An award-winning reporter for a major US news broadcaster recently faced discrimination from the Roman Catholic high school he attended while growing up in Louisiana because he is openly gay, he has said.

David Begnaud – the lead national correspondent for the television news program CBS Mornings – encountered anti-gay discrimination when he traveled to Teurlings Catholic High School to report a profile on his freshman English teacher, Josette Surratt, he wrote in an opinion column on Nola.com. Begnaud said the school’s current administration made him feel unwelcome at the campus because it didn’t want students to think his sexuality was acceptable – treatment that is not consistent with how Pope Francis has been trying to make the worldwide Catholic church more welcoming to LGBTQ+ community members.