Posted on 03/21/2015 9:25:16 AM PDT by Mrs. Don-o
I can’t get this question out of my head: Who is Patricia Jannuzzi? These last few weeks, we’ve seen a lot of religious organizations publicly wrestling with gay rights. The Mormon Church authorized new protections for gay people, while attempting to protect religious believers, too. A rapidly dwindling denomination of Presbyterians decided to embrace gay marriage. San Francisco’s City Church, the largest evangelical megachurch, embraced gay marriage for its congregants. Cardinal Dolan was the grand marshal of the first St. Patrick’s Day parade that permitted people to march with LGBT banners.
Some of these churches are discarding ancient Christian moral truths; others are looking for loving or tolerant gestures, while holding to their doctrines. It’s not always easy to figure out how to combine truth and love.
Enter Patricia Jannuzzi into the fray. Actually, to judge from the published accounts, it doesn’t appear she meant to enter any particular fray. Reacting to the crass way Dan Savage spoke to Dr. Ben Carson, she popped off on her personal Facebook page, which you can read here.
Mrs. Jannuzzi teaches theology at a diocesan Catholic high school in New Jersey. A few of her former students organized a petition calling her posting “public hate speech.” Another former student, now a reality-TV star, also attacked her. Susan Sarandon weighed in, and a media juggernaut was unleashed.
The school immediately suspended Mrs. Jannuzzi and made her take down her Facebook page. She hasn’t spoken to the press, but her family did put up this fundraising website for her. Side note: I’ve been asked if I agree with Patricia Jannuzzi’s post. Well, no, not exactly — especially, I don’t believe the gay-rights community is trying to harm Western civilization. (Re-engineer it? Obviously.) On the “born that way” versus choice, I believe most people do not choose their orientation, although it is not hard in the scholarly literature to find women who say they did make a choice, and there are even gay men who choose to marry women, and who say they love their wives and are happy living that way. Sex just won’t stay in our boxes.
But fundamentally, I think Patricia Jannuzzi is right in this: Sexual orientation is not like race, because while we don’t exactly choose our desires, we all do choose what we are going to do with them.
So who is Patricia Jannuzzi really? Is she a “nightmare human dumpster,” a hater and a bigot who is unworthy to teach at a Catholic school? Patricia is not talking to the press, but I found a few new things by Googling. Here’s a story from 2012 about the Bishop of Metuchen giving Patricia Jannuzzi a medal — the Regina Nostra medal.
The student reporter writes: “Because of her love and devotion to Immaculata High School and the parish, Mrs. Patricia Jannuzzi was the ideal nominee for the award.”
The reporter then quotes Mrs. Jannuzzi: “I am very grateful for the encouragement that Monsignor Seamus F. Brennan has given me for the honorable work of spreading the Gospel in our parish and high school. I do believe all honor, glory and credit go to Our Lord and Our Blessed Mother. I am just a frail instrument in His hands with her prayerful aid. I offer the Regina Nostra award back to Immaculata and thank the Blessed Mother for her constant prayer for our Parish and school!”
The reporter continues: Mrs. Jannuzzi participates in many school activities. Her contribution to campus ministry and volunteer work has made a big impact on Immaculata and, most importantly, the students she works with. The work she does makes a big difference to our school and parish. Leading retreats and trips has inspired many young students and helps involve them with the less fortunate and needy. Mrs. Jannuzzi’s time and dedication to Immaculata has been appreciated for years and every faculty member, student, and person involved with the parish is tremendously grateful for her commitment.
Lifesite News points out that many of her former students, even those who have criticized her statement, say she is a wonderful and loving teacher: During the feeding frenzy, her students defended her as a teacher and as a human being. “I had Ms. Jannuzzi this semester, and the way that she is being perceived here as somebody that’s a hateful person, it’s just not fair,” said David Rubin to a local TV station. “I’ve talked to her a few times, all good things,” Sam Constintino, a junior, said. “I’ve never heard anything bad from her, so I was surprised hearing this.”
But not all were supportive. “I left this school after being told in religion class I must live a celibate single life if I had gay ‘feelings,’” wrote Doug Bednarczyk, according to the New York Daily News.
