REXBURG, Idaho (AP) - A former Brigham Young University-Idaho professor said she was fired after posting a critical view of the Mormon church’s policies against same-sex couples on Facebook.
Former political science professor and LDS church member Ruthie Robertson, 22, wrote a lengthy Facebook post on June 5 in favor of equal rights for the LGBT community during Pride Month. The post also addressed the church’s opposition to same-sex relationships and legalized same-sex marriage.
“This is my official announcement and declaration that I believe heterosexuality and homosexuality are both natural and neither is sinful,” Robertson wrote. “I will never support the phrase ’love the sinner, hate the sin’ because that ’sin’ is part of who that person is.”
Robertson’s post was private, meaning it was only sent to her Facebook friends’ timelines, but later that day she got phone call letting her know that she had been reported to university administration.
University administrators met with her to understand her views and hoped that she would reconsider her stance and take down the post, according to Robertson. Robertson edited the post, but refused to delete it.
Because Robertson was not a tenured professor, there was no required due process before she was fired and as a private university owned and operated by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, there is no law that prevents a professor from being fired for expressing opinions that go against the church’s policies.
“I was really bummed out because of how much I love my students, and how much of a change I could see in them,” she told the Salt Lake Tribune. “I was also really stressed out because it was my sole income. But at the same time, I was angry - I was upset they would fire me over something like this. I was kind of indignant. I wasn’t going to back down.”
Robertson graduated from the university in April 2016 and began teaching online courses for the university in January. She taught her final class at the school’s Rexburg, Idaho campus on Tuesday.
Robertson was previously under contract to teach again during the fall semester and was told her contract would be renewed for 2018.
University spokesman Brett Crandall told the Post Register that officials declined to comment and cited a “long-standing policy of not commenting on personnel matters.”
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