A high school orchestra teacher refused to call his transgender students by their first names and was forced to resign rather than be fired. John Kluge, who taught at Browsnburg High School in Indiana, is a Christian who felt the school’s policy on referring to transgender students by their preferred pronouns went against his religious beliefs.

The Indianapolis Star reported that the school had threatened to fire Kluge if he did not start to refer to his transgender students by their first names – he had resorted to calling them by their last names – and so, under pressure, he resigned. After thinking about it further, Kluge attempted to withdraw his resignation but officials had already started processing it and refused to stop.