New Orleans teacher fired by Catholic school for being gay says ‘it’s just time’ for discrimination to stop

Mark Richards was fired from St Francis Xavier school after an obituary identified him as his late husband’s widower

A longtime music teacher at a New Orleans-area Catholic school who was essentially fired for being listed in an obituary as another man’s widower says he refused to suffer quietly because “it’s just time” for bullying and homophobic discrimination “to stop”.

“If I can put this out there and bring attention to it and make it easier for some other young, gay educator to stand up to it – then, yeah, I’ll do that,” Mark Richards told the radio show Talk Louisiana With Jim Engster on Tuesday. “I have nothing to lose.