Bob Russell
Posted on 09/16/2011 1:18:00 PM PDT by NYer
Bob Russell
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. (CBS 2) – He says he can’t take it anymore.
A gay choir director at a Catholic Church in New Jersey has quit his job because he says the priest is making his work environment hostile.
But does he have a case?
St. Joseph’s Roman Catholic Church in East Rutherford is where Bob Russell has been the choir director for decades. On Thursday, however, the 55-year-old was taking boxes into the parish to pack up his belongings.
“Felt that I was put into a position that I had to resign my job because of my sexuality,” Russell told CBS 2′s Christine Sloan.
Russell, who grew up Catholic, said his work environment has become hostile since a new priest took over and started strongly preaching against homosexuality.
“The sermon line was that marriage between two men is a lie,” Russell said.
The Catholic Church does not condone homosexuality, Sloan reported.
A spokesperson for the Archdiocese of Newark, which now runs the parish, said no one will comment because the church does not discuss personnel matters.
Russell said it wasn’t the sermon, but what the priest told him in private that made him realize it was time to go.
“When I spoke to Father Joseph and I told him that I was a gay man in a domestic-partner relationship, he told me that he would eventually like a children’s choir and that I wouldn’t be a good example to lead a children’s choir,” Russell said.
Legal analysts say the church has the right to preach its beliefs because freedom of religion is protected by the Constitution.
“I believe that nobody should have to hide what they believe in,” one woman told Sloan.
But parishioners at the church said they are baffled and could care less Russell is gay.
“I think he should have stayed,” Renato Pierantoni said. “I think he’s a great guy.”
Indeed. If this choir director was mad at his priest, imagine what’d he think if he ever bothered to read this:
‘And He answered and said, “Have you not read that He who created them from the beginning MADE THEM MALE AND FEMALE,
and said, ‘FOR THIS REASON A MAN SHALL LEAVE HIS FATHER AND MOTHER AND BE JOINED TO HIS WIFE, AND THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH’? “So they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate.”’
Matthew 19:4-6
The guy was choir director for decades? And parishioners could care less? Oh my!
Why is this even in the news? Who went crying to the news media? And notice how the two people they quoted are all okay with the homo. What about the others?
If he calls himself Catholic why was he still having sex with another man?
This church was probably run by a homo-friendly priest for some time prior to this. Glad this priest is cleaning things up.
God! Whining like this makes me disgusted. If you're gay then don't choose to join an organization that doesn't share the same belief in the first place! How hard can that be?
Apparently the homo in the article did not equate acts of abomination with self-excommunication; was he too busy scoping choir boys instead of hearing the sermons?
yeah.
Reminds me of when our parish had a missionary come to give a "mission" and he gave a sermon on the church's teachings about no sex outside of marriage. A lot of the laypeople were upset.
My son, who for various reasons was in a private Christian school, came out aghast and said: Mom, do you mean Catholics believe the same things that Brother Fetterman teaches?
Needless to say, this was in a diocese where the gay priest scandal had caused many to leave the church, and a parish where later, when one young priest ran away with the RCIA teacher, cause the pastor to shrug and quip: well at least he ran away with a woman...
(I should note this pastor was a good man, and worked hard to clean up the church after the previous gay pastor had caused a major scandal...he was the one who okayed the missionary to preach the sermon to wake up the sleeping sinners in the church)
“Don’t like the rules/by-laws/regulations etc. of a particular organization? Simple solution. DON’T JOIN!!!
“God! Whining like this makes me disgusted. If you’re gay then don’t choose to join an organization that doesn’t share the same belief in the first place! How hard can that be?”
Your opinion is way too logical for the current PC crowd. The problem is many folks lack that simple gift known as common sense.
Placemark.
That’s the first picture of her with hair that I have ever seen. Sad story, and a reflection of Sinead’s narcissism..
Most of the time when some schoolteacher, or someone who turns out homosexual comes out, most people could care less.
The story is, plenty of people who are homosexual disappoint plenty of us by walking out, because there are still good things, and opportunities to be a good person, that this person has, even if this person feels attracted to those of the same gender, or even if one practiced sodomy at one time. God help them, because frankly life is really hard when you separate yourself from him in heart as well as in person.
No accounting for the depravity of the general population I guess. I certainly am not one “who could care less”. I don’t intend to be anywhere resembling Sodom and Gamorah.
>>or even if one practiced sodomy at one time.<<
The guy this article is about is not one of the “at one time” crowd. He is an active sodomite.
I don’t think I disagree with you about sodomy, the act is disgusting and degrading to those involved actively in it. Numerous health problems are heavily overrepresented among practicing male homosexuals, lesbians seem to have issues doing what is “manly” but in reality isn’t good for even men to be doing.
The whole point I was making was the fact that the people didn’t victimize him in this situation. From the details alone, he did plenty of making himself victimized here, for the glory of liberalism, and to defame the name of Christ. We can argue for days about what church is right, but similar things have happened in the protestant Churches where some pastor comes out and walks out fast.
What I am saying is that in my personal experience, loads of people who come out about being sodomites are thin-skinned, and cry to their leftist big brothers for help and praise. It’s undemocratic, it’s immature, and I dislike it just as much as you do, if not more.
The biggest problem with having a gay choir master in your church is that they keep trying to put the organ in their mouth.
It’s so much a “hostile work environment” that Mr. Russell is not resigning until 9/30/11 even though the original comments were made by the pastor in July 2011. Give me a break, Mr. Russell, who are you trying to kid? Once you retained the lawyer it suddenly became a “hostile work situation”. Even though I enjoyed you leading the choir at St. Joseph’s, you are wrong and Fr. Joe is right!! Adios Amigo (a)??
A fundamental problem with many people who attend church happens whenever they refuse to change their thinking to follow the Will of God and instead remain in their thinking independent of Him.
We all are scarred in our thinking before we come to Him, but the Cristian life is not simply a cultural environment. It is a spiritual walk, which begins with our thinking focused upon Jesus Christ, thinking through faith in Him.
Homosexuality is not of Him, nor is any preoccupation with such lust or culture. Homosexuality is hostile to the thinking of God, who rejects placing ourselves before God.
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