The flip-flop, at the insistence of Bishop Manning, of the decision to not enroll the child of a lesbian “couple” in Sacred Heart School in Broken Hill is troubling, and this Cloistered writer thinks the initial decision by, presumably, the principal and Parish Priest NOT to enrol the child was probably the right one.
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| Picture: +Manning is farewelled from the Parramatta Diocese Catholic Education Office in February 2010. |
What would Jesus do? I think he’d bless the child and tell the lesbians to enrol her/him in the local state school.
Enrollment of a child in a Catholic school is about more than reading, writing and arithmetic, because the child and the child’s family are becoming involved in a whole Catholic community and environment.
Is it really fair on a child to enrol them in a school and milieu where they will, when they reach a suitable age, be quite properly exposed to the startling information that there is something truly, madly, deeply, flawed and unnatural about home, Mum and Mum?
I think Mum and Mum were being very unfair to their child by attempting to enroll in a Catholic school. The school and parish community has a duty to promote a healthy Catholic understanding of human sexuality and the parent/child relationship. It would be devastating for the child to be settled in to a school and build up relationships of respect with teachers and so on only to be placed in a really conflicted situation when they get a little older.
The cry has been “how dare the Catholic school discriminate against the child because of the sexuality of the parents!” But in fact it would seem wrong to enroll a child into a situation that is quite foreseeably going to cause confliction in the child and where the “parents” are in fact a living reproach to what the school actually stands for.
Most unfortunately, even Bishop Manning has been running that line, telling the ABC “"There's no way in the world one can penalise a child for what his or her parents do. And in this case, to penalise a five-year-old child because her parents are living in a homosexual relationship is just quite wrong."
The child was not being penalised for what his or her parents “do”, the child was probably being protected from an intolerable situation...and certainly other children and families in the school were being protected from having to turn a blind eye to a real problem.
The decision of the “parents” to adopt a lesbian relationship, presumably knowing that the Church considers this to be inherently wrong, and then to present a child for enrolment in a Catholic school is at best intellectually and morally inconsistent.
The Church teaches these days that one should not discriminate against people simply on the basis of sexual orientation. But a parish school is, or should be, able to protect its community from compromising its beliefs, and in so doing also protect the lesbians’ child from a too-soon disturbance of happiness.
Bishop Manning’s stance appears to be of the simple-minded tomfoolery that so many of his generation of clergy have indulged in. They seem to think that if you ignore the elephant in the room everyone will be happy and blissful, undisturbed, and feeling warm about everything. What happens instead, we have learned, is that the room starts to stink, and the ability of the Church to speak the truth in love is incrementally smothered.
And let’s hope Bishop Manning is eased back into retirement soon, and that his younger brethren are wise enough to guide us through these increasingly confused times.
7 Pilgrim Comments:
well said Hardman Window.
Like the fourth estate in pre-revolutionary France the bishops of today are paving the way for the persecution of the Church.
"Simple-minded tomfoolery" is a very apt description I think. When will clergy begin to act in accord with their God-given mission rather than at the whim of a media hell-bent on rubbishing the Catholic Church?
I found this story very disquieting, particularly the Bishop's haste to overturn the decision made by the school. With all due consideration to the child, the very fact that her "parents" would attempt to enrol her in a Catholic school, speaks volumes about their disrespect for Catholicism.
We cannot be sure what "Jesus would do", Mr Window, but we do know that, when he rescued the woman who was about to be stoned by the crowd, he told her "Go and sin no more". I think we can be clear that he would say at least that much to the "couple".
This troubling episode, courtesy of Rorate Caeli, has now made it around the globe and we hope that it has come to the attention - or will do soon - of the authorities in Rome. A very clear message is needed to repudiate Bishop Manning's misguided line. He should never have interfered in the decision of the Principal and the local priest, who, it seems have acted with more wisdom than he has.
Let's pray that he doesn't get his hands on Sacred Heart Cathedral in Broken Hill. We wouldn't want the good bishop to open up the Broken Hill outlet of his "Manning's Warehouse" chain.
The indignity of it all! And in the death throes of the Wilcannia Forbes Diocese too!
The Part-time Bishop woudl have done better to have left his middle class morality in his former Diocese of Parramatta!
My biggest fear now is that Bishop Manning is appointed to one of the vacant dioceses in Queensland - we have had enough of Bishops who are afraid to speak clearly on church teaching for fear of offending others. Any easy way out for the Bishop down there but one that will now have consequences for Bishops who are deciding whether to be courageous or not
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