This year has seen a significant rise in Catholic Church employees who have been punished in some way for LGBT related employment disputes. Basically, this means they have been fired, resigned, refused to renew restrictive contracts or had job offers rescinded because it was discovered that they were homosexuals living in an open relationship with a “partner” of the same sex. Reported cases since 2008 total around 40; of these, 17 were reported this year. MORE