Interesting viewpoints the good father espouses. I have read the visitation guidelines, and out of 11 pages there is one line addressing homosexuality.
The rest addresses dissent and heterodoxy. Some worry that once the "homosexual witch hunt" is completed in the seminaries, they'll move on to our parishes.
Since it appears they're trying to root out heterodoxy, if I were Fr. O'Leary, I'd be afraid. I'd be very afraid.
Re Fr. O'Leary:
There are none so blind as they who will not see.
If there were no other results of the practice of "gay" sex then the obsessive junky-like panic that arises in its practitioners at the slightest hint of disapproval of their "pole star," it would be enough to show that some real evil is at work in that practice. A junky will often do anything to get just one more fix, sacrificing the bonds of friendship, family, and faith on the altar of his gnawing need. It seems that those pushing the gay agenda may suffer from a similar spiritual blindness.
Tony makes a good point: the visitation is more concerned with dissent and heterodoxy than with homosexuality per se. Yet in light of the fact, irrefutably established by the John Jay report, that the majority of sexual-abuse victims were pubescent and adolescent boys, the visitors need to be concerned about homosexuality in the seminaries precisely in virtue of their concern about dissent and heterodoxy.
There is no reason to believe that the majority of homosexually-oriented priests abused boys or even broke their vow of celibacy. But on the basis of my experience as an adjunct professor in three seminaries—as well as of my long-standing friendships with several priests and working relationships with many others—the fact that so many priests are homosexual fosters a clubby atmosphere of mutual sympathy among them that includes resentment, even rejection, of the Church's teaching about homosexuality. Fr. O'Leary is a perfect confirmation of that assertion. That problem went, and to some extent still does go, right up to some bishops. And that in turn is what enabled a protective cocoon to be wrapped for so long around homosexual predators in the clergy.
The point of keeping homosexuals out of the priesthood, as apparently is planned by the Pope, is not to condemn homosexuals as individuals. As a group they are no worse, if no better, than any other large group of people. The point is to prevent the clubbification of dissent from the Church's moral teaching and thus prevent a cocoon from being wrapped again around homosexuals in the priesthood.
See my articles at Sacramentum Vitae on this issue. The comments are interesting too.
Be succinct, says our host.
Here is my position again:
Homosexuality is in itself a morally neutral form of human sexuality.
It is not a chosen orientation, or a personality disorder, or a disease comparable to alcoholicism.
Young homosexuals have been brutally oppressed by a society that subscribes to such mistaken theories.
The Catholic Church in particular has a record in regard to gays that is every bit as shameful as its record in regard to Jews.
Repentance and apologies are long overdue.
Human beings have a right to the creative and life-affirming expression of their godgiven sexuality within the constraints of moral consideration of the rights of others.
Prejudice against people on the grounds that they are homosexual is comparable to prejudice against Jews and blacks.
The Vatican inquiry into seminaries, if it is meant to root out people of homosexual orientation, risks building on all the above evil attitudes and reinforcing them.
It is probably true, as you all allege, that the clergy have become a gay club, reaching all the way up to the pope himself. If this club is to be dissolved, begin at the top, not with the most innocent and vulnerable.
The best way to dissolve the club is to invite non-gay people into the priesthood, thus correcting its skewed demographics.
"Homosexuality is in itself a morally neutral form of human sexuality."
Whereas the Church says it is morally disordered, a symptom of original sin.
"It is not a chosen orientation, or a personality disorder, or a disease comparable to alcoholicism."
For at least some it is a chosen orientation, but it is a psychological disorder or defect comparable to alcoholism. The jury is out on whether one is born homosexual.
"Young homosexuals have been brutally oppressed by a society that subscribes to such mistaken theories."
Such societies do not exist in the Western world any longer.
"The Catholic Church in particular has a record in regard to gays that is every bit as shameful as its record in regard to Jews."
It's an insult to the Jews to group them together with homosexuals. Judaism is a race and a religion (since 70 A.D., an erroneous or incomplete religion), not a psycho-sexual disorder. Jews can convert to Catholicism and become Jewish Catholics, but homosexuals who convert to Catholicism must be healed of their homosexuality in order to be able to enjoy heaven.
"Repentance and apologies are long overdue."
Yes, repentance and apologies are certainly long overdue from those who advocate, defend, or promote homosexuality and claim it is morally neutral or morally good.
"Human beings have a right to the creative and life-affirming expression of their godgiven sexuality within the constraints of moral consideration of the rights of others."
True -- that's why homosexuals need God's grace to heal them of their disorder, so they can finally enjoy their Godgiven sexuality -- for homosexuals' distorted, erroneous, disorder sexuality is not Godgiven.
"Prejudice against people on the grounds that they are homosexual is comparable to prejudice against Jews and blacks."
Now you insult blacks as well as Jews.
"The Vatican inquiry into seminaries, if it is meant to root out people of homosexual orientation, risks building on all the above evil attitudes and reinforcing them."
Good is not evil, so there is no risk of that.
"It is probably true, as you all allege, that the clergy have become a gay club, reaching all the way up to the pope himself."
I have made no such allegation, and I'm not aware of anyone here except for you making that allegation. I certainly know of no evidence that Pope Benedict XVI is a homosexual, and I'm confident you have no evidence of it either. Please retract your unfounded, slanderous allegation of the Holy Father.
Homosexuality is in itself a morally neutral form of human sexuality.
And you know this is true because...? Unfortunately the Church doesn't and never has agreed with you. It is no sin to be have SSA, but it is a disorder desire just like havering to rob a bank.
It is not a chosen orientation, or a personality disorder, or a disease comparable to alcoholics.
It is a perversion that, whatever its origin, is a true cross to those afflicted with it.
Young homosexuals have been brutally oppressed by a society that subscribes to such mistaken theories.
I was never a homosexual, but I was brutally oppressed in middle school by always being chosen last when teems were being formed and had to eat my lunch alone. Lots of kids are "oppressed" in school, and some of them grow up to whine about it.
The Catholic Church in particular has a record in regard to gays that is every bit as shameful as its record in regard to Jews.
Since you would say that calling the practice of homo sex a *sin* to be "shameful" on the Churches part, I don't agree with you here. But then the Church often actively defended the Jews, so I don't trust you history there either.
Repentance and apologies are long overdue.
"The Catholic Church is indeed sorry to have told you perverted sinners that you are perverted sinners." Happy now?
Human beings have a right to the creative and life-affirming expression of their godgiven sexuality within the constraints of moral consideration of the rights of others.
Fine! As the sin of every man harms the Body of Christ, this would preclude any sort of sex outside of wedlock. I'm glad to agree with you here Father!
Prejudice against people on the grounds that they are homosexual is comparable to prejudice against Jews and blacks.
Prejudice against any such group is a sin against charity, but disapproval of sinful and perverted sexual practice is not prejudice.
The Vatican inquiry into seminaries, if it is meant to root out people of homosexual orientation, risks building on all the above evil attitudes and reinforcing them.
No, it risks breaking the lavender mafia's grip on the priesthood
It is probably true, as you all allege, that the clergy have become a gay club, reaching all the way up to the pope himself. If this club is to be dissolved, begin at the top, not with the most innocent and vulnerable.
Careful here Father, you are risking the sin of gossip. All men die and leave this world. Organizations are renewed by reconnecting to their roots and inspiring the young. This is what you see happening in the Church now, and you don't seem to like it.
The best way to dissolve the club is to invite non-gay people into the priesthood, thus correcting its skewed demographics.
Sounds good, but I hope you're not trying to sneak in woman "priests" here!
It is probably true, as you all allege, that the clergy have become a gay club, reaching all the way up to the pope himself. If this club is to be dissolved, begin at the top, not with the most innocent and vulnerable.
Fr O'Leary, are you suggesting that the current pope is, or any of the last several were, homosexual and/or that they were members of "the club"? Such insinuations are serious; if intended too, at least one should be owned as a charge and supported with evidence. Leaving this at the level of insinuation is most irresponsible.
Best,
Mike
If you guys are serious about degaying the church, which you see as in the grip of a lavender mafia, surely you should begin at the top. I have only slight access to Roman gossip, but by all accounts the Roman Curia itself is rife with homosexuality (il resto non dico). So what not put to all curial officials the question that is to be put to young seminarians: Do you suffer from homosexual impulses? Then you can oblige those who answer yes to step down and yield their influential posts to normal hotblooded heterosexual men. (On second thought, coldblooded heterosexuals would be better; remember that in the 14th to 15th centuries Rome was the capital of prostitution and concubinage while the more respectable clerics formed common law marriages.) If you really want a radical reform of the Church, begin at the top.
Frankly, I am pretty sure that if Paul VI or Benedict XVI were asked if they *suffered from homosexual impulses* they would answer in the affirmative. I don't think there is anything wrong with that; it is part of their humanity, their godgiven natural temperament; nor does it necessarily mean that their rigoristic pronouncements on homosexuality are in bad faith; they spoke out of the constraints of an age-old mentality and were incapable of bringing some of its basic, mistaken premisses into question. That's all.
If you really want a radical reform of the Church, begin at the top.
Father O'Leary, I have a very serious question. Why do you continue to work for an organization for whose leadership you consistently show such contempt?
Were you employed in the real world, and you behaved this way, you would have been fired long ago.
Maybe the "visitors" ought to start with your parish.
http://www.ildialogo.org/omoses/
This is a very interesting site, in Italian. The Church is not only the bullies that you, Tony, admire so much; it is also the many young and old gay catholics who suffer and are confused because of the hypocrisy of the clergy, all the way to the top. Have you ANY idea of the suffering of so many innocent people?
