Indianapolis archbishop revokes Jesuit prep school's Catholic identity

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Indianapolis, Ind., Jun 20, 2019 / 01:49 pm ([CNA](https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/)).- The Archdiocese of Indianapolis announced Thursday that a local Jesuit high school will no longer be recognized as a Catholic school, due to a disagreement about the employment of a teacher who attempted to contract a same-sex marriage.
“All those who minister in Catholic educational institutions carry out an important ministry in communicating the fullness of Catholic teaching to students both by word and action inside and outside the classroom,” the archdiocese said in a statement Thursday.

“In the Archdiocese of Indianapolis, every archdiocesan Catholic school and private Catholic school has been instructed to clearly state in its contracts and ministerial job descriptions that all ministers must convey and be supportive of all teachings of the Catholic Church.”
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https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/...s-jesuit-prep-schools-catholic-identity-52408
 
What needs to happen is for alumni and other donors of this school to contact the provincial, that Catholic identity is important.
In fact, any supporter of any Jesuit institution in that or any US province should communicate right now, you don’t want this to set a pattern.

If it starts hitting the pocketbook of Jesuits in general, the other apples will lean on the bad Apple to reform.
 
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Interesting quote from the article:

"Fr. Paulson said the province will appeal the decision, first through the archbishop “and, if necessary, [pursuing] hierarchical recourse to the Vatican.”

There is no recourse other than to the bishop of Indianapolis. This is not an issue of faith and morals, thus the Bishop of Rome has no dog in this fight.
 
When the Jesuit advisor to the Jesuit pope is using the papal advisor media platform to encourage defiance of the archbishop, yes, Pope Francis is involved, right now. The papal advisor and others are already appealing through the secular media channels. They aren’t waiting for canon law process.
 
commenter said:
When the Jesuit advisor to the Jesuit pope is using the papal advisor media platform to encourage defiance of the archbishop, yes, Pope Francis is involved, right now. The papal advisor and others are already appealing through the secular media channels. They aren’t waiting for canon law process.
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Other than remove a sitting bishop, what else can the Pope do in this case?
 
I know of the school and for years there has been far more reasons to revoke the school. I pitty the kids who have been harmed there. Good for the archbishop!
 
This is a very important, I would even say landmark, case, and it raises many questions. Here we have a Jesuit school which hired a gay teacher and he is in a same-sex marriage. I don’t know if he got married after he was hired or before. Neither do I know what and how much detail the Mission of the School, which is most likely a part of the teacher’s written contract, includes. I am also not sure if he “advertised” his marriage in his classes or elsewhere, or if someone else found out and reported him. He is, according to the school administration, a very capable teacher of long-standing seniority of whom there have been no prior complaints by students, parents, other faculty, or administrators, and he does not teach religious classes. I have also read that Jesuit schools enjoy a certain degree of autonomy from the authority of the Archdiocese and that this interference in Jesuit school policy by a bishop is a first. This kind of interference could therefore set a precedent. In sum, there are a whole lot of factors to take into consideration here. We will just have to wait and see what unfolds in this case.
 
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KMC said:
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commenter:
When the Jesuit advisor to the Jesuit pope is using the papal advisor media platform to encourage defiance of the archbishop, yes, Pope Francis is involved, right now. The papal advisor and others are already appealing through the secular media channels. They aren’t waiting for canon law process.
Click to expand...
Other than remove a sitting bishop, what else can the Pope do in this case?
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For now, he can fire his papal advisor, who has interjected himself into the matter.
 
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commenter said:
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KMC:
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commenter:
When the Jesuit advisor to the Jesuit pope is using the papal advisor media platform to encourage defiance of the archbishop, yes, Pope Francis is involved, right now. The papal advisor and others are already appealing through the secular media channels. They aren’t waiting for canon law process.
Click to expand...
Other than remove a sitting bishop, what else can the Pope do in this case?
Click to expand...
For now, he can fire his papal advisor, who has interjected himself into the matter.
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Haha, good one 😉
 
How is this not an issue of faith and particularly moral values?
 
Could you specify one of these reasons?
 
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Predictably, Father Martin is siding with his Jesuit confrères on this one.

Given the high profile role he was given by the Jesuit pope, this is setting itself up very nicely.

Kudos to the Archbishop of Indianapolis for doing his part to say “enough” to the relentless efforts of some in the Church to normalize sodomitical relations.
 
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The word “sodomitical” itself makes the relations seem genteel.

Seriously though, I don’t see this as so clear-cut. There are other legal and ethical issues here. For one, this is a very capable teacher of long-standing tenure, with no previous complaints. Then there is the issue of the written contract, what was in it, and if the SSM took place before or after the teacher’s signing the contract, and so on. See my previous post if you wish.

I don’t see this as an attempt on the part of the Jesuits to normalize sodomy. Rather, the dignity of the individual and the capability of the teacher are being defended.
 
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He may be a super fantabulous teacher. It sounds like he was reasonably well-liked. His competency wasn’t questioned.

But it comes down to: does the Church stand by its teachings? Or is classical Christian morality a cute and quaint little set of do’s and donts that we trot out and admire from time to time (or even tsk over in our ever so enlightened day).

This isn’t a case of where somebody who is committed to chastity fell into temptation in a moment of weakness.
We’re all adults here. We know this happens.

This was a deliberate rejection of Christian/Catholic teaching. And now the kids know about it. And now the bishop’s hand is forced.
 
A teaching of the Church is not in question. What is in play is the governance of a diocese. The Pope does not interfere in the governance of a diocese, unless to remove a bishop.
 
Teachers have rights, but so do parents and students. They have a right to know what you they are getting.

If a school no longer meets a certain standard, the archdiocese can withhold it’s endorsement. It’s a standard that ought to be re evaluated on an ongoing basis anyway.

BTW, this school has to meet standards of several other accrediting or government regulatory agencies. Should the Catholic standard be the only one that is a rubber stamp?
 
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I’m not sure I understand your first statement. What are parents and students “getting into” besides a capable, well-liked teacher who is doing their job? Is the teacher bringing up their SSM in class and claiming it is in keeping with Catholic teaching? Will the students think it is normal and good because their teacher is gay and married to a person of the same sex? Surely they already know about such things from the media, and just how influenced are children by their teachers these days? If anything, teachers are probably mostly thought to be weirdos and have been for quite a while.
 
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