Read it all; there has been a lot of press coverage of this story during the current week and many links can be found here.
Read it all; there has been a lot of press coverage of this story during the current week and many links can be found here.
Without going through all of the materials, it appears to me that the job applicant had left a similar post in another diocese because he was in a same-sex relationship. After the relationship broke up, he applied for the job in Hereford. The bishop questioned him about his former relationship, since he had discussed his inclinations on the application form, and rejected him because of his “orientation,” the applicant says, since he is currently “single.” The tribunal agreed.
There have been cases in the US in which teachers in Catholic schools have lost their jobs after becoming pregnant while unmarried, thus making it clear that they were not living according to Church moral standards. In this case in England, the bishop wanted a Youth leader who supports the teachings of the Church, and the tribunal has told him he cannot insist on this so long as the employee is not actively engaged in activity contrary to Church teaching.
So, in England, the Church now cannot insist that its employees support its teachings.
Thanks for the link above. It may be worth pointing out that none of the press reports in that list were written with knowledge of the full text now linked. I believe I was the first to be able to write such a report, which is on the Church Times website at
http://www.churchtimes.co.uk/42275
The idea that parents are going to want for their children a church youth worker who was until recently in a five-year homosexual relationship is really a bit of a stretch. What was the diocese doing interviewing him in the first place?
Gordian, according to the file linked above, the applicant has a number of years of experience in youth ministry in both church and secular settings.
We’ve been through these arguments in the US with respect to the Boy Scouts. Let us assume, since we know nothing to the contrary, that this applicant is entirely reliable around young boys. Nonetheless, parents are likely to be concerned if they know that he does not support Church teachings about sexual behavior. Who would risk his own child’s well-being for an abstract ideal of “non-discrimination?”
# 4 Obviously the man couldn’t teach orthodox sexual morality, so it would be foolish to give him such authority over teenagers.