Boston’s largest Catholic organization is calling out a prominent all-girls Catholic school in Massachusetts for choosing a lesbian activist as its graduation speaker.
In her speech to the graduating class of Fontbonne Academy, Andi Lyons told students that disapproval of same-sex relationships was equivalent to inciting hate.
“Your generation still has much more work to do because the truth is, there will always be people who will hate you simply for what you look like, where you come from, or who you love,” Lyons told the 50 graduates of the 2023 class of Fontbonne, a 70-year-old Catholic school located in the affluent community of Milton, a border community of Boston.
Lyons, a Fontbonne alumni, is a professor of theatrical design and technology at the State University of New York at Albany. On her university web page, she lists the National LGBTQ Task Force among her “freelance activities.”
The group promotes abortion rights, drag queens, and gender-affirming care and started the campaign “queer the vote” during midterm elections last year.
The Task Force has referred to Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Texas Gov. Greg Abbot as “bigots” and denounced conservative groups like Moms for Liberty as “anti-queer” for objecting to sexually explicit books in school libraries.
According to a writeup about Fontbonne for a theater award she received, she is married to her “second life partner.”
Lyons, Fontbonne and the National LGBTQ Task Force did not respond to both phone and email inquiries from The Epoch Times.
Earlier this year, Pope Francis said that same-sex attraction is not a sin but that homosexual acts are. He also urged Catholics to be welcoming of members of the LGBTQ members community and has expressed support for same-sex civil unions.
C.J. Doyle, executive director of the Catholic Action League of Massachusetts, called Fontbonne’s choice of Lyons as its graduate speaker “demoralizing to faithful Catholics.”
“This is a clear case of dispossession,” he told The Epoch Times, “intended to depart from Catholic values.” In a statement on the controversy, his group called the school’s choice of Lyons “a scandalous and contumacious act of apostasy.”
The organization also condemned Massachusetts Cardinal Sean O'Malley for not rebuking the school for choosing a lesbian and gay activist as a graduation speaker.
“In Rome, Cardinal O’Malley chairs the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors. One might ask, quite reasonably, how can he carry out this grave responsibility if he cannot protect young people in his own archdiocese from spiritual predators who would imperil their immortal souls?” the group said in a statement.
O'Malley, the director of the Archdiocese of Boston, serves as the superintendent for all Catholic schools in Massachusetts.
According to his resume, O'Malley is a current member of the Catholic Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) Committee Pro-Life Activities committees on Migration and Pro-Life Activities for the Church in Africa and the Church in Latin America.
His office acknowledged inquiries from The Epoch Times about the issue but never provided any comment.
“He never enforces moral teachings,” charged Doyle.
Fontbonne Academy is run by the Sisters of Saint Joseph, one of the oldest orders of nuns in the country.
They also run Regis College.
In 2022, the Sisters invited pro-abortion Biden CDC Chief Rochelle Walensky to give a video address as the college’s keynote graduation speaker.
Previously, the Sisters also gave an award to state Rep. Brian Honan (D), who was hailed a “champion” by Planned Parenthood for his advocatory for so-called reproductive rights.
Doyle also pointed to a number of pro-abortionists sitting on boards in Catholic schools and colleges all over Massachusetts, including Boston College, MIT, and Stonehill, without any objection from O'Malley.
Last year, Massachusetts pro-lifers reacted with outrage at the lack of reprimand from Catholic leaders when Catholic Memorial, an all-boys school operated by the Christian Brothers in Boston’s West Roxbury district, chose Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, a staunch supporter of abortion rights, to receive its Blessed Edmund Ignatius Rice Award.
The award is named after an Ireland merchant who fought to teach the principles of the Catholic faith during the late-18th and early-19th centuries even though it was illegal.
Walsh now serves as the U.S. Secretary of Labor after being tapped by President Joe Biden for the job in 2022.
When he was Boston mayor, he vowed to make Boston one of the safest cities for abortions and, during a dedication ceremony, publicly praised an abortion doctor for fighting to protect choice.
Walsh received the Men For Choice Award from NARAL Pro-Choice Massachusetts for advocating for abortion rights.
O'Malley has remained silent about the awards and school appointments.
However, when an MIT chaplain commented that George Floyd did not live a virtuous life and showed no repentance for his sins in response to the national outrage over Floyd’s death in the custody of Minnesota police officers, O'Malley fired him “in seconds,” said Doyle.
Doyle said Catholics are seeing the biggest dispossession of the church since King Henry VIII seized and disbanded nearly 900 monasteries and expropriated all their assets.
