Kansas City apologizes after revealing where Harrison Butker lives on social media
Kansas City has apologized after a city government social media account revealed where Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker lives after a commencement speech he made last weekend advocating for traditional Catholic values drew national media attention.
Butker gave the graduation address at Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas on Saturday, sparking a media firestorm and a Change.org petition calling on the NFL team to release the three-time Super Bowl champion. As of Friday morning, the petition has over 181,000 signatories.
The official Kansas City, Missouri, account on X tweeted a message reportedly giving away the name of the municipality where Butker lives, which is not in Kansas City. The post was removed after users online accused the city of "doxing" a private citizen.
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In a Wednesday evening post, the Kansas City X account wrote, "We [apologize] for our previous tweet. It was made in error."
Mayor Quinton Lucas, a Democrat, issued a longer apology on his personal X account Wednesday night.
"A message appeared earlier this evening from a City public account. The message was clearly inappropriate for a public account. The City has correctly apologized for the error, will review account access, and ensure nothing like it is shared in the future from public channels."
In a letter to Lucas, Missouri's Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey said the city's X account likely violated the Missouri Human Rights Act by posting the "residential location of a private citizen." The law "prohibits government actors from discriminating against citizens because of their sincerely held religious beliefs."
Bailey surmised that the city posted the original tweet "in an attempt to retaliate against him for expressing his sincerely held religious beliefs at a religious college's commencement ceremony."
During the commencement address at the Roman Catholic college, Butker denounced "things like abortion, [in-vitro fertilization], surrogacy, euthanasia as well as a growing support for degenerate cultural values and media." He maintained that they "all stem from the pervasiveness of disorder." He also criticized President Joe Biden, a practicing Catholic, over his support for abortion.
"Our own nation is led by a man who publicly and proudly proclaims his Catholic faith but at the same time is delusional enough to make the sign of the cross during a pro-abortion rally," Butker lamented. "He has been so vocal in his support for the murder of innocent babies that I'm sure to many people, it appears that you can be both Catholic and pro-choice."
Suggesting in his remarks that one cannot "be both Catholic and pro-choice," Butker expressed concern that "From the man behind the COVID lockdowns to the people pushing dangerous gender ideologies onto the youth of America, they all have a glaring thing in common: They are Catholic."
"Being Catholic alone doesn't cut it," Butker asserted. "These are the sorts of things we are told in polite society to not bring up, you know, the difficult and unpleasant things. But if we are going to be men and women for this time in history, we need to stop pretending that the Church of nice is a winning proposition."
"We must always speak and act in charity but never mistake charity for cowardice," Butker said, instructing the graduates to "be authentically and unapologetically Catholic."
He warned that even "people in polite Catholic circles will try to persuade you to remain silent."
He went on to decry the widespread use of birth control.
"There is nothing good about playing God with having children, whether that be your ideal number or your perfect time to conceive," he said. "No matter how you spin it, there is nothing natural about Catholic birth control."
In response to the backlash to the speech, Jonathan Beane, NFL senior vice president and chief diversity and inclusion officer, released a statement distancing the league from Butker's comments, saying that "Butker gave a speech in his personal capacity."
"His views are not those of the NFL as an organization. The NFL is steadfast in our commitment to inclusion, which only makes our league stronger," continued Beane, as quoted by the Associated Press.
The advocacy group CatholicVote has begun circulating a petition asking the NFL and the Chiefs to stand by the kicker.
As CatholicVote President Brian Burch noted in a letter to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and Chiefs CEO Clark Hunt on Thursday, the NFL insisted that it "honors and celebrates the broad ranges of human difference among us, while also embracing the commonalities we share, and to provide each individual with the opportunity to achieve their full potential."
"Does this inclusion include Catholics, pro-life Americans, mothers, and those who hold to traditional beliefs?" Burch asked. "We certainly hope you will continue to ignore the reckless calls for Mr. Butker to be canceled."
While acknowledging that "not every American, or NFL fan for that matter, may share the same beliefs as Mr. Butker," Burch expressed hope that the NFL did "not intend to send a message to Catholics, or those that still uphold basic moral tenets of a civil society, that they are outsiders and no longer welcome."
"The growing hatred, intimidation, and now threats of violence against him for publicly defending our deeply-held beliefs represent the worst kind of anti-Catholic bigotry and cannot be tolerated," Burch added. "These ideals are not controversial for millions of Americans and indeed remain sacred for millions of religious believers, including millions of your fans and customers."
Ryan Foley is a reporter for The Christian Post. He can be reached at: ryan.foley@christianpost.com
