Pledging Allegiance
A Theological Reflection on the Kobasa Case

EDITORS’ NOTE: In October 2005, Stephen Kobasa, a Catholic high school teacher of twenty-five years, was fired from Kolbe Cathedral High School in Bridgeport, CT, for refusing to permanently display the flag of the United States of America in his assigned classroom. In its January-February 2006 issue, The Catholic Worker printed Kobasa’s statement, in which he explained that his teaching could “never take its legitimacy from any symbol except the Cross of Christ. To elevate any national emblem to that level would be for me to ignore the fundamental call of Jesus to compassion without boundaries.”

Kobasa, who taught at Kolbe for six years, never once asked that his students imitate his actions; he merely explained to them that he was doing what he believed his faith required of him. Kobasa wanted to show his students what it meant to live a life of integrity, a life consistent with one’s beliefs. Remarking on the decision of school auth.rities and the Bishop of Bridgeport, Kobasa wrote that this “unique and arbitrary standard. . . creates the unmistakable impression that national loyalty is being valued over faithful obedience to the Gospel.”

Kobasa has filed an appeal for recourse with the Cardinal Prefect of the Office of Education in Rome.

Anyone wishing to protest the firing of Stephen Kobasa can address their concerns to: The Most Reverend William E. Lori, S.T.D., Bishop of the Diocese of Bridgeport, Catholic Center, 238 Jewett Avenue, Bridgeport, CT 06606.

I am certain that the people who fired Stephen Kobasa thought that they were doing the right thing. Although I—like Kobasa himself —never got a response to my letter to Bishop William Lori, I can imagine that the Bishop acted to preserve some foundational values that he thought Kobasa jeopardized. What exactly those values are may be hard to express precisely; perhaps that is why Bishop Lori made no attempt to give reasons for his action. Indeed, one of the most remarkable aspects of the entire episode is that no one responsible for firing Stephen Kobasa seems to have put forth an argument—either to Kobasa or to the public - for displaying the American flag in a Catholic school classroom. Kobasa was given an edict, not an argument. All inquiries after the fact are directed to the statement on the Diocese website, which says, “The Diocese of Bridgeport has long believed that the American flag is an important fixture in its Catholic School classrooms,” without giving any indication as to why. The flag is not to be questioned; one simply owes it allegiance. There is a strong sense among many Catholics that to be Catholic is to be obedient, respectful of order and tradition, which is precisely what patriotism represents. Catholicism and Americanism are seen as a seamless garment that clothes the respectful and respectable Catholic person.

The irony here is that the Diocese’s response confirms Stephen Kobasa’s point: there is an aura of untouchability, obedience, allegiance and transcendence surrounding the American flag that threatens to rival our loyalty to God. The Diocese treats the flag like something sacred, while firing Kobasa for saying so. Not having the American flag on permanent display in the classroom was so great a menace to sacred values that the Diocese fired a faithful Catholic man with a family to support in the middle of the semester, but the Diocese was unable or unwilling to articulate a reason why. The flag is revered as sacred: one must honor it, pledge allegiance to it, never let it touch the ground, ritually fold it, cremate or bury rather than discard it, and, above all, be willing to kill and die for it. And yet, as with a totem surrounded by taboos, one must never acknowledge that it is really sacred.

Christians have a word for putting earthly things in the place of God: idolatry. Furthermore, the Church has not hesitated to identify the danger of idolatry attendant to the modern state. Pope Pius XI said that nationalism is “an ideology which clearly resolves itself into a true, real pagan worship of the state—a Statolatry which is not less in contrast with the natural rights of the family than it is in contradiction to the supernatural rights of the Church.” In its section on idolatry (2113), the Catechism makes clear that “idolatry not only refers to false pagan worship. It remains a constant temptation to faith.” The Catechism continues, “Man commits idolatry whenever he honors and reveres a creature in place of God,” and includes “the state” in a list of examples. Elsewhere, the Catechism warns against the “idolatry of the nation” (57).

The neat fit between Christianity and Americanism that many take for granted should be especially strange for Catholics, given the manifestly international nature of the Church. We have popes who are Italian, Polish, German, etc. to remind us that our fundamental loyalty is to the Body of Christ, not to any particular nation. As Stephen Kobasa says, the flag represents boundaries, the creation of distinctions between friends and enemies. The crucifix, on the other hand, represents the gathering of all people into God’s love. Thus Jesus’ words in reference to his death on the cross: “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself” (Jn: 12:32).

One final irony of Stephen Kobasa’s firing is that it took place at a Catholic school named after St. Maximilian Kolbe. Kolbe was a Franciscan priest who gave himself up to be starved to death at Auschwitz in place of a man who begged to be spared for the sake of his children. Saints like Kolbe keep us alert to the imperative to put loyalty to God over loyalty to the state. This is especially important when the state takes on ever-increasing power, as it did in Kolbe’s time and does in ours. Now Stephen Kobasa joins that cloud of witnesses to the love of God that transcends earthly power and earthly boundaries. I hope there are other Catholic schools that value his witness and his talents, and want him on their faculty. In the meantime, we can be grateful for the sacrifices he has made to help keep the truth before us.

?William Cavanaugh is an associate professor of Theology at the University of Saint Thomas in St. Paul, MN.