The election of City Councillor James Kelly as President of the Boston City Council, produced an anti-Catholic outburst from one of the homosexual groups involved in the St. Patrick’s Day parade controversey in Boston. Kelly, a staunch supporter of traditional values, was denigrated as “a bigot … a foul-mouthed Catholic bigot” by one Cliff Arnesen, vice-president of a group styling itself the ‘New England Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Veterans.’
Homosexual militants thought they had triumphed with a favorable court ruling in the parade case, only to discover that the sponsors of the parade, the South Boston Allied War Veterans Council, decided to cancel the parade, rather than compromise their principles and allow a homosexual contingent to march. Kelly, who represents South Boston, is a forthright opponent of homosexual involvement in the parade. Catholic League Operations Director C. Joseph Doyle stated: “Mr. Arnesen’s invective is one more expression of the strident anti-Catholicism that has become the stock in trade of homosexual militants. It is also a striking example of the hypocricy of those who want to march in a Catholic neighborhood, in a parade honoring a Catholic saint, but whose underlying sentiment is one of contempt for Catholics. The real bigotry here is the growing and vitriolic intolerance shown by homosexual extremists towards public figures who have the temerity to oppose the homosexual agenda.”
John Walsh, Communications Director of the Archdiocese of Boston, in a letter to the Boston Herald, said Arnesen had been “made bold by the resurgence of anti-Catholicism in American culture.”
