This valedictorian's Catholic school banned his graduation speech. He delivered it outside with a bullhorn instead.

"We must remember that we have a voice."
 By 
Heather Dockray
 on 

Most high school valedictorians deliver their graduation speeches in overcrowded gymnasiums to slightly sleepy crowds, but for one Kentucky senior things played out very differently.

Christian Bales, the valedictorian at Holy Cross High School in Covington, Kentucky, was recently banned from delivering his speech at the graduation ceremony. So he instead chose to deliver it from outside the building with a bullhorn -- with his entire class watching on.

Members of Bales' local Catholic diocese ruled that Bales' speech was too political and inconsistent with church teachings. But Bales, who is openly gay, was undaunted and forged ahead with the speech, which touched on the power of young people being activists. He applauded his fellow students -- all across the political spectrum -- for participating in a recent March for Life and for advocating for gun control.

From Bales' speech, which you can read here in a Google Doc:

"'The young people will win' because we’re finished being complacent. There’s a misguided notion that wisdom is directly proportional to age, but we’re disproving that daily. Sometimes the wisest are the youngest in our lives, the ones who haven’t yet been desensitized to the atrocities of our world. Therefore, we young people must be the educators."

Student Council president Katherine Frantz was also banned from making a speech. The diocese says the two missed a deadline for submitting the speech for approval, but the students say they were never aware of any deadline and were told it was the content of their speeches that the school took issue with.

Though in the end their message was heard loud and clear. If only all high school valedictorians and their corny speeches were this cool.

Topics Activism

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Heather Dockray

Heather was the Web Trends reporter at Mashable NYC. Prior to joining Mashable, Heather wrote regularly for UPROXX and GOOD Magazine, was published in The Daily Dot and VICE, and had her work featured in Entertainment Weekly, Jezebel, Mic, and Gawker. She loves small terrible dogs and responsible driving. Follow her on Twitter @wear_a_helmet.

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