According to the AP, a Scranton nun quit her teaching job rather than comply with what she called an “insulting” demand for a letter declaring herself a practicing Catholic. Sister Regina Werntz called the request “personally demeaning” and also “insulting.”

She refused to ask her pastor to furnish a letter to prove that she was a practicing Catholic and is now leaving the diocese. She then wrote a letter to the local newspaper just in case anyone missed her point.

Werntz is now leaving the Scranton diocese to teach at an all-girls school in New Jersey this fall. She said she hopes to set an example for her students “to question or protest injustice.”

The lesson of humility and obedience will, or course, have to be found elsewhere. We all remember the lesson in the Bible, “Thou shall battle against wicked and silly requests and call newspapers when someone asks if thou art a good Catholic.”

The request from the diocese was silly. The reaction sillier.