Here is how Christian homophobes treat their children -- and this is only the case of one who was still undamaged enough to be able to protest about it: http://www.gaypeopleschronicle.c...une/
0624053.htm
This is what the false psychology perpetrated by Philip Blosser and Jordan Potter leads to: http://a_musing.blogspot.com/200...age-of-
lia.html
http://www.washblade.com/2005/7-...nal/
gayteen.cfm
Here is a photo of the boy; Phil might like to give him a spanking!
The president of the association for survivors of clerical abuse denounces the Vatican's crackdown on gay seminarians: http://www.washblade.com/2005/9-...nal/
vatican.cfm
Mark Jordan has an excellent comment at the end of the piece I just linked (http://www.washblade.com/2005/9-16/news/national/
vatican.cfm) -- he says the results of the laughable investigation will be not fewer gay priests but fewer honest priests!
Phil is still ratting on about heresy and has still failed to provide ONE SINGLE EXAMPLE of a heresy from my lips. His dismantling of my views on the Incarnation petered out after some introductory clearings of the throat, to my disappointment. Perhaps he should study theology instead of pontificating on matters that he appears to know zilch about.
Father O'Leary, You still didn't answer my very simple question.
Why do you continue to work for an organization whose leadership you hold in such contempt?
One would think it would be a pretty easy question to answer. Since it is so easy to swim across the Tiber (the opposite way) to a Church who would gladly embrace your liberal views. What motivation would you have to stay as a Catholic priest? Seems somewhat of a sham to me.
The investigation will create exactly the climate of hypocrisy that lay behind clerical misbehavior with minors and behind the episcopal cover-up of same. So argues an objector in today's NYT: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/
2...artner=homepage
The failure of the church officials to investigate themselves is very telling. It has created a ludicrous situation, a real comedy, albeit more a black comedy than a wholesome farce. I suspect that the investigators in the 229 seminaries will play down the sexual aspect of their brief and make a song and dance about orthodoxy issues instead. I believe the 6-year investigation of 25 years ago was concerned with orthodoxy as well, and that it leaves sour memories in those who underwent it. These investigations are all that is needed to stamp out the last sparks of anything resembling theological inquiry in the dim seminary world. What the heck, American churches never thought they needed theology anyway, did they?
Tony, you think being a priest is a sham for me? So your brand of homophobia is a qualification for being a priest? But perhaps it is a disqualification for being a Christian? Qui se existimat stare, videat ne cadat.
Amazing how neocaths, some of them recent converts, love telling us liberals to GET OUT OF THE CHURCH! A touch of a God-complex about that attitude I would say -- though of course it is based on insecurity.
When Tony or Phil or Jordan can say that they have adhered unwaveringly to Catholic orthodoxy for 56 years, they may be in a position to have some idea of what orthodoxy means.
Much talk of a 1961 document barring gays from seminaries -- that was at a time when seminaries were packed to the seams with willing candidates. 44 years later vocations are exiguous and the gay purge, if carried out consistently, will reduce the seminarian population by a huge percentage. But it will also destroy whatever residual spark or personality the priesthood has left. The harried survivors of the purge will be a dismal residue. It seems clear that the Tridentine model of ministry is in its terminal phase, and that the church needs to open the presbyterate to married men, women, ands self-accepting gays. This seminary investigation is like Louis XVI ordering an investigation of his courtiers' dress while the revolutionaries are storming the palace. One factor that has been little mentioned is the intellectual nullity of seminarians today, whether gay or straight. Once the church could draw on the best and brightest for its ministry, now it will take any village idiot who can sign his name with an X as long as he goes through the motions of professing orthodoxy. Again, opening the presbyterate to the wide range of educated lay people including women would abolish this embarrassing situation overnight.
What I propose is a practical commonsense solution to a false problem created by neurotic clinging to dead traditions. Those who call this "heresy" reveal only their own insecurity.
"When Tony or Phil or Jordan can say that they have adhered unwaveringly to Catholic orthodoxy for 56 years, they may be in a position to have some idea of what orthodoxy means."
That's about the dumbest thing I've read in a while. So it takes 56 years of being a Catholic to be able to tell truth from error? How then could anyone ever convert to the Apostolic Faith?
"Frankly, I am pretty sure that if Paul VI or Benedict XVI were asked if they *suffered from homosexual impulses* they would answer in the affirmative."
Well, that's about clear as we're going to get it -- Father O'Leary thinks the late Paul VI has, and the current Holy Father has, what the Church says are disordered, perverted sexual affections.
"Amazing how neocaths, some of them recent converts, love telling us liberals to GET OUT OF THE CHURCH!"
Asking you why you remain in a religion you believe to be false is not the same as telling your to get out the Church. My desire and hope and prayer is not that you leave, but that you remain, and can come to accept what the Church holds to be true.
"It seems clear that the Tridentine model of ministry is in its terminal phase, and that the church needs to open the presbyterate to married men, women, and self-accepting gays."
You keep saying that we haven't found a single instance where you hold or propound a false doctrine, and yet you repeatedly say the Church not only can but must ordained women, even though the Church couldn't make it any clearer that the Church has absolutely no authority to ordain women. You've been given a choice, and you've chosen not to believe what the Church believes on this matter. You do the math.
As for "self-accepting gays," it is those who are "self-accepting" who make not only the worst priests but the worst Christians. Jesus commands us to deny self, not accept self. It's only the Christians who give up their lives who will save their lives.
Potter, your arrogance is boundless. So because I recommend women priests I no longer believe in the truth of my religion? And Jesus' message of self-denial means that gays must be self-hating? I think you are posing as an ultra-conservative closed-minded intransigent to please your own ego-ideal. You show little reflective concern for human welfare or for Christian truth. You have succeeded remarkably in making Christ's message of salvation sound very nasty, largely because of your deep-rooted homophobia, which you should analyze.
To see how truly odious your rantings about homosexuality are, just imagine that you had a gay son, who came to you and said, "dad, I think I'm gay". I guarantee that if you ran by him the hateful things you have said about gays on this forum, you would be inviting tragedy.
Oh I know you will answer, "I am merely repeating what the Holy Father says". A sort of Eichmann defense. Catholics repeated what the Holy Father said about Jews for centuries, and you know the result of that. Use your head, man.
As to papal sexuality, you can be quite sure that many popes have been gay. As Galileo put it, eppur si muove. You may expel nature with a pitchfork but she'll always come back and give you your come-uppence.
The analogy with the Church's mistake about the Jews should have warned us not to indulge in manichean condemnation of millions of our fellow humans. Ratzinger claims to have learned the first lesson even as he commits the same mistake in his horrendous utterances on gays. Thank God, gays have found their voice at last and are not putting up with bullying and obscurantism, and pharisaical hypocrisy, any more.
What humiliations the church heaped on Jews over the centuries, as they were forced to enact the misery of their "blindness" for the delectation and edification of the faithful! Gays are now saying "no, thank you" to this scapegoat role, and the bigots and bullies do not like it one bit.
When Ratzinger went to the Alps to seek inspiration, like Nietzsche, for his first encyclical, we wondered what bold statement would come out. So far, nothing. Now it looks as if Ratzinger's first papal statement will be an absurd, farcical document on homosexuality, unless last-minute wisdom prevails. Parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus! How disappointing, yet how fitting after all. There is a poetic justice in this bathos. Ratzinger spent thirty years repressing Catholic thought, and now the penury of his own thought will be on open display. The emperor has no clothes!
What do you make of all those priests speaking to the NYT on condition of anonymity, fearful that if their names were known they would be punished? Is this the church of Stalin or of Jesus? This is certainly the church of Ratzinger.
I asked a leading Catholic theologian what he expected of Ratzinger as Pope, and he answered. "the discrediting of the Vatican". If the forthcoming document is anything like what these anonymous priests say it is, this prophecy will begin to come true.
Bush is already a lame-duck president, Ratzinger seems headed to being a lame-duck pope. He has proved unable to cast off the unprepossessing image with which he came to the thrown.
Phil claims that the investigation of 229 seminaries will be expedited in a mere six months. If it is, it will merely have been a tactic to give the impression that the church is doing something about the painful scandals of recent years. A serious inquiry should take at least the six years that the last one took. Six years for an investigation based on false premises, a protracted farce causing problems and confusion at every turn!
Fr O'Leary:
I know homosexuality in the priesthood up close: as a victim of abuse by a priest in puberty, as one who has served as an instrument facilitating priestly vocations in others, as a close friend of several priests, and as a seminary adjunct professor in the past. Though I have no vocation to the priesthood, much to my past disappointment, I have learned from the above-cited experiences and from my own studies much that is relevant. On that basis, I have two things to say.
First, though it would be impossible to exclude from the priesthood all men who have experienced SSA and hence would be foolish to try, the men who should be excluded are those who affirm a homosexual identity for themselves as God-given and unchangeable. Such men can only reject the ancient and irreformable teaching of the Church, currently expressed by saying that homosexual acts are "intrinsically" disordered and inclination to such acts is "objectively" disordered. Given human nature, such rejection cannot but occasion sin and, worse, the clubbiness necessary to maintain the old protective cocoon around homosexual predators in the clergy.
Second, I believe that priests with views and attitudes such as yours on this complex of questions are part of the problem. Since it is not for me to say that you shouldn't be a priest, I won't. But a man who, in another comment box on this blog, says that young men praying the Rosary together is "redolent of homoeroticism", as if a prayer the Devil particularly hates were a form of incipient masturbation, tells me all I need to know that the spirit animating him is not of God.
I shall offer my next Rosary for you.
Best,
Mike
I am sorry to hear you were abused by a priest.
Nonetheless, you are committing an abuse yourself by describing gays as sufferers from SSA and as changeable into straights, and by denying that their sexuality is godgiven. Read my postings above about the monstrous perversion of parent-child relations to which this thinking leads.
