The teacher celebrated a same-sex "wedding" - all the trimmings, lavish reception, people invited to contribute towards a luxury honeymoon, etc etc. When St Peter and Paul school explained that she could not return to her teaching job, angry parents were outraged, and gathered at the school to protest.
The info is here
But the journalist writing the report just can't seem to grasp the concept of a Catholic school.
Such a school must have integrity. It cannot both teach and oppose what the Church knows and understands as the truth. The Catholic Church understands that she must guard, teach, and celebrate the truth about the human person.
No one is forced to teach in a Catholic school. There are a great many other things to do with one's life. The decision to teach in a Catholic school is job-specific.
This is what the Catholic Church teaches on same-sex unions:
2357 Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity,141 tradition has always declared that "homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered."142 They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.
2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God's will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord's Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.
2359 Homosexual persons are called to chastity. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.
2360 Sexuality is ordered to the conjugal love of man and woman. In marriage the physical intimacy of the spouses becomes a sign and pledge of spiritual communion. Marriage bonds between baptized persons are sanctified by the sacrament.
3 comments:
So by the same token, it would be perfectly all right (for example) for a well-known airline to dismiss an employee who insisted on wearing a cross? After all, no-one FORCED them to work for a secular organisation.
In the case of airline staff wearing uniform, it might be reasonable (as happened at my convent school!) to urge that items of jewellry, even of a religious nature, be not worn. In the case of a cross or a religious medal, it can easily be worn inside the clothes: many of us do this as a matter of convenience and safety when necessary.
But if, for example, a member of airline staff publicly denounced airline travel and urged everyone to join him in a celebration formally honouring opposition to air travel and to that airline in particular - there could well be a case for suggesting that this activity was incompatible with working for the airline.
To put this in context, airlines are very fussy about dress codes for cabin staff - they represent the image of the company. Some staff push back at that by trying to embarrass the airline, for example over AIDS awareness ribbons. The airline's response was to say that the ribbons could be worn for one day only, an AIDS awareness day declared by someone or other, then must be removed. Cabin crew demanding religious jewellery is part of that.
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