Brisbane religious school Citipointe Christian college restricted its school counsellors from providing any support to students on matters of sexuality or gender identity last month, amid uproar about new “discriminatory” enrolment contracts.
The school’s principal, Brian Mulheran, took extended leave in February after asking families to sign an enrolment contract that said students could only be enrolled by their “biological sex”.
The contract included a “statement of faith” that described homosexual acts as “immoral” and “offensive to God”.
Mulheran ultimately withdrew the contracts and apologised to students, saying: “The college does not and will not discriminate against any student because of their sexuality or gender identity.”
Guardian Australia has now obtained an extract of a letter Mulheran sent to teachers before the contracts were revoked, when the school was experiencing considerable public backlash, in which he explained his reasons for their creation.
In the extract, Mulheran said the enrolment contracts introduce a “major material change” that mean the school would only enrol students in accordance with their biological sex.
“It truly breaks by heart to include such a clause,” Mulheran said.
“Recent changes to our state legislation now make it impossible for us to accommodate precious young lives with gender dysphoria or gender incongruence if they desired to progress further towards transitioning.
“State legislation has restricted our ability to journey alongside such young people in a way we believe would help and support their families best. These precious young people with such dispositions need to be afforded love, care and support, and I believe we would be one of the best schools to support them.”
Mulheran also detailed plans to withdraw in-school psychological support to children who sought counselling for gender and sexuality issues. He said students who desired counselling would be given a referral to go elsewhere.
“The second major change relates to restrictions on our student counsellors and psychologists regarding the support they can provide our students,” he said.
“Our student counsellors and psychologists will not be able to counsel or provide support in areas including but not limited to: gender dysphoria, gender incongruence, gender identity, sexuality and sexual orientation. Students who desire to seek counselling for these areas will be referred to experts outside the college.
“Our counsellors and psychologists must be available for all students and therefore will be limited from dealing with such complex issues.”
Mulheran did not specify which changes to state legislation prompted the school’s revised approach. Guardian Australia has only been able to identify one potentially relevant change to legislation in recent years – a statewide ban on gender and conversion therapies, passed in 2020.
Multiple former teachers and students say that such conversion therapies have previously occurred at the school.
Guardian Australia reported last week that Citipointe had sent teachers employment contracts that threatened them with the sack for being openly gay. The school says these are being redrawn and that its parent body, the International Network of Churches, has withdrawn its controversial “statement of faith”.
Guardian Australia has sought clarification from the school about several matters, including whether the restriction on counselling on gender and sexuality matters was revoked once Mulheran took extended leave.
The school sent a brief reply that did not address that question. It said: “The college has provided and will continue to provide pastoral care and support to all students, and values all students equally.”
“Citipointe Christian college can confirm that the new enrolment contract has been withdrawn in February 2022 and will not be reintroduced.”
The school did not address questions about whether the school had ever authorised or undertaken any sort of conversion therapy on students.