I myself pray the Rosary every day. So you must be mistaken in supposing that I regard it as redolent of eroticism. Perhaps you might look again at what I actually did say?
I notice that in practice you call for the exclusion from priesthood only of self-affirming gays. But isn't it the self-hating types who are most likely to fall into abusive behavior -- spiritual abuse of the faithful, clandestine sexual abuse of the young and defenseless? A clear example is the repressed self-hating homosexuality of Archbishop John McQuaid, "ruler of Catholic Ireland" for decades; the full destructiveness of his career has become evident only when the archives his vanity assembled, 700 boxes of documents, fell into the hands of biographers. McQuaid would pass your entry test with flying colors, whereas many of the excellent gay priests whom you must know or know of would be cut off at the pass. In any case the Vatican plan is to banish all gays from seminaries, not only those whose ideology they dislike.
Coming back to Tony's question, I would say that it is highly likely that in, say, 30 years time, the Church will draw on the talents of women in the priesthood, and that its attitude to gays will have profoundly changed; already the more enlightened bishops are apologizing to gays for the abuse they have suffered over centuries at the hands of Mother Church. So one reason for remaining loyal to the Church is to make one's small contribution to that happy future. Of course it is not the only reason; but we are not discussing here the depths of doctrine, only the surface misunderstandings that, however painful their effects, are far from the centre of the Gospel message.
Here is the best account I have found on what the forthcoming inquiry is seeking to achieve. Gayness is mentioned in only one of 55 questions (but one of the six questions to which an answer is mandatory). The whole thing seems far more sensible than we had been led to believe, with a wide focus on the integral formation of the future ministers.
Perhaps the forthcoming Vatican document will not be as bad as advance notices suggest -- if indeed it is issued at all.
I suppose those bishops who really are obsessed by homosexuality will put the emphasis there while others will play it down.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/0...5261/
573644.stm
This is the link for the account I mentioned.
Mirabile dictu, I discover that Amy Welborn -- of the neocath blogosphere -- has a very balanced attitude to gayness in the seminaries: http://amywelborn.typepad.com/
op..._to_rumble.html
What a wonderful blogsite this is (http://amywelborn.typepad.com/openbook/2005/09/
ready_to_rumble.html)! The discussion is open, frank, courteous, and there are as many women as men. The whole atmostphere is healthier, and in the best sense more Catholic, than when we have in the spooky group Phil Blosser has attracted. I think I'd do better to join in that instructive discussion rather than waste any more time with the rank homophobia that poisons this particular coterie.
I agree completely with Amy's statement as follows:
I agree that those who embrace a "gay" identity as defined by American culture should not be admitted to seminary, because most of the time, that self-definition is formed more by American culture than by Church teaching. Andrew Sullivan, for example, is complaining long and loud about this, but the truth is that, judging from his previous writings, Sullivan doesn't have any problem with, for example, sexual promiscuity, obsessions and fetishes as lived out in the gay subculture, sees all of that beyond the pale of possible judgment, and for all of his hopes for the positive impact of gay families (which I believe is sincere), has absolutely no connection with the ways that Catholic tradition has conceptualized and thought about sexuality. You're laughing because you're saying "Of course," but I'm making the point because there's a veneer of tradition that some would like to try to pretend exists: that the self-identified, political gay position is capable of simply espousing gay marriage, for example, or the morality of love-inspired homosexual acts, and at the same time retaining the rest of traditional Catholic morality underneath it all.
I say...that position can't and, isn't really interested. So for that reason, sure, the self-identified political gay man shouldn't be in seminary.
But should the man who struggles with same-sex attraction and seeks to live chastely, who buys the whole package of Catholic moral teaching, be put into that category? Absolutely not. To me, that's insane, and truth be told, it's not that difficult to tell the difference. And if you think that your list of favorite, orthodox priests through the ages doesn't include at least one who's struggled with same-sex attraction, you're mistaken, and I'll bet you real money. Not that we can prove it, of course.
I do not, however, agree with you that it's "abusive" to deny that homosexual orientation is God-given. (I won't even bother rebutting your claim that considering such orientation "changeable" is also abusive, as though I ever said it always was changeable. The evidence suggests that it sometimes is—to a greater or lesser extent, and if the person wants that—but that more often it is not.) JP 2's "theology of the body" explains why heterosexuality is God-given (though corrupted by original sin); but for some of the same reasons, homosexuality is not God-given. It is one of the corruptions bequeathed by original sin. To affirm the contrary is clean contrary to Scripture, Tradition, and the Magisterium when read, as Dei Verbum would have us read them, together. Your position is heretical.
Best,
Mike
Heterosexuality is godgiven, and for the same reasons homosexuality is godgiven. Crying "heresy!" is futile. We are living in a world where people are more and more open and frank about their sexual orientation (including bisexuality) and to class some people as intrinsically disordered in their orientation while others are intrinsically well-order just does not wash! You can say that heterosexuality is normative but a norm does not exclude minor variants etc.
"Frankly, I am pretty sure that if Paul VI or Benedict XVI were asked if they *suffered from homosexual impulses* they would answer in the affirmative. I don't think there is anything wrong with that; it is part of their humanity, their godgiven natural temperament; nor does it necessarily mean that their rigoristic pronouncements on homosexuality are in bad faith; they spoke out of the constraints of an age-old mentality and were incapable of bringing some of its basic, mistaken premisses into question. That's all." Fr. Joseph O'Leary, Tokyo.
Well, enough is enough! Slandering our sweet Vicar of Christ, the gloriously reigning Pontiff, is just too much... Does the defamer have any evidence of this?
Please read the discussion at Amy Welborn's site. It is infinitely more varied and interesting than what can be found here. It reflects the variety of America and of American Catholicism. The rigid homophobia that dominates this site is traceable to Phil Blosser himself, he of the "fags and queers" talk and the Juvenalian jokes about sodomites's piles. The different atmosphere of the other site is similarly traceable to the personal graciousness and reflectiveness of Amy Welborn.
I have a lot of conflicted feelings and ideas on these sexual issues, but I think the points I articulated in my first contribution to the present thread express some basic certitudes that have been with me for decades and that have served me well in reflection and debate.
I notice that there is general agreement among the Welbornites, in opposition to the Blosserites, that there should not be a ban on homosexual seminarians as such but only on those who identify with American gay culture and reject celibacy. It is hard to argue with that, even if one considers the celibacy regime a failed exercise in human engineering as Daniel Maguire does. In fact the Church would be better engaged in helping its gay sons and daughters to live responsible sexual lives, rather than expecting celibacy of them.
New Cath, we're all rather open about our sexual orientation these days, even public figures. My view of Benedict XVI in that regard is based on close study of the man and his writings since 1968, as well as numerous anecdotes about him. I did not intend any slander, just a personal impression. Would you say that to surmise of someone that they are Jewish or black is a slander? If you did, the racism and antisemitism would be your own responsibility.
Twenty posts in about six hours. Whew!
Just a few comments in response to the bazillions of comments Fr. O'Leary has posted since midnight "Blosser time."
"So because I recommend women priests I no longer believe in the truth of my religion?"
How can you believe your religion is true if you think it is false on a point where it claims to be true?
As for Amy Welborn's weblog, I've been over there, and it's alright -- definitely noisier and busier than Dr. Blosser's little corner of the internet. Guess I like it quieter. If Fr. O'Leary likes it better over there, that'll be okay.
Ah, Daniel Maguire: the Apostle of Abortion. No surprise he despises celibacy--it parallels his views on the dispensibility of marriage vows, having dumped his first wife for someone more interesting.
"I think I'd do better to join in that instructive discussion rather than waste any more time with the rank homophobia that poisons this particular coterie."
And yet you're still here. Why? How many times have you "quit" this blog? A man of God should possess the fortitude to stick to his decisions, and yet you keep coming back here to express your disapproval of our so-called homophobia. Why keep repeating yourself? Will you never be satisfied until the people here either grovel in repentance or participate in an all-out gay orgy?
"Heterosexuality is godgiven, and for the same reasons homosexuality is godgiven."
You sound like a parody of a strict Calvinist, claiming that God forces his creatures to sin. If it is natural for someone to have homosexual feelings, then why is it not natural to desire something like, say, violence? If someone cuts me off on the freeway and I immediately feel the urge to ram his car off the road, how can you say this is not "godgiven"? After all, once I've committed the act I might feel a whole lot better and less stressed out, and maybe I could even get a group of people together to beat up on random people. A veritable fight club. If my violent tendencies are suppressed or preached against, I'll start feeling very negative thoughts about myself. I mean, look at all this pent-up anger I need to let out, and here's the Church telling me it's unnatural and sinful! God gave me these feelings, and it would be dishonest of me not to act them out.
And if you or anyone else says otherwise, you're a furyphobic.
Father O'Leary,
I notice you refer to the Holy Father as "Ratzinger".
When you were ordained, did you take a vow of obedience to your bishop and all his successors?
Good one, Jon.
And actually I believe that repugnance to homosexual behavior and acts (which our Irish-Japanese friend would call "homophobia") is quite natural, too, isn't it?
So Fr O'Leary is being homophobophobic!!! Oh, the intolerance!!!!
It is possible, I believe, that a person who suffers from homosexual inclinations may have these inclinations lessened, if not eliminated altogether. There do seem to be some cases when this cannot, or at least does not, happen. In either case, even in cases when it does happen, it does not happen easily or quickly. Regardless, there are persons who find themselves with homosexual inclinations at least temprarily, if not permanently, who did not choose this state. This is clear enough in the CDF document on the subject. We need assume no culpability on the part of the person who suffers from such inclinations, merely from the fact that they do so suffer. And, at the very least, during the time that they do suffer from such inclinations, they deserve our compassion, even if it is conceivable that these inclinations may at some future time be removed, due to extensive and thoroughgoing therapy.
