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The bright, two-tone letters of the Black Lives Matter flag and the bright stripes of the Pride flag’s rainbow fluttered over a Massachusetts Catholic school for more than a year before the local bishop registered his opposition.
The Black Lives Matter flag, Bishop Robert McManus said in April, was “co-opted by some factions, which also inspire widespread distrust of the police.” And the LGBTQ flag can be used to contrast the church’s teaching that marriage is between a man and a woman, he added.
When Worcester’s Christmas school did not move, McManus issued a stern decision. The free high school, which serves boys facing economic hardship, can no longer be identified as Catholic because the flags are “incompatible with Catholic teaching,” he said Thursday.
“Waving these flags in front of a Catholic school sends a mixed, confusing and scandalous message to the public about the Church’s position on these important moral and social issues,” McManus wrote. “Despite my insistence that the school administration remove these flags due to confusion and the correct theological scandal they are making and can promote, they refuse to do so.
This challenge, McManus said, left him with no choice but to deprive the Jesuit school of his Catholic affiliation. The school also can no longer celebrate liturgy or sacraments or use diocesan institutions to raise funds. It was not included in the list of the diocese’s Catholic schools in the region on Thursday.
The decision, which comes during the Month of Pride, seems to be a rare case of belonging to a Catholic organization with the phrase “Black life matters” becoming a hot spot for its diocese. The Conference of Catholic Bishops in the United States has taken a nuanced approach to the phrase, endorsing the concept of racial justice, but not necessarily the organizations that attach to this message. The Black Lives Matter movement is described as aimed at eradicating white supremacy and ending violence against black communities.
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The Nativity School said the use of the Black Lives Matter and Pride flags was a response to a call from its students, most of whom are people of color, to make their community more inclusive. The flags symbolize that everyone is welcome at Christmas, the school’s president said on Thursday.
“It is now understood that both flags celebrate the human dignity of our relatives, friends and neighbors who have faced and continue to face hatred and discrimination,” wrote Thomas McKenney. “Although any symbol or flag can be co-opted by political groups or organizations, waving our flags is not an endorsement of any organization or ideology, they are waving in support of marginalized people.
The bishop disagrees. The Pride flag supports same-sex marriage and the “LGBTQ + lifestyle,” he said. And while the church teaches that all lives are sacred, McManus said the Black Lives Matter movement used the phrase to contradict Catholic teaching about the importance of the nuclear family. (Black Lives Matter previously said on its website that it aims to “violate a Western-imposed requirement for a nuclear family structure by supporting each other as extended families.” The page was later taken offline.)
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Rozhdestvo said she would appeal the bishop’s decision, but had no plans to remove the flags, which she said showed a commitment to solidarity with her students and families. McKenney said the administrators’ decision was based on the gospel, Catholic social teaching and the school’s Jesuit heritage.
The result follows months of dialogue between the school and the Diocese of Worcester. At about the same time that McManus challenged the flags in March, a man lowered both flags, the school said. Two months later, the bishop warned the school that he would lose his Catholic label if he did not remove the displays.
The Nativity School is not the only educational institution that lacks its “Catholic” label. In 2019, the Archdiocese of Indianapolis told the Jesuit Brebeuf Preparatory School that it could no longer identify itself as a Catholic after refusing to fire a teacher of the same sex. The Jesuit province in the Midwest has said it will appeal the decision through a church trial.
For Guillermo Krimmer Jr., an openly gay graduate of the Nativity School, the flags symbolize that the Nativity includes the lives of blacks – a message he said is crucial in a school with predominantly blacks and Latinos.
“For these young men who are witnessing what is happening across the country and seeing the Black Lives Matter flag flying, it’s a big deal,” he said.
The 27-year-old Creamer said he expected the bishop’s decision to make other Catholic schools that agree with the Black Lives Matter or pro-LGBTQ messages in some way question whether this is acceptable. But he said it might not be a bad thing to encourage Catholics to speak honestly about whether and how these reasons fit into their faith.
In a letter to the community, McKenney reminded parents that the Christmas school is funded by individuals and groups – not the diocese – and that it will continue to operate as usual.
In front of the school building, he noted, the flags were still flying.
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