Here you can watch Patricia Jannuzzi speaking at a March 23, 2012, religious-freedom rally she helped organize in Philadelphia in front of Independence Hall, to protest the new HHS mandates on Catholic and other organizations: “We need to make this a priority,” she told the rally. “We need to put all our hearts and minds to the task of preserving religious freedom. . . . We must make this injustice visible, we must follow in the footsteps of Blessed John Paul II, Lech Walesa, Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, who led prayerful, peaceful movements to expose and change the great injustices of the day, and this is the beginning of that kind of movement.”
She went on: “We need to talk about it around the table, we need to talk about it at sporting events . . . e-blast people, upload articles to your Facebook page, blog on the topic.” And then — more on the you-can’t-make-this-stuff-up watch — she said: “This process to secure religious freedom will be painful. It is going to hurt like all fighting hurts, but we will persevere in prayer because the truth is on our side. The fragrance of our sacrifice will bring everything back to grace. Be revolutionary. Prayer, sacrifice, penance and action. God bless you.”
I wonder if the diocesan lawyers who are no doubt working this case really understand what they appear to be proposing to do: take away the livelihood of a 57-year-old woman, with two kids to support, because she expressed herself awkwardly and heatedly on her personal Facebook page in support of Catholic teaching.
I don’t know if they know how unlikely a secular employer is to want to take on the headaches they may be tempted to cast off, after they’ve judged her unfit to be a Catholic teacher after 30 years of service. I hope the diocesan lawyers figure out how to do the right thing. I hope they figure out a way to work together to minimize the damage this kind of organized protest tactic can do to Catholic institutions.
I hope Mrs. Jannuzzi says she regrets any hurt feelings, because she loves her students and only wants to speak truth in love. She seems to be that kind of Catholic. I hope others go to her family’s website and offer support, moral or financial. I hope this for her sake, but even more for the Church’s sake: Please, don’t let the throwaway culture come to Metuchen, N.J., and throw away a treasure like Patricia Jannuzzi.
— Maggie Gallagher, a senior fellow at the American Principles Project, writes at MaggieGallagher.com.
As another commenter noted, when she said that, she blew it, and demonstrated--at the very least--gross naiveté.
Thanks, Shibumi!
So she wrote this:(caution - vile...?)
“One minute they argue hey [sic] are born this way and it is not a choice to get 14th amendment rights equal protection” – which was intended for “unchangeable characteristics such as race and disability,” she wrote. Then, “they will argue everyone should be able to choose” to engage in the homosexual lifestyle.
That juggernaut threatened to “reengineer Western civ[ilization] into a slow extinction.”
“We need healthy families with a mother and a father for the sake of the children and humanity,” she concluded.
Well, if it’s Metuchen’s St. Francis Parish, you can fuhgeddabout it!
Have you noticed how intolerant the homosexual lobby is while insisting they are victimized by criticism!
Guess Maggie has a niece who “came out.” That’s usually how it works.
The fund seems to be up about a thousand dollars from when I first saw it yesterday. I hope more people are able to help her.
Bishop Paul G. Bootkoski's statement on status of teacher at Immaculata High School, Somerville NJ 20 Mar 2015 My dear brothers and sisters, (1) We are a compassionate Catholic community committed to treating our students, faculty and parishioners with respect. (2) We have never wavered from our traditional Catholic teachings. To that end we need to correct some misstatements with regard to the teacher in question. (3)The teacher’s comments were disturbing and do not reflect the Church’s teachings of acceptance. (4)However, she has never been terminated, as some media outlets have reported. She has been put on administrative leave. There has been no interruption in her pay and benefits. (5)Pope Francis reminds us that we are to accept all of our brethren. (6)We must ensure that our educators steer away from harsh and judgmental statements that can alienate and divide us. We regret that certain individuals and groups are using inaccurate media reports to push their own agendas. |
(1)If you're trying to teach your students, faculty and teachers with respect, why do you fail to even address Patricia Jannuzzi by name?? And why do you fail to quote her actual words, showing where they differ from Catholic teachings? This isn't "respect," it's leaving the victim of you actions nameless and voiceless.
(2) Never wavered? Can you show is even one instance in which you have actually taught "our traditional Catholic teachings" on the question of homosexuality?
(3) That a teacher's comment is "disturbing" may or may not be relevant. One may "disturb" another by telling the truth, or by telling an untruth. Christ said things which were so disturbing that the religious and social hierarchy of His day wanted to kill Him. Would you want to dispute the truth of anything Patricia Jannuzzi said?
