(May 8, Toronto) Two days of hearings in a suit brought by a high school student fighting to bring his boyfriend to the prom wrapped up Tuesday in a suburban Toronto courtroom.

17 year old Marc Hall took the Durham District Catholic School Board to court after his principal told him the church would not allow him to bring his boyfriend to the annual prom.

Superior Court Justice Robert MacKinnon said he would issue a ruling on Friday, just hours before the prom is scheduled to begin.

Tuesday a lawyer for the board called the 'A' student a "bad example" and letting him bring boyfriend Jean-Paul Dumond to the dance would "condone homosexual relationships".

"He's an example we cannot approve," said lawyer Peter Lauwers. "He's a bad example from a Catholic perspective and what he wants to do is not consistent with teachings of the church." 

The board is arguing that under Canada's Constitution, Catholic schools have the ability to take matters of faith into account when they make decisions about the conduct of students.

"We're about indoctrination, plain and simple," Lauwers said

He told the court  Hall and other gay students can attend school dances if they follow the rules of the board and go "stag."

"But if they manifest romance they would be stopped," Lowers said.

"So they can't dance?" Superior Court Justice Robert MacKinnon asked.

"Correct."

"I'm having a good time, but I can't dance." MacKinnon said to laughter from the audience.

Lauwers said that if gay or lesbian students kiss, hold hands or dance on school property, they could be disciplined, or suspended.  They could even be expelled. 

Lauwers then suggested Hall could go to a public school if he could not abide by the Catholic school board rules.

Monday, Hall's lawyer, David Corbett, said that because the Catholic school board accepts public money it is required to abide by Ontario's Human Rights Code which protests gays and lesbians.

Corbett also said the board was violating Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms. 

He compared Hall to American civil rights activist Rosa Parks.

"Rosa Parks chose to get on a bus in Alabama, knowing she might be discriminated against.  She could have left her community and moved to the North where she would not have faced that problem.

"But she was part of her community in the South, and when she was told that as a person of colour she had to sit at the back of the bus, she refused, because she knew that what she was being asked to do was morally and legally wrong."

Hall may be a "bad influence" for the Catholic school system, but to gays and lesbians he is a hero. On May 19 he will be given the Coalition for Lesbian and Gay Rights in Ontario's highest honour.

Hall has been named winner of the John Damien Award. The honour has been given out only 11 times since 1979.

As for the prom, Hall says he is hopeful the judge will rule in his favour.  The teen had his characteristic blue dyed hair "touched up" on Monday, and has his tux picked out.

Posted 12:14 am, May 8, 2002
©365Gay.com Ltd® 2002 

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