LGBTQ: the sea change is happening: Eastside Catholic students strike in support

[pnwmom]

of their former vice-principal, a gay man.

On Thursday at Eastside Catholic High School, deep in the conservative suburban part of King County, the gay vice principal was dismissed -- predictably -- because he got married.

By lunchtime, several hundred Eastside Catholic students (about half the student body) were staging a sit-down strike in protest, and word was spreading on twitter. Eastside Catholic closed today for Christmas, one day early, to try to quell the protest -- and now Catholic students at other schools are staging protests in support. Alumni are contacting the school in support of the vice principal and threatening to withhold any further donations. And parents are supporting the vice-principal, too.

Realistically, there is almost no chance that that this vice-principal will get his job back. BUT these students are the future -- of the Catholic Church and of everywhere. So the sea change is inevitable. The only question is the timing.


http://www.kirotv.com/news/news/after-gay-vice-principal-dismissed-eastside-cathol/ncQXj/


Hours after hundreds of Catholic school students protested their vice principal’s dismissal because of his gay marriage, alumni said they would stop financial support if the school didn’t make amends.

SNIP

“Unless the people responsible are removed from ECHS and an apology to the students, alumni and the person himself is issued, please never reach out to me for money again and remove me from all communication,” he wrote. ““I am ashamed to be an alumnus of ECHS today.”

Parents told KIRO 7 their children aren't sure they want to attend Eastside anymore.
“She’s ashamed to be a student here,” parent Florence Colburn said of her daughter.

SNIP

Students at Bishop Blanchet High School in North Seattle and Seattle Prep on Capitol Hill - both part of the Seattle Archdiocese - held gatherings Thursday to support the Eastside Catholic community. On Facebook and other social media, Eastside alumni were vocal that dismissing Zmuda was the wrong decision.

SNIP

[Humanist_Activist]

1. Heh, this is how ex-Catholics are made, once they realize the school and the Church aren't...

going to change for them.

[pnwmom]

2. It's pretty short-sighted. nt

[Humanist_Activist]

3. OK, how about "unchurched" Catholics, there's a reason quite a lot of Catholics...

only culturally identify that way, and rarely if ever go to Church.

ON EDIT: Actually their are many reasons, the one in the OP would be just one among many depends on the Catholic, of course.

[pnwmom]

4. I agree with you on both points. They risk alienating many people this way.

Right when Pope Francis is trying to change the message to a more conciliatory one: "Who am I to judge?"

[Chrom]

6. how do we get this story to the pope?

I bet he would side with the children

[Humanist_Activist]

8. No he wouldn't he is against same-sex marriage.

Where did you get the impression that he's for it?

[Bluenorthwest]

11. Francis is and has been for years a raving propagandist against equality or any other

rights for gay people. To claim otherwise is nonsensical and dishonest as anything could be. In Argentina he lead the anti equality forces with such venom that the President called his language 'Medieval and suggestive of the Inquistion'.
You know that Francis said 'who am I to judge' about celebates. About those who are closeted. In the same diatribe on his private jet he preached about the evils of the 'gay lobby' because, you see, it is wrong for gay people to organize or to make community, wrong for us to marry, to have sex, to have happy lives. That's what your Francis said.
This man said our families are an attack on God's plan, yet you claim he says conciliartory things? Our equality is an idea from Satan, he says. You can try to polish that turd if you wish, but you are being seen doing that polishing.
The Pope is Phil the Duck Guy wearing silk. The entire difference is sartorial. Quack quack.

[pnwmom]

15. His views have evolved on the issue.

Do you have a link for your quotes and paraphrases?

There is a group of men in the Curia who have been involved in financial mis-dealings, and some of them are supposedly gay, and have been referred to as a lobby. But I can't know what you are talking about without more information.

[Chrom]

5. or this is how the catholic church is forced to change for the better

we shall see

The new pope has certainly changed the catholic church for the better.

[Humanist_Activist]

7. Really, how? Did he change the Church's teachings on anything? n/t

[pnwmom]

9. He hasn't changed the teachings but

he's not trying to shove them down anyone's throat.

AND he's changing the focus and priority to economic social justice issues.

[BarackTheVote]

14. I really do think this teaching can change

or at least be deemphasized. Homosexuality is never mentioned in the Gospels, and the only time it is mentioned is in a rant by St. Paul... which, St. Paul also complained about men having long hair, which obviously we don't take seriously today. I'd love to see the core of the Gospel (love your neighbour as yourself; do unto others as you would have them do unto you) actually become the most important moral teaching. Take that bone away from the hate-mongers.

[pnwmom]

16. I think he IS trying to deemphasize it.

Ironically, anti-Catholics will join with conservative Catholics to try to lock him in the old position.

[BarackTheVote]

17. The American Catholic Church is very close to schism

American exceptionalism, capitalism, nationalism are all cancerous ideologies that have no place in the institutional Church. As the Pope has said, our main concern should be working for equality and equity, ensuring that everyone has a roof over their heads, food in their bellies and pantries, clothes on their backs, and are respected as human beings.

Conservative Christians act like (and probably believe) God gave them the poor so that they can be good and give charity (which makes them feel good about themselves). No. The poor do not exist for your gratification. The poor exist because of social evils, and society, through the government, should be a tool in eradicating poverty.

Neo-Conservativism with its complete disregard and dehumanizing of the poor, its warmongering, its worship of money, its pandering to the rich--these are completely counter to Christian teachings, and yet these horrible ideologies have become part of the American Church through osmosis and through insidious infiltration. I think the next generation of Catholics kids like the ones described in this article, if they stick around, can pull the American Church back to what it should be: a positive force working for equity and peace in the world.

[pnwmom]

18. Yes -- and "if they stick around" is the big question. Pope Francis might help.

[BarackTheVote]

19. The Church needs to emphasize love and the sacraments

Fear might make a child behave, but love is what forms an eternal bond. That's what these gloom and doom pastors and priests don't understand.

[BarackTheVote]

13. I would've been right there with them

and I have absolutely no intentions of becoming an ex-catholic.

[rhett o rick]

10. I would love to see the Pope weigh in on this one. nm

[Bluenorthwest]

12. He has, for years. His entire career is built on vehement and extreme anti gay

rhetoric, diatribes worthy of a Grand Inquisitor, backward, superstitious and ignorant. In his native country he got famous for leading a fight against marriage equality with horrific hate speech and rants against any and all forms of equal treatment of minorities he does not care for. He is not a whit different from the Duck Dynasty guy, save the costumes and props.

[pnwmom]

20. Do you have links for this? I would like to know what he said

and when he said it.

My understanding is that his position has evolved over the decades. He is in his seventies now. Many people felt differently when he began his priesthood, 50 years ago.