INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — A Vatican office has temporarily suspended the decree from the archbishop to no longer recognize Brebeuf Jesuit Preparatory School as a Catholic institution because a teacher was in a same-sex marriage.
The announcement came from the president of the school, the Rev. Bill Verbryke.
His statement on the school’s website said in part, “We have just learned that the Congregation for Catholic Education has decided to suspend the Archbishop’s decree on an interim basis, pending its final resolution of our appeal.”
The decision means that Brebeuf is free to resume normal sacramental celebrations of the Eucharist, as well as celebrate the Mass for the Feast Day of St. Jean de Brebeuf on Oct. 24.
Verbryke continued:
“It is very important to understand, however, what this temporary suspension of the Archbishop’s decree does NOT mean. It does not mean that the matter has been resolved, or that any permanent decision has been made. It also does not mean that anyone should infer that the Congregation for Catholic Education is leaning one way or the other on any of the issues at hand. The Congregation has simply granted a temporary suspension of the Archbishop’s decree until it makes a final decision.”
In June, after 57 years of partnership, the school and the archbishop announced the separation after a disagreement over personnel at the school. The disagreement occurred when the school refused to adhere to a directive from Archbishop Charles Thompson to fire a teacher in a same-sex marriage.
Brebeuf is sponsored by the Midwest Province of the Society of Jesus, which allowed the school to keep its Catholic identity and sponsorship even without the archdiocese’s support.
Archbishop Thompson also forced Cathedral High School to fire a teacher in a same-sex marriage to preserve the school’s “Catholic identity,” administrators said in June. He said in June his orders for two Catholic high schools in the city to fire gay teachers or lose their connections to the archdiocese was about upholding church teaching on marriage and not about sexual orientation.
Thompson has previously said he didn’t seek out information about the marriages involving the teachers but had to respond to what he called a “public situation” of Catholic school employees not following church doctrine.
(Photo by WISH-TV.)
