WASHINGTON — As the Archdiocese of Washington celebrated the opening of school with a special Mass on Tuesday, a group of teachers instead marked the occasion by calling for the removal of the capital’s embattled archbishop, Cardinal Donald Wuerl.

The cardinal is among several American Catholic leaders implicated in the growing sex abuse scandal enveloping the church. This month, Cardinal Wuerl’s name appeared in a Pennsylvania grand jury report, which cited cases when the cardinal, then the bishop of Pittsburgh, allowed abusive priests back into the ministry. Then over the weekend, Cardinal Wuerl was accused by a former Vatican diplomat of knowing about the sexual misconduct of his predecessor in the Washington diocese, Theodore E. McCarrick.

A statement that garnered about 50 signatures from Washington diocese teachers announced that they were boycotting the Mass on Tuesday, held at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, as “an act of solidarity against the injustices condoned by Cardinal Wuerl and the greater hierarchy of the Church.” They held a brief prayer service themselves outside the basilica to pray for the survivors and victims.

“The reason we do this is because kids are important to us and their education is important to us,” said Jack Devlin, 27, a local teacher who stood with several colleagues on the outskirts of the basilica under a nearby tree, holding signs emblazoned with Bible verses about justice. “We care. This is personal.”