Catholic Church is filled with hypocrisy
- Details
- Published: Thursday, October 15 2015
- Written by Diversity Richmond
This opinion piece by Bill Harrison is from the 10/14/2015 edition of GayRVA.com
I was not surprised to read that Roman Catholic Bishop Francis DiLorenzo fired John Murphy from his position as executive director at the St. Francis Home because he is married to a man. No news there: this IS the Catholic Church. However, I later learned that when hired, the St. Francis board chair assured Murphy that his sexual orientation and his 30-year relationship with his husband, Jerry Carter, would not be a factor affecting his employment.
The St. Francis Home board, having been told by the Bishop that they had to fire Murphy, unanimously voted to oppose the Bishop's demands. Having been thwarted by the board, DiLorenzo then sent his own agents to fire Murphy. Several board members subsequently resigned in protest.
The actions of the church reek of hypocrisy. While the Catholic Church cannot find tolerance for same-sex marriage; it is the sin of child sexual abuse that is most disturbing. By its own accounting, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, in April 2014, estimated that more than $3 billion had been paid out in court ordered disbursements for reckless endangerment and sexual abuse that was visited upon innocent children.
Did you know Richmond was named the 
A Richmond native, Brian Harrison left RVA as a young adult and recently returned with a new vigor and has readily assumed leadership positions in the LGBT community. He is in the Business Analyst/Project Manager profession with Suntrust Mortgage after having spent over 20 years in the financial industry at both large and small firms. He is a major player in the Suntrust LGBTA Teammate Network and has already scheduled a Diversity Richmond presentation for its members.