SAN FRANCISCO — The archbishop of San Francisco sent a letter to California lawmakers on Thursday asking them to respect his right to hire people who uphold Catholic teachings.

Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone wrote the message in response to a letter sent to him earlier this week by California lawmakers urging him to remove from a teachers’ handbook morality clauses they say are discriminatory and divisive.

“Would you hire a campaign manager who advocates policies contrary to those you stand for, and who shows disrespect for you and the Democratic Party in general?” Cordileone asked the lawmakers in the letter.

On Tuesday, Democratic Assemblymen Phil Ting of San Francisco and Kevin Mullin of San Mateo made public a letter to Cordileone written by them and signed by every lawmaker representing the communities served by the four Catholic high schools in San Francisco, San Mateo and Marin counties.

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Cordileone adds he respects the lawmakers’ right to hire whoever may advance their mission and that he is asking for the same respect.

Cordileone earlier this month presented teachers with a statement that says Catholic school employees are expected to conduct their public lives in a way that doesn’t undermine or deny the church’s doctrine.

The statement outlines the church’s teaching that using contraception is a sin and that sex outside of marriage, whether it is in the form of adultery, masturbation, pornography or gay sex, is “gravely evil.”

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