Dignity USA News

Leaders of DignityUSA join Catholic families in Boulder, Colorado in expressing extreme disappointment that the young child of lesbian parents has become the Archdiocese's latest target in its attacks on gay, lesbian, and transgender people. The child has been barred from returning to Sacred Heart of Jesus School because of her parents' sexual orientation.

DignityUSA was requested to participate in a seminal and hastily organized gathering of Catholic LGBT advocates in Washington, DC on January 30 and 31, 2010. I represented DignityUSA in lieu of Executive Director Marianne Duddy-Burke, who was unable to clear her calendar on short notice. I was joined by Board members Mark Clark and Tom Yates, both of Dignity/Washington. Ray Panas, President of Dignity/Washington was also present.

DignityUSA’s Board of Directors will meet at the Radisson Plaza-Warwick Hotel, 220 South 17th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103, (215) 735-6000, Friday through Sunday, April 16-18, 2010.

We encourage DignityUSA members to see the board in action. You need not spend the entire weekend with us.

The board meets for about 3 hours Friday night. Work resumes by 9 a.m. on Saturday and goes through the day until about 6 p.m. Sunday, the Board wraps up its work in a 3-hour session ending at 12 noon.

Nominations are open for four (4) Directors-at-Large for a period of two years—October 1, 2010 to September 30, 2012.

Marianne Duddy-Burke, executive director of DignityUSA, a group for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Catholics, called the Catholic Charities decision "appalling."

"It's a two-tier system among its workers," Ms. Duddy-Burke said. "It violates every principle of the dignity of work and justice for workers that the Catholic Church has stood for for years and it makes employees of Catholic Charities a sacrificial lamb to prove a political point."

Ms. Duddy-Burke said the choice to cut spousal benefits in these economic times imposes a burden on new Catholic Charities employees. She said this would cause "more damage to their families than a same-sex marriage."