Posted on 07/15/2016 3:43:12 AM PDT by Petrosius
An order of nuns was forced to pay 25,000 Euros to a teacher for discontinuing her employment based on the incompatibility of her sexual orientation with the school’s ethos.
For the first time in Italy, a judge has fined a Catholic school on the ground of discrimination towards a female teacher for her public homosexual lifestyle.
The Institute “Daughters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus” in the northern Italian town of Trento paid a sum of 25,000 Euros in reparation of property damage to an anonymous teacher. Additionally they were fined 1,500€ to the “Radical Association of Certain Rights” – a gay rights activist group in Italy and another 1,500€ to a local labor union.
The case goes back to a conversation in 2014 between the teacher and the then-director of the educational institute, Sister Eugenia Libratore, who had heard about the teacher living together in a romantic relationship with another woman. Sister Libratore, who was then mother superior but passed away in September 2015, justified her inquiry to the teacher by saying that it was her responsibility to protect the minors in her school. The teacher had refused to answer the question, despite the fact that Sister Libratore told her: “To resolve the problem, it would have been enough to confirm or negate the rumors, therefore guaranteeing a professional continuity at the Institute.” Despite this promise, the employee was unwilling to describe her personal situation to the nun, leading the mother superior to the conclusion that her indisposition to answer “equals to the assent of being homosexual.”
The labor court of Rovereto declared that the “presumed homosexuality of the teacher had nothing to do with her adhesion to the educative project of the school.” The court further reproached the school for “collective discrimination” since the decision of the school administration allegedly “affects everyone that potentially is interested in taking on a position in the Institute.”
Alexander Schuster, lawyer of the teacher who preferred to stay anonymous, added that: “This decision makes one point clear: that employers of religious or philosophical inspiration cannot subject their employers to questions about their private lives or discriminate them for their choices in life. The use of contraceptives, the choice of cohabitation, divorce, and abortions are private decisions of a person and do not affect the employer.”
Despite the Catholic character of the school and her personal reservations, Sister Libratore told the teacher that she would have “been available to close an eye if she [the teacher] had agreed to resolve the problem.” This “resolving the problem” was understood by the teacher as an invitation to change her lifestyle. Consequently she felt offended at the intimation that homosexuality was “a problem, a sickness, or something that needed to be cured,” as attested in an interview.
The Catholic Institute denied the accusation of discrimination from the start, claiming that there were no grounds to renew the work contract which had come to its natural contractual close in the first place.
Despite this, the judge spoke in favor of the teacher, quoting the law of discrimination in the workplace (effective in Italy since 2003) that calls for “the absence of any direct or indirect discrimination on the ground of religion, personal convictions, handicaps, age, or sexual orientation.”
Italian legislation does have a provision for religious liberty which states that differences in treatment based on religious convictions within a religious organization are not considered discrimination if the nature of the religious conviction does not stand in the way of carrying out one’s profession in the given context. Yet the judge ruled that “in this case, discrimination of sexual orientation was proven; not discrimination because of a religious conviction.”
The Pope is pleased.
The Pope could in fact do something.
The Church better start to stand up and fight for the faith or it will be taken away in short order.
No help from Church leadership, so it must come from the rank-and-file and the individual priests. And the Catholic schools.
I wonder if this is Italian law, or part of their obligation to follow the laws of the EU.
The whole point of the Catholic Church is the structure of leadership. If the rank and file takes over... they might as well be Protestants.
I’m not trying to be flippant. I’m serious. A Catholic Church without leadership is what, exactly?
Why did they pay.
Make the police come and handcuff all those nuns and take them to jail. Call every single news agency in the world to witness it.
You are Catholic nuns, you should not be afraid of ANYTHING the world can throw at you.
MAKE THEM ARREST YOU AND FORCE YOU!
“The Pope could in fact do something.”
Such as?
“MAKE THEM ARREST YOU AND FORCE YOU!”
You’re exactly right!
I don’t think you’re being flippant.
I’m not advocating any kind of a coup by the local congregation, but if the Bishops ad Cardinals and even the Vatican are turning what seems to be a blind eye and deaf ear to the war on the Church, what else can be done?
Seems to me we’ll end up holding Mass in people’s basement.
That is my thinking - do you still disagree? Can you suggest a different remedy for what’s going on? Or do you think the system will be self-correcting?
“You are Catholic nuns, you should not be afraid of ANYTHING the world can throw at you.”
_____________________________________________________
You’re right. And the same goes for any Catholic or Christian really. We are not citizens of this world but of the world above, as you’re alluding to.
True
The Interdict.
Wonder if they considered arguing that they fired her, not for being gay, but for living with someone romantically before Catholic Marriage
“The Interdict.”
On a judge? The entire court system? All of Italy?
Start with the judge and the activist.
He could condemn the action. The Pope has influence, authority. If he doesn’t use it, what good is it?
“He could condemn the action.”
He could. He might. He might wait for an appeal if one is in the works too.
“The Pope has influence, authority.”
The Pope has some influence, but little over the secular courts of Italy. He has ZERO authority over them. ZERO.
“If he doesn’t use it, what good is it?”
It isn’t much “good” in terms of strength whether he uses it or not.
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