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Openly Gay Teacher Fired From Catholic School After Sharing Wedding Pics On Facebook
Jocelyn Morffi lost her job the day she returned from her wedding.
An openly gay teacher in Florida lost her job last week after posting photos of her wedding on social media.
Jocelyn Morffi, a first grade teacher at Saints Peter and Paul Catholic School in Miami, married her same-sex partner last weekend, and later shared photos of her seaside ceremony in the Florida Keys on her Facebook page. She was fired from her teaching job on Thursday, the day she returned to school, NBC reports.
Mary Ross Agosta, spokesperson for the Archdiocese of Miami, told WPLG that Morffi was fired because she "broke the contract she signed when she began teaching at a Catholic school," which includes a moral turpitude clause.
"As a teacher in a Catholic school their responsibility is partly for the spiritual growth of the children," Agosta told KMOV. "One has to understand that in any corporation, institution or organization there are policies and procedures and teachings and traditions that are adhered to. If something along the way does not continue to stay within that contract, then we have no other choice."
Principal Carlota Morales sent a letter home to parents last week informing them of Morffi's firing, calling it a "difficult and necessary" decision.
Morffi, who had been with the school for almost seven years, commented on the loss of her job in a brief post on Friday.
"This weekend, I married the love of my life and, unfortunately, I was terminated from my job as a result," she wrote. "In their eyes, I'm not the right kind of Catholic for my choice of partner."
Several parents met with school administration to protest Morffi's termination, but say they have yet to receive a satisfactory explanation.
"We were extremely livid. They treated her like a criminal; they didn't even let her get her things out of her classroom," Cintia Cini, the mother of a child who was in Morffi's class, told the Miami Herald.
Morffi is being represented by attorney Erica Canas, who told WPLG that she and her client are considering which legal steps they'd next like to take.
[Photo: Facebook]
