By Diego Poole

[Para leer en español, haz clic aquí]

The controversy surrounding the use of the Cathedral of Santa Ana in Las Palmas as the backdrop for a mass nude performance during the city's Pride celebrations raises a question that goes far beyond ecclesiastical administration. It concerns the very nature of tolerance, the purpose of institutions, and the duties of those entrusted with safeguarding them.

Much has been said about inclusion, diversity, and dialogue. Much less has been said about the rights of institutions to preserve their own identity. This silence is revealing.

Tolerance has never meant that every institution must surrender the goods that define its existence. This is one of the oldest principles of legal philosophy. Every institution exists for a purpose. Law protects institutions not merely because they exist, but because they serve goods that society considers worthy of protection. A cathedral is therefore not simply another public square. It is a sacred place, legally recognized as such through religious freedom and the institutional autonomy granted to religious communities. Its dignity derives from its purpose.

For that very reason, this controversy is not fundamentally about freedom of expression. Those who organized the event enjoyed every right to express their views. The question is different: should the principal Catholic church of an entire diocese become the symbolic stage for a ideological movement whose anthropological premises differ profoundly from those professed by the Church itself?

A genuinely pluralistic society should answer no—not because one  institution deserves legal privilege over another, but because pluralism presupposes mutual respect between institutions. Respecting diversity means allowing every institution to preserve its own identity rather than transforming every symbolic space into a neutral platform for whichever movement happens to occupy it.

From the perspective of legal philosophy, this reflects a misunderstanding of the limits of tolerance. Tolerance ceases to be a virtue when it becomes indifference toward the very good one has the duty to protect. Every office carries corresponding obligations. Judges must defend justice. University rectors must defend academic teaching and research. Parents must defend their children. Likewise, bishops are entrusted with defending the sacred character of the Church and her places of worship.

The virtue traditionally associated with such responsibility is fortitude. Aristotle understood fortitude as the disposition to endure difficulties for the sake of what is noble. Thomas Aquinas refined the concept by explaining that fortitude enables one to persevere in the pursuit of the good despite fear or external pressure. Prudence without fortitude easily degenerates into accommodation. Dialogue without fortitude becomes indifferencee. Tolerance without fortitude becomes surrender.

This is why many faithful have interpreted the bishop's response not as an exercise of prudence but as a failure of pastoral courage. Whether one shares that judgment or not, it arises from an understandable expectation: that the shepherd entrusted with the care of a cathedral should publicly defend its sacred identity when that identity becomes the object of ideological appropriation.

The biblical image of the "mute watchmen" in Isaiah (56:10) remains strikingly relevant. The prophet condemns not those who make mistakes, but those who fail to speak when speech is required. Throughout Christian history, the gravest crises have often been marked less by active betrayal than by hesitant leadership unwilling to bear the cost of defending the truth.

Christ reserved some of His strongest words not for His enemies but for those whose conduct scandalizes the faithful. "Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a great millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea" (Matthew 18:6). The warning is directed above all to those entrusted with authority. A bishop's first duty is not to preserve his public image or avoid controversy, but to protect the sacred and strengthen the faith of those under his care. 

The irony is that unlimited tolerance ultimately destroys the diversity it claims to protect. When every institution is expected to open itself indiscriminately to every symbolic or ideological use, institutional identity disappears. A cathedral ceases to be a cathedral in any meaningful sense if those charged with its care no longer distinguish between sacred worship and ideological performance.

The lesson of Las Palmas therefore extends well beyond one bishop or one event. A society does not lose its identity only through persecution. Sometimes it loses it because those appointed to defend it quietly stop believing that it is worth defending.

If they keep quiet, the stones will cry out. (Luke 19:40)

Diego Poole