Philadelphia’s Archbishop Charles Chaput is now under attack by gay activists who are furious about his support for the firing of an openly gay Director of Religious Education (DRE) at a private Catholic elementary school.

According to Philly.com, Margie Winters, DRE at Waldron Mercy Academy, a private Catholic elementary school in Philadelphia, was fired from her job earlier this month because of her marriage to her lesbian partner.

Winters claims that the school knew about her relationship when they hired her nine years ago and told her to keep it quiet and to discuss it only with faculty, not parents or students.

Winters claimed she did this for years, although it “has been hard.”

However, the DRE recently found herself in an argument with a parent named Megan Schrieber over St. John Paul II’s Theology of the Body. One of St. John Paul’s most celebrated teachings on the human body, marriage and sexuality, Schreiber wanted Winters to use it as curriculum for sixth, seventh and eighth graders.

Winters believed the text was too mature for the students and advised the school’s principal, Nell Stetser, against the recommendation.

This disagreement led to complaints about her being allowed to work on the faculty while in a same-sex marriage.

As a result, the school’s principal and board of directors opted not to renew her contract for next year and sent a letter to the parents informing them of this decision. As is the case in many of these instances, some of the parents rebelled against the school, staged angry meetings and set up fundraising efforts to support Winters.

However, the Sisters of Mercy, who run the school, have stood firm and issued a letter stating that they are responsible for ensuring that the teachings of the Catholic Church are upheld.

“As a Catholic school, Waldron Mercy is responsible for adhering to the teachings of the Catholic Church in its curriculum and programs and as a public witness in the wider community. Our concern in this situation is Waldron Mercy’s authentic participation in the mission of Catholic education.”

Archbishop Charles Chaput, who was not involved in the decision, followed this with a statement of his own in which he said that “Schools describing themselves as Catholic take on the responsibility of teaching and witnessing the Catholic faith in a manner true to Catholic belief. There’s nothing complicated or controversial in this. It’s a simple matter of honesty.”

He applauded the sisters, saying that “they’ve shown character and common sense at a moment when both seem to be uncommon.”

As Catholic author George Weigel reports, in spite of the First Amendment which guarantees Americans the right to not only worship, but practice, the religion of their choice, the Archbishop became the target of activists and Church-haters alike, some of whom sent him emails so vile they cannot be reprinted here.

The local press, not known for its love of the Catholic Church, piled on, with Michael Newall of the Philadelphia Inquirer accusing the archbishop of “hypocrisy” and dismissing him as a “relic” while “waving the bloody shirt of sexual abuse, as if this had anything to do with what had happened at Waldron Mercy Academy.”

Why is this happening? Simply because Chaput believes “that the Catholic Church has a better answer to the human longing for happiness than the false promises of the sexual revolution in a society-without-aberrant-behavior — the New Normal,”Weigel writes.

“Because he thinks that Catholic institutions and those who work in them should embody the truths about life and love that the Catholic Church professes on the basis of both revelation and reason. Because he understands that, when the state demands that we believe something that we know is not true, all sorts of bad consequences for democracy follow.”

This assault on the Archbishop is a taste of what lays ahead for many others, Weigel predicts.

“The useful idiots who insist that, if the bishops of the United States would just retreat from the culture wars, all would be well, are manifesting their ignorance of the requirements of pastoral leadership while unwittingly confessing to a degree of political stupidity that is staggering.”

He goes on to warn that the recent Supreme Court ruling “has let loose demons, and their name is Legion. Those demons should be fought with compassion, critical intelligence, and blunt honesty about the Church’s own failings. They should be fought with hearts open to the possibility of conversion on the part of even the most besotted Church-bashers. And they should be fought in full recognition that we all live by the Divine Mercy. But they must be fought. Both the Church’s evangelical witness and the future of the American democratic experiment depend on it.”

UPDATE: Megan Schreiber’s family has been under attack since the widespread publication of her name as being the parent responsible for the uproar. She made exclusive comments to the National Catholic Register which are well-worth reading. Please keep her and her family in your prayers!

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