Metro East Sun

Father McGivney Catholic High School in Glen Carbon is now mask-optional.

The announcement came in an email to parents by School President, Reverend Jeffrey Goeckner, in response to a Sangamon County court ruling late Friday that declared Gov. J.B. Pritzker's school student mask requirement "null and void."

"In light of this ruling and guidance from Bishop (Thomas) Paprocki's Administrative team at the Springfield Diocese... wearing masks indoors is still recommended regardless of vaccination status, however not a requirement," Goeckner wrote. 

"With the understanding that the 'temporary restraining order' issued on Friday is a matter of active litigation, we ask our families and school communities to be patient as we respond to this very dynamic situation," he said.

Paprocki has communicated his decision to parents and school administrators, but not to the media, sources tell the Metro East Sun.

In emails to parents, Paprocki aide Mike Christie has said schools in the Springfield Diocese should "accommodate families who choose not to send children in masks."

The Springfield Diocese covers schools in Jersey, Bond and Madison Counties in the Metro-East. Catholic high schools in the diocese include McGivney, Marquette Catholic in Alton, St. Teresa in Decatur, St. Anthony in Effingham, Routt Catholic in Jacksonville, Quincy Notre Dame and Sacred Heart-Griffin in Springfield.

In a 30-page ruling Friday night, Judge Raylene Grischow declared Pritzker's blanket state emergency school rules on masks and tests through the Illinois Department of Public Health "null and void." She said the governor and his agencies have been mandating rules upon students illegally.

“Statutory rights have attempted to be bypassed through the issuance of Executive Orders and Emergency Rules … This type of evil is exactly what the law was intended to constrain," she wrote.

Father McGivney is the first Catholic school in Illinois to announce it will follow Grischow's order.

On Saturday, Timothy Christian Schools in Elmhurst, Township High School District 214, Lombard School District 44, Lake Forest public schools and Arlington Heights School District 25 announced they would be mask-optional. 

The schools superintendent of the Chicago Archdiocese, however, said all Catholic schools in Cook and Lake Counties will still require masks as he will not recognize Judge Grischow's order, while the Joliet Diocese, which governs Catholic schools in DuPage, Will, Ford, Grundy, Iroquois, Kankakee and Kendall Counties, signaled he would also refuse to follow the court.

Quincy Public Schools Superintendent Roy Webb said enforcing Pritzker's mask mandate after the ruling was "not feasible."

"The ruling stated that to enforce the orders, it would take individual court orders with support of the (county health department), wrote Webb. "Not feasible."

"Does that Face Mask Really Protect You," a 2010 research article by Dr. Larry E. Bowen of the Southern Research Institute in Birmingham, Ala., fit various types of masks on a mannequin to study their effectiveness, found that wearing surgical, bandana and dust masks offer "very little protection" and concluded that "wearing these face masks may produce a false sense of protection."

Schools in St. Clair and Monroe Counties are in the Belleville Diocese.

Father McGivney, founded in 2012, has 263 students.