To imagine that a person who suffers from such inclinations can simply make up his mind otherwise, and immediately become a stable, healthy heterosexual, is wishful thinking. Hence, compassion, respect, etc.
(blosser fils)
Note that the above quote from Jamie Blosser, while conceding too much to homophobia by figuring homosexuality as a mere inclination that might conceivably be corrected by therapy, nonetheless speaks of COMPASSION and RESPECT for gay people. How come that these words have NEVER been used by the true homophobes who populate his dad's site?
Do you guys ever get beyond square one?
From this report in Le Monde http://www.lemonde.fr/web/articl...1-
691953,0.html
I see that the document announced by the Vatican is not due for publication anytime soon. The 1961 directive on not accepting gays was never applied; a dead letter in fact, like the contemporary directives about keeping Latin in use. Basically the Vatican is doing no more at the moment than making a vague noise. The trouble is that this vague noise has caught a lot of people's attention and confirmed the image of the church as regressive and homophobic. I see that Tony Anatrella, priest-psychoanalyst, is quoted in the Le Monde piece. My psychoanalyst friend tells me that Anatrella is regarded as a walking disaster by the psychoanalytical community. His writings on homosexuality are totally homophobic. Nonetheless he is the French church's number one spokesman on sexuality!
The church is totally unable to handle the gaying of the priesthood because the church has stifled all honest public discourse on homosexuality for so long. It has ostracized the very experts it now needs to make sense of its self-created quandary -- the McNeills, Sipes, Jordans, Drewermanns. The ridiculous postures it is now adopting as it goes through the motions of miming transparent self-examination is all part of the reward of a culture of mendacity -- a come-uppance worthy of the highest comedy -- of Moliere -- so sit back and enjoy the spectacle, folks!
More pious c--p from Tony: "I notice you refer to the Holy Father as "Ratzinger". When you were ordained, did you take a vow of obedience to your bishop and all his successors?"
An ordinand makes a promise of obedience and respect to the bishop -- not a vow as such (in fact it seems to be an error to speak of "vows" in regard to secular clergy). Such a promise in no way excludes referring to bishops by their unadorned surnames, as is in fact the common usage among the clergy everywhere. Sorry if that offends your selective notions of piety!
Irrational and mendacious positions inevibably betray themselves by the emergence of the sure index of falsehood, namely CONTRADICTION.
One such contradiction is that gays are blamed for identifying themselves as gay, as if their sexual orientation defined who they are, while at the same time this very sexual orientation is taken as an essential defining mark whereby seminarians are to be accepted or rejected. This contradiction was caught in a letter on J Akin's site:
"If one is going to say that it is imprudent to ordain a man because a particular condition he has preempts any other consideration and that demonstrated behavior is irrelevant, doesn't same-sex attraction logically become something which a man can form his entire identity around? Isn't it ultimately contemptuous of human individuality for consideration of a candidate to cease based upon the presence of any condition regardless of how the candidate deals with that condition? Fundamental identity, it seems, becomes rooted in the temptations a candidate faces.
"If the Church is going to make a prudential judgment that a candidate with same-sex attraction is ill-equipped to handle the rigors of the priesthood and that he is, in the final analysis, a ticking time-bomb poised to prey upon the innocent, what is to stop every faithful Catholic from making the exact same prudential judgment about mere association with such a person?"
Among critics of the purge-the-gays mentality is Fr John Harvey of COURAGE, who may now find himself forced to change his views in order to continue in his role as poster boy of orthdoxy!
"doesn't same-sex attraction logically become something which a man can form his entire identity around?"
What the point here? You can form your entire identity around any disorder or sin. So what?
"Do you guys ever get beyond square one?"
Do you ever have anything to talk about but homosexuality and women's ordination?
Potter, the point is that the Vatican accuses gays of forming their identity around their sexuality and then proceed to do exactly the same thing itself. Do you really not get the point or do you systematically pretend not to?
Homosexuality is the chief topic of this (all-male) site, in case you haven't noticed. One really wonders why! You guys seem to get a perverse kick out of repeating all the old chestnuts of homophobes, never learning, never leaving square one.
But I do talk about religious pluralism on Chris Blosser's site today.
Meanwhile it seems that the Vatican has made a strategic error in leaking information about its forthcoming document in order to test the waters of American public opinion. This has allowed every kind of fear and suspicion to be aroused. Only a tiny group of neocath freaks are welcoming Rome's purge-the-gays line; the decent majority of people are appalled. And the Vatican's stance is being defined by the media coverage which has its own dynamic, so that even if the final document modifies this and tries to be fair and rational the damage to the church's image and to the pope's image has already been done. This is the first papacy for centuries to be defined by such a petty, mole-like document. Ratzinger is coming across as a very narrow man, which of course we always knew him to be. He risks becoming a sort of lameduck Pope at the very beginning of his pontificate (as Paul VI and John Paul II were only in their final days).
Note that the attempt to heal the church's image by making noises about purging gays has had the effect of creating the worst image of the church since the pedophile scandals, and this not only in America but throughout the world. It is by far the most newsworthy event of Ratzinger's pontificate so far -- and it is a downer!
"Homosexuality is the chief topic of this (all-male) site, in case you haven't noticed. One really wonders why!"
Because you're obsessed with the topic of homosexuality and hardly talk about anything else. Since you tyrannise the conversations here, we find ourselves dragged back to rebutting your erroneous statements and un-Catholic beliefs about homosexuality.
"you're obsessed with the topic of homosexuality and hardly talk about anything else. Since you tyrannise the conversations here, we find ourselves dragged back to rebutting your erroneous statements and un-Catholic beliefs"
ERRONEOUS in your opinion, and you have failed to provide any REBUTTAL, merely assertion of your own ideas about homosexuality, which are very ill-informed. Have you read any of the authors I recommended? Do you ever read anything? You seem to spend more time on this site than anyone else, but how barren are your contributions!
Have you any gay friends? Have you even had a frank talk with them about homosexuality, on which you pontificate with such assurance?
If one of your kids were gay would you trot out your barren and static dogmas? If one of your children asks for bread do you give him a stone?
O'Leary is a homophobophobic and I resent his intolerance!!!
Oh, and there's this: the dreaded document HAS ALREADY BEEN APPROVED by the pope in his audience with Cardinal Grocholewsky last week. As it usually happens with such congregation documents, it will be a few weeks or months before it is published -- certainly after the Synod of Bishops.
Actually, my only complaint about this document is that it does not establish the appropriate sodomite-hunt inside the Church. We are witnesses in our Catholic lives and even in small peaceful "places", such as this weblog, that the sodomitical infiltration in the clergy is immense, powerful, influent, and vicious, poisoning so many lives -- in North, Central, and South America, in Europe, Australia, and even (as we see) in the Far East.
You post 40 times about homosexuality in this thread and accuse everyone else of obsessing about it?
The most remarkable case of projection I have seen in some time.
"ERRONEOUS in your opinion, and you have failed to provide any REBUTTAL, merely assertion of your own ideas about homosexuality, which are very ill-informed."
If referring to the teachings of Holy Church do not impress or have the slightest effect on a Catholic priest, of all people, then no rebuttal is possible.
"Have you read any of the authors I recommended?"
No, I don't believe so, but I have read homosexualist authors, especially those who play games with Holy Scripture and Church teaching in an attempt to explain away what Jesus and the Apostles want us to believe. I've concluded that their arguments and positions are erroneous.
"Do you ever read anything?"
There's not a day that I don't read.
"You seem to spend more time on this site than anyone else, but how barren are your contributions!"
Yes, I do visit here almost every day if not every day, and lately you've given me plenty of occasion to post comments here.
You, however, post more comments here than anyone else (when you're here, that is -- you were away for a good while, but boy are you ever back), and it's always about the same things -- usually about how wrong Jesus is about homosexuality, and how God is going to have to come around to your way of thinking.
"Have you any gay friends? Have you even had a frank talk with them about homosexuality, on which you pontificate with such assurance?"
Yes, I have homosexual friends, but no, I don't talk to them about their problems. They know what I believe, and they've heard it all before. I pray for them, and try to show them Christian charity -- God can save them, and I pray He does soon, because they are so obviously unhappy living the way they do.
"If one of your kids were gay would you trot out your barren and static dogmas?"
Yes, I would make sure he or she understands what the truth is. I wouldn't stop loving him, of course, though I'd be heartbroken for him.
"If one of your children asks for bread do you give him a stone?"
No, I would not give him a stone -- that is, I wouldn't approve of his sin or give my blessing to his perversion.
Has it ever occurred to you that you might be wrong about this, Father?
"Anonymous" wonders why homosexuality seems to dominate this site. That overstates the matter, certainly, as a quick scroll through past posts shows. However, it is fair to ask why the topic has been raised again and why it has struck such a nerve; and the answer takes no great effort to discern. The Apostolic Visitations have been in the news. I posted an article on the visitations on Sept. 19th ("Apostolic visitations of all U.S. seminaries to start next month"). The article makes no mention of homosexuality. So who do you think dredges up this tedious topic on this site? Who pours out avelanches of comments obsessively devoted to this topic, spiking the average number of comments from the usual 12-20 up to 50-70?
"Potter, your arrogance is boundless."
Funny. Fr. O'Leary ("Spirit of Vatican II") offers gratuitous ad hominem attacks like this, and then wonders why there's so little said about "COMPASSION" and "RESPECT" on this site. This is a red herring. It is because of their compassion and respect for those suffering from SSA that his opponents take the positions they do. By contrast, O'Leary shows little respect for his opponents and his position entails little genuine compassion, as opposed to narcissistic self-indulgence, for those suffering from SSA.