You say she has not upheld the Church's teaching of "acceptance," and yet these are the actual words of the Catechism:
"Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that "homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered." They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved. "
The Catechism also says that persons with a deep-seated homosexual tendency "must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity" and that "Homosexual persons are called to chastity." If Patricia Jannuzzi's comments were blunt, they were not more blunt than Paragraph 2357 of the Catechism.
(4) "She has never been terminated"? This is an untruth. She was put on administrative leave (with pay) until August, and informed that she would not be re-hired in September. That means she is terminated as of September.
(5) There is a difference between accepting "brethren" and accepting the social and political agenda of LGBT activist groups, the "Gay Lobby."
As Archbishop of Buenos Aires, Pope Francis (Abp. Bergoglio) called on the priests of his Archdiocese to bring the faithful to an upcoming protest against homosexual "marriage."
"Let's not be naive, we're not talking about a simple political battle; it is a destructive pretension against the plan of God," wrote Cardinal Bergoglio in a letter sent to the monasteries of Buenos Aires. "We are not talking about a mere bill, but rather a machination of the Father of Lies that seeks to confuse and deceive the children of God."
Pretty disturbing, isn't it? I'm thinking Bergoglio would be considered unfit to teach in the Catholic schools of the Diocese of Metuchen.
To the clergy of the parishes, Bergoglio requested that all of them read from the pulpits a declaration defending the true definition and understanding of marriage.
"The Argentinean people will have to confront, in the coming weeks, a situation whose result could gravely injure the family. We are speaking of a bill regarding marriage between people of the same sex," a bill that calls into question "the identity, and the survival of the family: father, mother, and children."
It's impossible to miss the parallels between Bergoglio's statement, and Mrs. Jannuzzi's comment on Facebook that the Gay movement threatens to “reengineer Western civ[ilization] into a slow extinction...We need healthy families with a mother and a father for the sake of the children and humanity."
(6) Patricia Jannuzzi made no "harsh and judgmental" statements toward any individual gay student or any individual whatsoever. She was speaking of the homosexualist movements, ideologies and social-change groups which are even now coercing acceptance of homosexual acts and the relationships predicated upon those acts, by force of law.
The only report of her speaking to or about an individual, was the following from the New York Daily News. "I left this school after being told in religion class I must live a celibate single life if I had gay ‘feelings,’” wrote Doug Bednarczyk.
Is this wrong? Isn't this the same choice facing every human being, no matter what their orientation: either chaste celibacy, or marriage as defined by Divine and Natural Law?
This should have been an excellent teaching moment. In my opinion, Mrs. Jannuzzi should have been invited to clarify and expand on her thoughts by citing the Catechism and Bergoglio statements quoted above.
Jannuzzi should not have been suspended or terminated. That kind of heavily punitive reaction is entirely disrespectful of her, and consists of silencing, shaming, and exclusion as well as a punishing loss of vocation and income. Such radical exclusion of an excellent teacher with decades of honorable service to the Church and School is cruel and shockingly unjustified.
“One minute they argue hey [sic] are born this way and it is not a choice to get 14th amendment rights equal protection” – which was intended for “unchangeable characteristics such as race and disability,” she wrote. Then, “they will argue everyone should be able to choose” to engage in the homosexual lifestyle.
That juggernaut threatened to “reengineer Western civ[ilization] into a slow extinction.”
“We need healthy families with a mother and a father for the sake of the children and humanity,” she concluded.
But in the fullest sense of a rather elastic word, who is the truest Catholic in this news item? Bishop Bootkoski or Patricia Jannuzzi? Patti Jannuzzi has my vote, that's for sure--- since she is doing the "shepherding" the appointed shepherd has failed to do.
The ones who are faithful to Catholic faith and morals, are on the right track. They truly lead the Church and protect and feed the lambs under the headship of the One Good Shepherd. That is rock-solid. That's why I'm so glad I'm a Catholic.
On her now-deleted Facebook profile earlier this week, the veteran private Catholic school teacher said gays or gay activists “want to reengineer western civ (sic) into a slow extinction” as part of their “agenda.”
“We need healthy families with a mother and a father for the sake of the children and humanity!!!!!” she wrote, adding that the argument that gays are protected under the 14th Amendment is “bologna.”
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