Thing
A letter just sent to parents shows the school is digging its heels in.
Hi,
Bethlehem College has just sent out a statement to parents and caregivers indicating they won’t be changing a Goddamn thing.
The email was sent from principal Larne Edmeades:
Good morning Parents & Caregivers,
Attached is the most recent communication from Mr Shakes in response to a statement from the Human Rights Commission around our legal obligations.
Love and grace
The statement all boils down to one line, really:
“We believe we are adhering to all relevant legislation.”
So, I guess nothing is changing in regards to Bethlehem College’s active distain for the LGBTQI+ community — despite what the Ministry of Education has told them:
The Ministry of Education has confirmed that this statement was not included in the College’s Integration Agreement entered into with the Minister of Education in 1999. It has ordered the Principal, Board of Trustees and Deputy chair of the Christian Education Trust to remove point 13.
The letter — from Paul Shakes, who is still refusing to talk to me — rambles on, with the usual talking points, including this clanger:
We appreciate that, for some, Christian beliefs can feel personally hurtful. Our message to those people is that our intention is certainly not to be hurtful.
I feel like I’m being sucked into the hellscape of Arise Church all over again.
Please, Christians: If your intent is not to be hurtful — but you’re being hurtful — something is fundamentally broken.
I’ve included the full letter below — in which Shakes also comically says this:
“If there are people with hurts or concerns from their time at Bethlehem College, our message is to please be in touch directly so we can address them with you. Our heart and desire is to deal with complaints in an open and honest manner.”
Again — Paul: I am a person with a concern. I went to Bethlehem College. I am engrained on your school’s wall.
Your desire to deal with complaints in an open and honest manner? You won’t even answer my emails.
I’ve included the full email sent from Bethlehem College to parents below.
Webworm has reached out to the Teachers Council and Ministry of Education about Bethlehem College essentially extending them the middle finger.
David.
Ok. Simple. If you want your child to go to a school that will bring it up to be a bigot, then you pick up the bill. Let us, in a secular country, stop funding these religious schools. Most religions have access to plenty of funds of their own, anyway!
Famous Christian Theologian and Narnia author, C.S Lewis wrote that "Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive" in one of his nerdy hard to comprehend books.
There is a common concept that much evil is done with good intentions (which is sometimes misused to defend/explain psychopaths, dictators, mass murderers).
God of the Machine author and sacred cow satirist Isabel Paterson wrote that, "Most of the harm in the world is done by good people, and not by accident, lapse, or omission. It is the result of their deliberate actions, long persevered in, which they hold to be motivated by high ideals toward virtuous ends".
They're both talking, I believe, about situations like this. Add in that newer concept of cognitive dissonance, and you've got this situation where "Christians" are blinded to their oppressive habits and can only interpret corrective actions towards them as persecution. It's the same thing that makes people with react defensively to the concept of white privilege, the same thing that makes dictators think they're acting for the greater good. It's born in ignorance and nourished in echo-chambers of like-minded agreement. People believe that they are good, and therefore all their actions are good. They've got no idea of nuance.