"So because I recommend women priests I no longer believe in the truth of my religion?"
Oh, c'mon! So because Jesus chose no women disciples He no longer believes in the truth of His?
"And Jesus' message of self-denial means that gays must be self-hating?"
Twist and shout: you're twisting what Mr. Potter said and shouting foul. Nobody ever said a man who has same-sex attractions ought to hate himself. One's "self" is what God created, which is good. However, that's not the same as the ebullient idiocy of asserting that the grave disorder of same-sex attraction is itself a "precious gift" of God to be "treasured," any more than congenital disposition to parinoia or color blindness is.
"I think you are posing as an ultra-conservative closed-minded intransigent to please your own ego-ideal. You show little reflective concern for human welfare or for Christian truth. You have succeeded remarkably in making Christ's message of salvation sound very nasty, largely because of your deep-rooted homophobia, which you should analyze."
Oh such ad-hominems! These are so easy, and cut both ways: And I think you are posing an ultra-trendy-lefty closed-minded intransigent to please your own ego-ideal. You show little reflective concern for human welfare or for Christian truth. You have succeeded remarkably in making Christ's message of salvation sound very nasty, largely because of your deep-rooted phobia of orthodoxy and the Holy Father, which you should analyze.
Compassion? Pity? I feel something like these for Fr. O'Leary here, in whose comments I detect a couple of things -- something a bit like a plaintive swan song, something a bit like the fear and indignation of a cornered scamp ... as if daddy called to say he and mother would be home tomorrow, unexpectedly early, and the party in his parents' house he'd invited all his friends to would soon be over. Scheler: the resistance of reality.
Dr. Blosser,
Are you going to post Part III of your announced five part rebuttal to Fr. O'Leary's article "Demystifying the Incarnation?"
I would hope an intellectual engagement between you and he -- one of a different sort than the above comments -- could be engendered, point by point.
I've just done a little re-reading of the comments in this thread, and spotting a real whopper I'd missed the first time (so easy to do with Fr. O'Leary's verbosity): "Catholics repeated what the Holy Father said about Jews for centuries, and you know the result of that."
I would say the real problem is that Catholics weren't attentive enough to what the Holy Father said about the Jews. They heard the some of the parts about the Jews' errors resulting from their rejection of their Messiah, and the rules about not marrying or doing business with Jews, but they stopped their ears to what the Holy Father said about the Christian obligation to show charity to them, to stop harassing and persecuting them, to stop believing the hideous lies about child abduction and human sacrifice and demonism.
The truth, as usual, is never as simple as some would like to think.
It is true that the Papacy was often a defender of the Jews. But the Popes were great constructors of Ghettos; expansion of the Papal States meant less freedom for the Jews. In Rome Jews repaid papal protection by being compelled to hear public sermons in which their blindness was denounced.
Basic papal teaching on Judaism put the Jews firmly in their place: what every Catholic heard when I was a boy was "the perfidious Jews". We understood that the Jewish people were under a curse.
It is reported that John XXIII said that the Church's treatment of Jews amounted to crucifying Christ a second time.
Ask Jews themselves what they think of this history, and ask gays what they think of the Church's brutal record in their regard.
You reduce it to schoolyard bullying, but that is only a tiny part of the oppression.
Young gays are cast into a state of mystification, self-doubt and self-hatred by the Catholic demonization of their godgiven sexuality. For many this leads to suicide; it is a major cause of adolescent suicides.
As always it is the innocent and most vulnerable who pay for the callousness and self-serving silence of the powerful and of those who should know better.
Jews do not look favorably upon the Inquisition. Doesn't that in and of itself lend support to Fr. O'Leary's judgment?
Why are Catholic/Jewish relations so strained even today? Because no one listened to the Holy Father? Is that what you're saying? If so, it's not a compelling argument.
I don't think my words are all that difficult to comprehend, Jerry.
There can be no denying that the problems between Catholics and Jews are in large part to be attributed to Catholics being insufficiently Catholic -- including not listening to the Holy Father (as Fr. O'Leary apparently does on several matters).
I doubt most people look favorably on the Inquisition (at least one would hope so), but then I also doubt most people really know anything about the Inquisition. It's not surprising that Jews would be ignorant of Catholicism, or of the reasons for the sins that Catholics have committed against them. I don't see how Jewish ignorance of the Inquisition can support Fr. O'Leary's contention that Catholic doctrine pertaining to Judaism is to blame for Gentile persecution of Jews. (One wonders what Fr. O'Leary thinks was/is the cause of Jewish persecution of Christians.)
For most Jews, Gentiles and Christians are, or have been portrayed as, a faceless hostile "Other," just as Gentile Christians have been taught to think of Jews as nothing more than faceless, pernicious "others." Thanks to original sin, it's so much easier for us to nurse grudges, to cling to false perceptions and prejudices, that to seek truth and pursue it. But that's the only thing that will save us from the perpetuation from the errors and crimes of the past.
Fr. O'Leary:
Young gays are cast into a state of mystification, self-doubt and self-hatred by the Catholic demonization of their godgiven sexuality. For many this leads to suicide; it is a major cause of adolescent suicides.
As always it is the innocent and most vulnerable who pay for the callousness and self-serving silence of the powerful and of those who should know better.
Your argument is fatally flawed. What is absolutely mystifying about this assertion (leaving aside the loaded term "demonization") is the underlying naive presumption that the Church's teaching on homosexuality has such a profound impact on the secular worldview.
It presumes that the same society (including most self-identified Catholics) who ignore the Church when it speaks against contraception, abortion, divorce, premarital sex and polyamory (to name but five common practices), suddenly starts nodding attentively when the Church says "homosexual acts are intrinsically ordered," but then instantly gets glassy-eyed again when the Church insists in the same breath that homosexuals are to be "accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity."
It involves the same giant leap of illogic as those who condemn the Church's stance on condom use in Africa: it assumes that promiscuous and adulterous men who disregard the Church's stance on pre- or extra-marital sex are dutiful sons of the Church with respect to condoms.
Absolutely illogical.
Not "who ignore", but "which ignores." Ack.
The ongoing difficulties that exist between Catholics and Jews are also found at the official level, i.e., between leaders of both religions. Indeed, high level talks about reconciliation were suspended earlier this year.
The individuals engaged in such dialogue are not "ignorant" Jews and Catholics. They are well-educated and represent official positions. But, they are separated by difficult theological, philosophical, and historical issues.
Thus, ignorance cannot explain away the tension that exists between Catholics and Jews. Jews who know the Inquisition still condemn it. And the same is true of Catholics. Not surprisingly.
Despite this, you make an important point. One I will not deny. But it is not the entire story. Like it or not, there is a solid basis for what O'Leary has said. Even JPII pleaded for forgiveness for sins the Church committed against the Jews.
Face it guys, ya'll never understand the holiness of priest/altar boy erotic love.
"Indeed, high level talks about reconciliation were suspended earlier this year."
Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't there also a falling out because some Jewish scholars have swallowed the libelling of Pius XII hook, line, and sinker?
"Jews who know the Inquisition still condemn it. And the same is true of Catholics. Not surprisingly."
I certainly condemn the abuses and excesses of the Inquisition(s), of which there were many, though nowhere near as many as the Black Legend has claimed.
"Despite this, you make an important point. One I will not deny. But it is not the entire story. Like it or not, there is a solid basis for what O'Leary has said."
Thanks for your concession -- it is very much appreciated. However, I still have big problems with: "Catholics repeated what the Holy Father said about Jews for centuries, and you know the result of that."
"Even JPII pleaded for forgiveness for sins the Church committed against the Jews."
That's one of many, many things that I loved about him -- and still love about him (for he is gone from us, but I hope and trust he is with Jesus now, or at the very least will be soon).
Whoops. Left my name off my comment again.
Dale Price, I pointed out that youngs gays are psychologically destroyed by the church's demonization of their sexuality. You query "the underlying naive presumption that the Church's teaching on homosexuality has such a profound impact on the secular worldview". But in countries like Italy, Spain and Ireland the connection between church teaching and the psychological torture of gays is DIRECT. The secular worldview has been a blessing for gays; most homophobia in America has Christian sources, not secular ones.
Potter insinuates that church persecution of Jews, gays, etc. was the result of Original Sin and not of the specifics of church teaching.
That won't wash. The "teaching of contempt" was the direct source of the humiliations and restraints to which Jews were subject in civil life in Christian states (and which were the model for those imposed by Hitler). The expulsion of all Jews from England and the forced conversion of all Jews in Spain also have roots in Christian theology.
The Vatican have not even begun to apologize for two of its cardinal institutions over many centuries, namely the crusades and inquisitions. These were at the very heart of Roman theology, canon law, politics and spirituality.
Gays come second only to Jews as scapegoats of this system.
Two little quotes that may have some relevance:
"the church does not do justice to the flesh" (Mauriac)
"Christianity gave eros poison to drink. But eros did not die. It sickened, and became vice" (Nietzsche)
There are no "gays". There are sodomites and sodomite-wannabes. The sad thing is that they had to take possession of this happy word to pretend their miserable situation is joyful.
In their own flesh they receive the punishment for their wickedness, thus warned the holy Apostle.
New Catholic, if you have an adolescent son or daughter, he or she may be suffering right now from the realization that their sexual orientation is to the same sex rather than to the opposite sex. He or she has probably no idea of what "sodomy" is, and indeed many sexually active gays never practice sodomy at all, but are content with other forms of sexual expression (kissing, cuddling, petting, to begin with). You have categorized your own child's sexuality as a kinky wanna-be-a-sodomist pathology.
