Approximately 300 people gathered in front of the Salida Regional Library yesterday as part of protest against a planned “Rosary Rally” organized by members of St. Joseph Catholic Church to oppose LGBTQ books in the library. Rosary Rallies have been associated with the Catholic activist group America Needs Fatima, named after the series of apparitions and miracles that occurred in Portugal in 1917. America Needs Fatima’s website identified April 19 as a day of Rosary Rallies to “stand against porn and LGBT books in schools and libraries.”
The Rosary Rally organizers canceled the event on April 17, but supporters of the Salida Regional Library and Salida’s LGBTQ community came out to voice their support.
“In the parish bulletin dated April 16, members of St. Joseph Parish in Salida were invited to a Rosary Rally to raise awareness of inappropriate materials being made available to children in schools and libraries,” said Bishop James Golka of the Diocese of Colorado Springs in an emailed statement. “However, as word of the rally spread in the wider community, it was depicted as a call for book banning and burning, and a ‘counterprotest’ was planned. In the interest of safety, Father Jim Williams, the pastor of St. Joseph, made the decision to cancel the rally. The practice of faith and religion in the public square is our First Amendment right as Americans. The Rosary Rally was for parishioners of St. Joseph to gather and pray in peace and unity for the protection of children. It was not meant to be a protest or a show of hatred for any members of the community. It has long been the teaching of the Catholic Church that parents have the primary right to determine the timing and content of their children’s education in human sexuality, and I stand by those seeking to uphold that right.”
Melinda Roberts, pastor of Salida United Methodist Church, noted that the organizers of the Rosary Rally represented a small faction of St. Joseph’s congregation, and were not representative of the Catholic community as a whole.
“This is about human dignity,” said Roberts, “It’s about respect. It’s about belonging, and it’s about loving your neighbor as yourself. Which I didn’t come up with that term, by the way — you might recognize that that was Jesus. Jesus would be standing with us here today. Jesus always found himself standing on the side of the marginalized and the abused and the oppressed. Jesus would not be on the side of the religious people throwing stones, but rather would be on this side of the street, waving a flag, waving a sign, saying, ‘You matter, you belong, you are loved.’”
Salida Mayor Dan Shore spoke in support of Salida’s LGBTQ community. “I really believe that the true measure of a community is how it stands up for groups who’ve been historically marginalized and or targeted,” he said. “We always talk about the heart of Salida. Your presence here today is a true embodiment of that. … My message today to our LGBTQ community is that you matter, you are supported, and we are going to provide the mechanism for you to feel safe, to be authentic. You mean so much to us as a community.”
LGBTQ youth, particularly those who are transgender, have become a major focus for conservative politicians across the country. Over 400 pieces of anti-trans legislation have been introduced in the last year, and outrage over LGBTQ books and media have spurred protests at local school boards and libraries across the country.
Colorado Springs School District 11 recently considered — but eventually tabled — a policy to prevent teachers from asking students their pronouns, and last year Fremont County School District tabled a proposed transgender policy, designed to comply with state law mandating support for transgender students, after pushback from local politicians, teachers, and community members.
Former educator and Salida School District Board of Education member Robin NeJame discussed the importance of upcoming school board elections. “This is a democracy and it’s about choice,” she said. “This school board is not something that’s political. There should not be a D, an R, a U, or an I associated with our school boards. These are nonpartisan positions. So you’ll never see that on a ballot. And you shouldn’t”
The event was organized by Jimmy Sellars, the director of policy and programing for the Salida activist organization Partnership for Community Action, which provides support for LGBTQ youth and families.
“What’s really hard is a lot of young people, when they’re dealing with this sort of unaffirming behavior of families, this sort of stuff [anti-LGBTQ rallies] just contributes to it, makes it worse,” said Sellars. “A lot of our young people are really struggling right now. The worst sort of thing in [the] community that a lot of people are sharing is just around pronouns and being attacked. People literally touching them, ripping off pronoun pins, pulling them across the counter or things like that. I think as far as the escalation over the last several months, we’re seeing queer people being fired, which is affecting a lot of these young people because they’re seeing that fearful attack coming towards them.”
Sellars and their partner, Mark Munroe, have been organizing and advocating for the LGBTQ community in Colorado’s Western Slope for nearly a decade. “Jimmy and I do a lot of stuff around town,” said Monroe, who works at the library’s circulation desk. “We do a queer potluck every month. We do LGBTQ cultural literacy, fluency training, Safe Zone trainings. We try really hard to bring the queer community together to come out and to support one another, but sometimes the climate is not conducive for folks, they don’t feel safe.”
During the rally, Monroe read a statement from the Salida Regional Library. “The Salida Regional Library extends its thankfulness to the Salida community and your rallying to support us in our mission, committed to providing equal access to information, materials, and programming, technology, enhancing the pursuit of our patrons’ personal growth while balancing physical needs,” he read. “We are lucky that our community is so supportive and shares in the belief that the choice is up to the individual. People have the right to make their own choices, and no one group should determine what is acceptable and what is not. As a public library, it is our duty to do our best to ensure freedom of information for all and to serve the entire community.”
