San Antonio – A teacher at a Roman Catholic school in San Antonio fired after she married a divorced man has filed a federal discrimination complaint.
The principal of Central Catholic High School urged Marquis LaFortune, 25, a week before her wedding in November to resign or to have her husband-to-be seek an annulment of his first marriage, options she turned down. She told the San Antonio Express-News that the firing took some of the joy out of the preparations for the marriage.
“I would have resigned if I’d felt like I’d done something wrong,” she said. “I couldn’t get out of bed. It’s just been this cloud. It was supposed to be the best week of my life, and I had to pull myself together for the ceremony.”
Under Catholic teaching, divorced persons cannot remarry.
LaFortune has filed a complaint with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
School officials learned of her fiance’s marital status from an article in The Pep, the school’s newspaper. She helped manage the paper.
“In addition to gaining a new last name, Ms. LaFortune will also be inheriting a beautiful stepdaughter,” the article said.
United Press International
Copyright 2008 by United Press International
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posted December 30, 2008 at 7:47 pm
This article doesn’t say if the newly married couple are RC. So I assume they aren’t. When she took the position of teacher she must have been given the rules of being an employee there. If this wasn’t on the rules for non-RC people, in print, she might win her job back. The thing is RC schools, churches, control everything in, on, or around them; if you find this to be ‘choking’ your decisions and freedom, run don’t walk to the nearest exit!
posted December 31, 2008 at 12:15 am
‘This article doesn’t say if the newly married couple are RC. So I assume they aren’t.’
‘The principal of Central Catholic High School urged Marquis LaFortune, 25, a week before her wedding in November to resign or to have her husband-to-be seek an annulment of his first marriage, options she turned down.’
Annulment is mostly a Catholic terminology (if my understanding is correct). But I agree with your philosophy totally. If you don’t agree with your church’s teachings you should conveniently look for the nearest exit. That seems to be the problem with many of today’s Catholics. They seem to think that they can somehow influence the Magesterium into changing their teaching. There are sheep and there are shepards, and it’s a collosal shame how many parishioners seem to get it backwards.
posted December 31, 2008 at 10:25 am
It is incredibly sad that the diocese has made this unfortunate decision. Sadly, it is their’s to make – IF – if they make it clear that all faculty are required to be Roman Catholic or follow the mandates and doctrines of the RCC. If that was not a condition of employment, they do not have a cause to defend. Laws are made for people, not people for the Laws. Someday someone might take that lesson seriously, but not today I guess.
Well, the world needs good teachers, especially in the public schools. I hope she will find a new and better position soon – and I wish her and her husband-to-be a happy wedding!