Jordan,
I couldn't agree more about JPII. He recognized not only the strengths of the Church but its weaknesses and excesses. Clearly there exists a plenitude of both. For this reason, he expressed joy and sorrow -- a full human commitment.
JPII's stance unleashed a profound sense of reconciliation within and without the Church. In so doing, he demonstrated that to admit weakness is to diminish nothing. But to deny weakness is to diminish everything.
NYT talks of "anger and sadness among some gay priests and seminarians who say they may soon have to decide whether to stay or leave, to remain silent or to speak out."
"I do think about leaving," said a 30-year old Franciscan seminary student. "It's hard to live a duplicitous life, and for me it's hard not to speak out against injustice. And that's what this is."
In telephone interviews on Thursday with gay priests and seminarians in different parts of the country, all were adamant that their names not be used because they feared repercussions from their bishops or church superiors. IS THIS THE CHURCH OF STALIN?
"I find that I am becoming more and more angry," said a 40-year-old priest on the West Coast who said he had not decided whether to reveal his homosexuality publicly. "This is the church I've given my life to and I believe in. I look at every person I come in contact with as someone who's created in the image and likeness of God, and I expect that from the church that I'm a part of. But I always feel like I'm 'less than.' "
The fears by gay priests and seminarians intensified this week after news reports from the Vatican that a long-awaited church document will bar gay men, even those who are celibate, from becoming Roman Catholic priests.
Some conservative priests welcomed the changes. The Rev. John Trigilio Jr., president of the Confraternity of Catholic Clergy, a conservative 400-member group based in Harrisburg, Pa., said that barring gay men from seminaries was "for their own good," just as the church once barred epileptics from the priesthood.
"It's pretty much the same thing," Father Trigilio said. "The work and the ministry of the priesthood is going to be too demanding and will put a strain on them. He's going to have to spend five to eight years in a seminary where he's only going to be with men."
One gay seminarian in his 30's responded that such reasoning was "ridiculous" and that he has lived harmoniously for four years with a group of mostly heterosexual seminarians.
"Homosexual men are socialized differently," he said. "We have spent our whole lives living and working with other men. We've been on the same school teams, shared the same locker rooms, been in the same fraternities, and we are accustomed to being around people to whom we are attracted. To suggest that because one has a homosexual orientation one is unable to control one's sexual impulses is, frankly, insulting."
He said "it would be hard to imagine" staying in the seminary, because "I take very seriously the church and the authority of the episcopacy."
Gay priests say they are being scapegoated for crimes committed by pedophiles and covered up by bishops who never faced any discipline. The interviews made clear that they now had the strong sense of being persecuted by their own church.
"I feel like a Jew in Berlin in the 1930's," said a 48-year-old gay priest who has spent 18 ye
"I feel like a Jew in Berlin in the 1930's," said a 48-year-old gay priest who has spent 18 years in a religious order. He said he was considering donning a pink triangle - the symbol used by the Nazis - and getting heterosexual priests and members of the laity to wear the triangles as a protest.
WELL WE WON'T SEE THAT, ANY MORE THAN WE SAW NON-JEWS PROTEST ABOUT HITLER'S TREATMENT OF JEWS IN 1933.
Jerry, it is all very well to speak up for Jews, but given the theme of this thread, I would like to hear a word of support for your gay sisters and brothers as well. Thanks.
http://www.corriere.it/Primo_Pia.../23/
ruini.shtml
Cardinal Ruini, facing whistling youths who cry "shame" and "siamo tutti omosessuali" responded with smirks and smugness that outdo George Bush!
Gay Men Ponder Impact of Proposal by Vatican: A Response
What struck me in this article on whether or not the Vatican will ban potential or current gay seminary students is the explicit conflation of homosexuality with pedophilia.
Laurie Goodstein writes, "A study commissioned by the American [Catholic] bishops found last year that nearly 80 percent of those abused were boys." These were not cases of gay priests who forsook their vow of celibacy by having consensual sex with men 18 and older. No, these were pedophiles who radically misused their authority as ecclesiastical leaders to gain the trust of underage boys and secretly abusing them.
This conflation of gay men as child abusers has a long history, one that has the potential of being perpetuated by the Catholic Church. As a gay man who was sexually abused as a boy, who has never abused a child, and who has healthy relationships with adult gay men, I find this potential move by the Catholic Church offensive and highly uneducated.
In my opinion, the Catholic Church needs to focus its research on why the priesthood either attracts pedophiles or potentially creates them rather than singling out gay priests as the scapegoat.
Daryl Carr
San Francisco
A psychological issue that needs to be studied is this: WHY are Catholics so fascinated by celibacy, especially in males? What exactly is the fascination of this precious object? Why are Catholics so enthusiastic about celibacy, even for their own children? Why are they so distressed if priests are not celibate?
I really do not know the answers to these questions, though surrounded by the cult of celibacy all my life.
Can any of you guys explain why celibacy is so important to you? Has it a concrete moral or spiritual significance for your own lives, as opposed to that idealized priest-image that you seem to have made into a fetish (with all the unconscious erotic implication of this)?
I can make some sense of celibacy as an ascetic discipline in certain circumstances. But the mystique of celibacy -- or of the sexless adult male, as it boils down to -- strikes me as odd, puzzling, in need of explanation.
Fr. O'Leary:
Repeating the same illogical argument with higher volume doesn't make it any less flawed. You have offered *no* evidence--none--to support your position. Your claim of "demonization" is refuted by the clear command of the Catechism, not so BTW (e.g., the Church's mandate that homosexuals are to be accepted.
The inhabitants of those Catholic countries (Italy and Spain) are almost wholly secularized and laugh off the Church's sexual teachings (both are nowhere near replacement birth levels, for starters), including that on homosexuality. If homosexuals are experiencing "demonization," it is strictly a pagan phenomenon. At the very least, you bear the burden of showing a direct link between the teaching of the Church and any such hostility. You have not even attempted to meet that burden. Ipse dixits need not apply.
Indeed, the term "demonization" is nearly laughable, considering how officially Muslim nations or communist Cuba treat their homosexual citizenry. Yeah--it's the Church's fault.
"In so doing, he demonstrated that to admit weakness is to diminish nothing. But to deny weakness is to diminish everything."
Amen, brother! I think St. Paul said something like, if we're going to boast, let's boast about our infirmities and weaknesses.
I sure have enough of those.
When I am weak, then I'm strong, he also said. Helps with the humility thing -- gets ego out of the way so God can work in you without self getting in the way. At least in theory.
"WELL WE WON'T SEE THAT, ANY MORE THAN WE SAW NON-JEWS PROTEST ABOUT HITLER'S TREATMENT OF JEWS IN 1933."
So the Apostolic Visitation is like the Holocaust?
"Gay priests say they are being scapegoated for crimes committed by pedophiles and covered up by bishops who never faced any discipline."
That's balderdash, since we now know that 80% of the reported cases of sexual abuse by priests involved teenage boys and young men. It's impossible to continue to call it a pedophilia problem -- it's a homosexuality problem.
But I think they're right about the wayward bishops not facing appropriate discipline.
A mother here in Japan forced her 28 year old gay son to go to a psychiatrist, who told him it was the mother not himself who had a problem.
Needless to say, the mother was a Catholic.
Protestant sects go much further in demonizing gayness and gays, as do fundamentalist sects within Islam. But the Catholic church, a much larger organization, has also done a very effective job of poisoning young gay people's lives.
The fact that you can see this evil in Islam indicates that you are not incapable of seeing it in Catholicism if you take the blinkers from your eyes.
An Italian man burnt himself alive in St Peter's Square to protest the way the Vatican was fomenting murderous homophobia in Italy. And this was quite recently.
It is not a pedophilia problem, but a gay problem. True, most so-called pedophile cases seem to be about minors, who in many European countries would not be counted as minors at all.
The outcry about pedophilia has nothing to do with protecting kids, then, and everything to do with stopping gay priests expressing their sexuality?
Or what are you saying?
I see that even YOUNG MEN, not minors, are considered *victims* if their sexual partner is a priest. Well, the logical end point of that is to make all homosexual sex an abuse and to make it a criminal offense. That is just what the Vatican would like. And in the same breath they talk about their compassion and understanding for gays!
The Bishops of Northern Ireland, a place where you would feel at home, protested in 1980 or so against the decriminalization of homosexuality, possible under Vatican pressure (i.e. Ratzinger). Largely due to catholic and clerical hypocrisy it took until 1993 for homosexual acts to be decriminalized. All gay young people were given to understand that in the eyes of church and state they were potential criminals. I call that demonization.
Correction, it was probably 1982 or possibly 1987 that the bishops of Northern Ireland made their shameful intervention (I denounced it as mortally sinful in The Irish Times at the time); possibly Ratzinger was behind it.
Your arguments completely confirm the accusation that the most zealot witch-hunters of pedophiles are not actuated by any concern with protecting children but rather are moved by hatred of gays. They are happy to cause misery not only to adults but also to adolescents who dare to affirm or express their homosexuality. Hence the title of Judith Irving's (name?) book HARMFUL TO MINORS. In my experience it is HOMOPHOBES not HOMOSEXUALS who are the most harmful to minors, particularly to their own children.
Pedophilia is a problematic sexual disposition and pedophile offenses are grave because of the vulnerability of children. Adult sexual relations, in contrast, are not necessarily abusive.
The priesthood attracts a considerable number of pedophiles, for psychological reasons I indicated.
It attracts a much larger number of homosexuals who have no pedophile leanings, though some of them may be attracted by post-pubertal adolescents.
It used to attract heterosexuals as well at one time, but this attraction has greatly waned.
In the past those of Jewish blood were forbidden to become Jesuits, though one of the great Jesuit Generals had been of Jewish descent. That seems quite harmless, a mere disciplinary matter -- but in reality it manifested a discrimination that is remotely connected with the Holocaust.
