The pastor of the Sacred Heart of Jesus parish in Boulder, Colorado, Father Bill Breslin, thinks it makes perfect sense:
“If a child of gay parents comes to our school, and we teach that gay marriage is against the will of God, then the child will think that we are saying their parents are bad. We don’t want to put any child in that tough position — nor do we want to put the parents, or the teachers, at odds with the teachings of the Catholic Church. Why would good parents want their children to learn something they don’t believe in?”
But, even though an unidentified child was not allowed to re-enroll in the Sacred Heart of Jesus Catholic School’s pre-school program this year because its parents are lesbians, there are plenty of kids in Catholic schools all over the country whose parents are divorced, remarried or unmarried, which is also against the teachings of the Catholic Church. Add to that all the children of couples who are still married but use birth control and it becomes clear that Catholic schools would be nearly empty if they actually didn’t accept any children whose parents didn’t follow the teaching of the Catholic Church.
In fact, Catholic schools across the nation often accept many students who are not Catholic at all – in some urban areas the number of non-Catholic students in local Catholic schools is greater than 90 percent of the student population.
There have been public protests at the Boulder school – but beyond carrying signs, there isn’t much the child’s mothers can do legally. As a private religious institution the school can decide who it wants to admit. But it will likely be the Church itself who suffers the most for having put this child out of their institution.
Surveys show that for Americans – particularly the younger demographic that the Catholic Church desperately wants to recruit back into its shrinking ranks – equality for gays isn’t even a question any more. Americans support civil unions by an increasingly large margin, 58 percent for verses 37 percent against among 18-29 year olds.
That same demographic already perceives Christianity in general and Catholics and evangelical Christians in specific as “anti-homosexual” – an image that will hardly be improved by expelling a pre-schooler because her parents are gay. Many Catholics agree that the Church needs to find new ways to deal with a changing world. Juli Aderman-Hagerty, a member of the Sacred Heart of Jesus parish, said – “I just feel the Catholic Church is a church that should be teaching acceptance and tolerance,” Juli says. “I just don’t think this is an example of that.”
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