Yet another legal atrocity

Employers can still discriminate against LGBTQ employees. At least some employers can.

We might think this sort of thing was just an historical curiosity -- but not so.

A federal appeals court on Wednesday [May 8] sided with a Catholic high school that fired a gay teacher over his plans to marry his partner, saying that the termination did not violate federal workplace protections for LGBTQ workers.

A three-judge panel of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals said the North Carolina school did not violate Lonnie Billard’s rights under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a federal anti-workplace discrimination law that protects against race, sex and religious discrimination.

Two members of the panel held that Billard “played a vital role as a messenger” of Charlotte Catholic High School’s faith values and said as a result, his firing was permissible under the “ministerial exception to Title VII.”

That is, a drama teacher at a school run by a religious institution has to follow and promote its line, whatever that line is. Religion trumps the full citizenship of a guy who just wanted to share the news of who he loved.

A couple of thoughts: 

1) Those artsy types are always the subversives. 

2) All of us need to be aware that our "rights" exist at the sufferance of federal judges.

After the Supreme Court decision voiding women's right to abortion, we should all know the second point.