The present disciplinary decision to weed out gays is motivated by a false psychology and a demeaning judgement on gays as suffering a personality disorder. It seems a harmless disciplinary action but it links up with some of the most evil tendancies of a homophobic history, including the Nazi extermination of gays. Hence the priest who said he is going to wear a pink triangle henceforth.
Interesting article
http://www.baywindows.com/media/...ay-
901590.shtml
Fr. O'Leary wrote:
A psychological issue that needs to be studied is this: WHY are Catholics so fascinated by celibacy, especially in males? What exactly is the fascination of this precious object? Why are Catholics so enthusiastic about celibacy, even for their own children? Why are they so distressed if priests are not celibate?
I really do not know the answers to these questions, though surrounded by the cult of celibacy all my life.
Can any of you guys explain why celibacy is so important to you? Has it a concrete moral or spiritual significance for your own lives, as opposed to that idealized priest-image that you seem to have made into a fetish (with all the unconscious erotic implication of this)?
I can make some sense of celibacy as an ascetic discipline in certain circumstances. But the mystique of celibacy -- or of the sexless adult male, as it boils down to -- strikes me as odd, puzzling, in need of explanation.
I think you're misstating the explicandum. Most Catholics, yours truly included, do not idealize "the sexless adult male" and are even, at least nowadays, faintly repelled by him. Priests with ambiguous or minimal sexuality don't impress me as men; neither do they so impress most people. What really impresses people, yours truly included, are manly celibate priests: those with a clear yet mature heterosexuality that is comfortable without genital expression. I have a few priest friends who are like that, and both sexes seem to appreciate it equally.
I've been attending a Catholic academic conference this weekend, where I've been struck by how concerned the participants are with what they see as the crisis of manliness in the priesthood. They do have perspective, of course: most see it as one of the sadder manifestations in our culture of the general crisis of fatherhood and generativity. I could go on and on about the general crisis, but most thoughtful men living in America don't need to hear the problems recounted. The solution has to include the clergy. But that doesn't and can't mean a feckless reversion to "sexlessness."
I for one am not distressed by married priests in active ministry, such as one finds in the Eastern Catholic churches and among the clerical converts from Protestantism ordained as Catholic priests under the Pastoral Provision. What distresses me are priests who are supposedly committed to celibacy but do not observe it. I don't think I should have to explain or justify that. I'm "enthusiastic" about retaining celibacy as the norm in the Latin Church for the reasons given by Paul VI and John Paul II; I can't put it any better than
better than they did. Catholic men baptized in the Latin Church who can't or won't commit themselves to that discipline shouldn't be priests. I count myself among them!
Have the others followed the latest string of O'Leary's comments?
There were two stunning additions: (1) the belittlement of celibacy; (2) the assumption that young men who are victims of these sodomitical priests are not exactly victims.
This is very interesting because that is why the complete ban on sodomites and those with sodomitical tendencies in Catholic seminaries is necessary: people who define themselves by their sodomitical experiences of thoughts (the so-called "gays") cannot really be celibate. Their own definition of self includes homosexual behavior. They ridicule celibacy because they have a "new" identity, defined by the devious sexual desires and acts.
Young men (over 1
who have sex with priests or indeed older men or young or older women may be victims, but normally we do not think of adults who have sex with other adults as victims. New Catholic seems to think that anyone who has sex with a priest is that priest's victim. This is creeping witch-huntism, and at bottom deeply anticlerical.
ML writes of "manly celibate priests: those with a clear yet mature heterosexuality that is comfortable without genital expression. I have a few priest friends who are like that, and both sexes seem to appreciate it equally."
Well, that leaves my question unanswered. What is the attraction of celibacy that makes it the object of such a mystique? Manly and mature men who are not celibate are just as attractive as ones who are, in my opinion. I really do not see why their non-genital sexuality is an added attraction to both men and women, or why it makes them somehow more dependable or comforting or whatever. Many of the best priests I have known were married men (Anglican, Orthodox) and I never felt that this in any way diminished their spiritual power -- increased it, rather!
Rather than belittling celibacy, as New Cath with his usual querulousness objects, I am asking a simple question that has puzzled me all my life' what do the enthusiasts for celibacy (for others, not for themselves) SEE in it?
Papal documents leave me completely unenlightened on this score.
I do know that Catholic mothers can think the priesthood is the ideal destination for their gay sons. Other mothers may love the idea of their son untouched by another woman. The psychological dynamics of all this probably to very deep, into family relationships.
It is hardly worth arguing with the bitter bigotry of New Cath, but again I signal the contradiction in this:
people who define themselves by their sodomitical experiences of thoughts (the so-called "gays") cannot really be celibate. Their own definition of self includes homosexual behavior.
It is the VATICAN who is insisting on defining even sexually inexperienced seminarians by their gayness (by their orientation not by any self-definition or any connection with "sodomitical experiences"). The Archbishop in charge of the seminary inquiry has plainly said that it is intended to weed out people of homosexual orientation, all of them.
New Cath would say that closet gays, in denial about their sexual orientation, are not really gays at all. Wonder why.
Most celibates had a sexual identity before they undertook celibacy -- or rather, all of them. One is aware of one's sexual identity at puberty -- either as heterosexual, homosexual or some sort of bisexual. So to say that a gay celibate would find a "new" identity in the scenario New Cath imagines does not make sense. It is true, however, that a celibate who has ruled out sexual experience may become open to sexual experience and may then dump celibacy, as has happened to hundreds of thousands of priests, many now happily married. But to say that this is a new identity is silly.
"The Bishops of Northern Ireland, a place where you would feel at home, protested in 1980 or so against the decriminalization of homosexuality,"
Yes, it would be preferable if serious sexual misconduct could be criminalised -- adultery in particular should be prosecuted, as well as fornication (not just "criminal sexual abuse" or statutory rape, but fornication), and sodomy, and incest, and bestiality, and prostitution, and the making and distribution of pornography, and the making and distribution of sex toys, and strip-tease businesses. We'll know we're living in a truly Catholic Christian culture when all those things are criminalised again, not just the handful that are criminalised in some places.
"New Cath would say that closet gays, in denial about their sexual orientation, are not really gays at all."
Many distinguish between "homosexuals" and "gays." The term "gay" is applied to homosexuals who are open, or even militant, about their perversion.
Yes, it would be preferable if serious sexual misconduct could be criminalised -- adultery in particular should be prosecuted, as well as fornication (not just "criminal sexual abuse" or statutory rape, but fornication), and sodomy, and incest, and bestiality, and prostitution, and the making and distribution of pornography, and the making and distribution of sex toys, and strip-tease businesses.
GREAT! Read Shakespeare's "Measure for Measure" which is precisly about this wonderful scenario. But I hope you are serious. It is not enough to have laws on the books unless people are also fined, imprisoned, named and shamed, and for crimes specified in the Bible or the Koran stoned to death.
"We'll know we're living in a truly Catholic Christian culture when all those things are criminalised again, not just the handful that are criminalised in some places." You agree with Friedrich Nietzsche, who said "the reason Christians no longer burn us at the stake is that their love has grown cold". And surely you are not forgetting masturbation? Do you not think there should be an inspection of bedsheets to ensure that this abominable practice is duly chastised? Do you not think flogging would be an appropriate punishment?
"Many distinguish between "homosexuals" and "gays." The term "gay" is applied to homosexuals who are open, or even militant, about their perversion." Clerical pedophiles are usually "homosexuals" rather than "gays" according to this typology. That is why the Vatican wants to weed out both categories.
When prosecuting adultery, I hope you will have males prosecuted and stoned with equal rigor as women. Also do not forget female masturbation, a sexual crime that is often hidden and that is practiced in particular by witches.
Here is an interesting piece from Nathan of exiledcatholic.blogspot.com:
It's a shocking development. Within the broader Christian Church, it means that the Catholic Church has implicitly joined the ranks of those Christian denominations which believe that homosexuality as an orientation is unacceptable. How long will it be before we see Catholic ex-gay ministries popping up as a result of this new ecclesiastical development? Within the Catholic Church itself, this new development means that gays and lesbians are the only group of Catholics who will not be able to receive either of the two sacraments of service: marriage or holy orders. Sisters and brothers, we have heard for years that the Catholic Church's teaching on homosexuality is not discriminatory, and the Vatican has gotten away with it fairly well by pointing to the fact that Catholic teaching condemns behavior rather than orientation, or nature. Let's not lie to ourselves anymore. Catholic teaching on homosexuality has always been discriminatory, and it has become even more discriminatory now that the Catholic Church has excluded gays and lesbians based on orientation alone rather than on the basis of behavior.
It may be a subtle distinction, but it's nevertheless an important distinction to make.
This takes me back to the question: "Should I stay or should I go now?" It would seem to the naked eye that there is little reason to stay. I have already been condemned for refusing to accept the Vatican's vision of chastity for me, and now I am being condemned based on my very orientation, which God himself is ultimately responsible for. I have been rendered a second class Catholic, I have been excluded from two of the sacraments, I have been given a general vocation to love God and neighbor without the possibility of a sacramental vocation to shape how I will live out that love in the world. I have been told that I am "sealed with the gifts of the Holy Spirit," I have been told that my baptism joins me inseparably to the priesthood of all the faithful, but the actions of the Church's leadership tell me something very different. It appears that Pope Benedict XVI and his bishops, who have now allowed themselves to become his altar servers instead of fellow successors of the apostles, have no Good News for me. For what possible reason would I stay?
