With Pride Month making its big return, we can expect everywhere to get a lot more colorful. With life generally becoming a rough ride, a festival as bright and celebratory as Pride always gives people a lot to look forward to.
Although some Pride events this year started up as soon as it started getting warmer, most areas of the country can count on June as the month that members of the LGBTQIA+ community can come together and celebrate making it another year.
It seems that not everyone is in such a festive mood, however.
Although Pride is explicitly for the LGBTQIA+ community, anyone who wishes to show their support is welcome to attend.
As Zachary Zane wrote for Rolling Stone , Pride began as a protest commemorating the Stonewall Riots of 1969 after police raided the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village, New York City.
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Although Pride is fun and colorful, it’s also always been about the continuing fight for the community’s rights and the more supporters that fight has, the better.
It’s these supporters, however, that Catholic Bishop Thomas Tobin of Rhode Island seems to take issue with.
Specifically, he told Catholics not to attend because he was under the impression that Pride promotes a culture that is inherently contrary to Catholic values.
The fatal kicker, however, is the last part where Tobin called Pride events “harmful for children.”
While many users weren’t impressed by Tobin’s statement in general, Twitter couldn’t pass up the golden opportunity the “harmful for children” statement gave them.
Specifically, it was an opportunity to remind Tobin that a ranking member of the Catholic Church probably shouldn’t be lecturing people about what’s harmful for children.
It’s certainly hard to ignore that the Roman Catholic Church has spent decades dealing with the scandal resulting from its members abusing children on a systemic, international level.
As the BBC reported , it also didn’t help that the organization’s decades-long policy on the matter was to transfer disgraced priests to other districts instead of having them face any real consequences.
Although some were more subtle about this dark aspect of the institution, others who were directly affected reminded Tobin of which people had actually proved harmful for them.
One user in particular pointed out how hypocritical it is for Tobin to suddenly seem so concerned about children’s well-being.
As the Associated Press reported , he had previously said that he was aware of sexual abuse incident reports in Pennsylvania, but that it wasn’t his job to deal with them.
Last year, a Pennsylvania grand jury released a report detailing how six dioceses — including the Pittsburgh one where Tobin served as an auxiliary bishop from 1992 to 1996 — covered up abuse for decades.
As response to Tobin’s tweet escalated, it attracted the attention of some celebrities.
One was Mia Farrow, who called out Tobin’s tweet as “ignorance & bigotry” while making it clear that her family has also been affected by sexually abusive priests.
Pro wrestler and actor Dave Bautista also weighed in to discuss his personal stake in the culture that Tobin found so contrary to catholic morality.
In particular, he spoke of his mom, whose actions seem more line with the church’s stated values than Tobin seemed to realize.
In the wake of the backlash, Tobin released a statement on Sunday.
According to the Associated Press , it read , “I regret that my comments yesterday about Pride Month have turned out to be so controversial in our community, and offensive to some, especially the gay community. That certainly was not my intention, but I understand why a good number of individuals have taken offense.”
He also claimed to have respect and love for members of the gay community, but also said his obligation was to, “teach the faith, clearly and compassionately, even on very difficult and sensitive issues.”
The group Rhode Island Pride held a rally outside the Diocese of Providence – where Tobin currently serves – on Sunday evening.
In a statement, the group’s president, Joe Lazzerini said , “Jesus never said a word about homosexuality, about Pride, or the Queer community. Rhode Island Pride respectfully calls on Bishop Tobin to do some self-reflection as the majority of Catholic Rhode Islanders in this state reject the idea that to be Catholic is to be complicit to intolerance, bigotry, and fear.”
h/t: Associated Press