As I have contemplated that question, I have only been able to come up with one reason. The reason is the question that God asked of Job in Job 38:4 -- "Where were you when I founded the earth?" It is a rhetorical question, followed by a rather lengthy series of rhetorical questions. The point of this series of rhetorical questions is to remind Job -- and us, by extension -- that we don't know the will of God. We don't know why he wills what he wills for us, why his permissive will allows us to bear suffering, both necessary and unnecessary. But the Judeo-Christian tradition urges us to remember that God has a purpose; and
God has a purpose; and the Christian tradition, specifically, urges us to remember that the purpose of all suffering -- all life, really -- is wrapped up in the purpose of Christ's death and resurrection. The purpose of everything willed by God, either actively or permissively, is to make himself "all in all," to reconcile all things to himself. Sometimes, in certain events, we can't see how he's doing that; but the Judeo-Christian tradition urges us to remember that he is doing it.
Over the past days and weeks, I have been learning more about Benedictine spirituality. I've been reading Seeking God: The Way of St. Benedict, by Esther de Waal. I've been touched by the profundity and simplicity of the Benedictine vows: obedience, stability, and conversatio morum (the accepted translation is "conversion of life" or "conversion of morals"). I think these vows can help me explain why I'm staying in the Catholic Church.
When I stood up in front of my parish community and made my profession of faith, and when my pastor anointed me and said: "Be sealed with the gifts of the Holy Spirit" -- I made a commitment that night, on the Vigil of the Lord's Resurrection, to find my way to God through, with, and in the Catholic Church. I could leave now, and by worldly standards I would be justified in doing so. But in my heart, I would not be justified. In my heart, I would know that I lack obedience -- obedience to God's call, which has brought me here to the Catholic Church and which has insistently urged me to remain, despite my many objections. In my heart, I would know that I lack stability -- a spirit of steadfastness, a spirit of perseverance, ready to accept God's will for me in the Catholic Church, with these people and in this place, for better or for worse. In my heart, I would know that I lack conversion of life -- a willingness to accept inevitable change, to know that this change is only another turn on the winding road to God.
"Listen carefully, my child, to your master's precepts, and incline the ear of your heart (Prov. 4:20)." These are the words found at the beginning of the Rule of St. Benedict. I have asked God what I'm supposed to do. I have listened. And this is his answer: "Where were you when I founded the earth?" Although I do not accept the Church's teaching on homosexuality, and although that teaching and my refusal to accept it has the potential to bring great suffering, I feel called to stay here in the Catholic Church. I must be faithful to that call. I must trust that he who founded the earth knows what he's doing. If today I hear the voice of the Lord, I must not harden my heart. St. Benedict, ora pro nobis. Amen.
Here is Nathan's reply to those who wrote in support:
In general, I want to thank all of you for the support that you've offered. I would find it much more difficult, if not impossible, to do what I'm doing without your support.
Damien -- Thanks. That's a lot to offer.
Fr. B -- I hope others will challenge us to oppose this injustice and protect ourselves from it. I hope I can challenge other queer Catholics to oppose this; that's part of the reason this blog exists, if not the primary reason. My hope, though, is to inspire them to stay and fight this within the Church. I think that's the only way we're going to change the faith community we love.
Beppe -- Thanks for your comments, and for your prayers.
Chris (not to be confused with *Christopher) -- I appreciate your saying that my staying is a testament to my faith, but the truth is that my faith is generally pretty weak and I still consider it a fledgling faith. If it's strong now, it's only because God has made it that way.
I appreciate the welcome I've received from members of the churches you've mentioned (and others), and I don't doubt that all of these are part of the universal Church. It's not something I can prove intellectually -- how can you prove the unity of the Church, really? Even when it is institutionally unified the unity may not be there -- but it is something I've experienced, that the Church is still fundamentally one and that we are all part of the one Church of Christ.
Christopher -- I agree with you that this will ultimately liberate queer Catholics, and perhaps queer Christians in other faith communities. But I think that it will be a death and resurrection experience. Before we get to experience the resurrection, I think we're going to have to experience the cross even more profoundly than we already have. I think that's going to be the difficult part to deal with, even with the hope of liberation in the future.
Anonymous -- Thanks for your support and your thoughts. I don't think the Catholic Church's teaching on human sexuality is ultimately good for anyone. I have seen the damage that it can do to both heterosexual and homosexual people; I've watched it damage heterosexual relationships even while it offers them up as the ideal and denies the very validity of homosexual relationships. The Church's teaching on birth control and its usurping of responsibility for one's own body and one's own role in procreation are detrimental to all straight people; the Church's teaching on gender complementarity idolizes archaic gender norms and continues to subtly (and sometimes not so subtly) assert the inferiority of women.
I write from the perspective of a gay male Catholic, but I recognize that the entirety of Catholic teaching on human sexuality is fatally flawed. I've heard from both lesbian and straight women how the Church's teaching has hurt them personally and in community; I've heard from single, partnered, and married me
I've heard from single, partnered, and married men, gay and straight, how the Church's teaching has warped their view of their own bodies, and thus has warped their view of all matter, and especially the bodies of women. It may be more relevant to say that I've experienced these things myself, and I think we all have, regardless of whether or not we are Catholic. The truth is that the Catholic Church has shaped how all of Western culture views human sexuality, and that's why we're so confused about it today. Catholic teaching on sexuality is simply wrong, and it's time for the Church and Western society to move beyond it to a healthy vision of human sexuality rooted in the Gospel.
Thanks again to everyone for their words of encouragement.
Just one more snippet from nathan:
The point is that I am a 21-year-old young man just like other 21-year-old young men. I see people walking down the street who turn my head. I get caught checking out somebody I'm attracted to in the check-out line of a grocery store, and I turn away, red-faced, in embarrassment when I receive a smile of acknowledgement in return. God created me to love his beauty in other creatures, just as he created others that way. God created me for love and joy, even and especially in my sexuality, just as he created others. The only difference is that where heterosexual 21-year-old young men end up in awkward situations with beautiful young women, I end up in those same situations with beautiful young men. For me, this is as natural as it is for the 21-year-old heterosexual guy. I don't decide this or that guy is going to turn my head; he just does. Because God created my head to be turned by other men. And it's okay.
I see Amy Welborn is writing in the New York Times today!
She says that the seminary inquiry in simply a general health check, nothing in it about rooting out those of homosexual orientation as long as they are soberly preparing for a celibate life.
So then all this fuss has been about nothing? There is no planned purge of gays?
But unfortunately the Vatican, perhaps due to bad communication, has managed to tell all the world's gays that precisely such a purge is what it has in mind. The Roman document has not been published. Instead a prepublication strip tease has set all sorts of hares of rumor running. Perhaps the Vatican are hoping to write the final draft of the document in light of the responses to the advance rumors they have floated. If so, their plot seems to have misfired badly. The priesthood already has a bad name, and parents are anxious that their sons not become priests; the current set of conflicting noises from Rome will scare away even more candidates and compound the distrust of parents. Maybe it's the Holy Spirit's way of finishing off the Tridentine priesthood and clearing the ground for a more functional version of Christian ministry?
"She says that the seminary inquiry in simply a general health check, nothing in it about rooting out those of homosexual orientation as long as they are soberly preparing for a celibate life."
As far as I can tell, Welborn's appraisal is pretty accurate. Your hysterical reactions to the Apostolic Visitation do not appear to be justified by anything that we know at this time. The Church has not said she wants to go on a "witchhunt" to rid the priesthood of all homosexuals. But the document that the Pope has reportedly signed, to be released later this year, so we've heard, does reportedly call for a return to the former policy (which was never actually rescinded, just ignored) that barred homosexuals from ordination.
"But unfortunately the Vatican, perhaps due to bad communication, has managed to tell all the world's gays that precisely such a purge is what it has in mind."
What evidence do you have that it was the Vatican that blabbed to the press? Seems to me it's the mainstream media who are to blame for their rumor-mongering and deliberate distortions and disinformation about a document that has not even been published yet. Your theory that the leak was planned by the Vatican is, of course, possible, even if there's not a shred of evidence to support it.
I'll leave the rest of your wild, wishful thinking without further comment.
Great news for the wicked "Spirit of Vatican II" -- in the Church of England... (Source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_ne...rcs/
4277176.stm ):
The Bishop of Hereford has defended the decision to ordain a transsexual woman as a priest.
Assistant curate Sarah Jones, 43, from Ross-on-Wye in Herefordshire, was born as Colin Jones and spent the first 33 years of her life living as a man.
Evangelical group Evangelical Alliance said there was no "Christian acknowledgement" of gender realignment.
But the Right Reverend Anthony Priddis said Ms Jones - being ordained on Saturday - was "made and loved by God".
Ms Jones was a "superb candidate" who had the gender realignment surgery "many years ago - long before she explored the possibility of being ordained", Bishop Priddis said.
Well, I suppose it's good at least that the Anglican bishop has ordained a man instead of a woman, albeit a very confused and anatomically self-mutilated man. Time was such a man would be rejected as a candidate for priesthood, but the Anglican hierarchy long ago put such considerations behind them.
Potter, as I pointed out several times it is the Archbishop in charge of the seminary inquiry who has pointed out that even faithfully celibate gay men are to be rooted out of seminaries; Amy Welborn contradicts this; you cannot have it both ways. The content of the promised Vatican document may not yet be finalized. The welcome it has received among conservative Catholics may give the Vatican pause. They are all in favor of weeding out self-affirming gays, but they are not in favor of rooting out all those with homosexual orientation (indeed that would mean rooting out many of themselves). Which way will the Vatican cat finally jump? Do you know? I certainly don't.
Potter, you yourself posted the following report:
19-September-2005 -- Catholic World News Brief
POPE APPROVES BARRING GAY SEMINARIANS
Vatican, Sep. 19 (CWNews.com) - Pope Benedict XVI has given his approval to a new Vatican policy document indicating that men with homosexual tendencies should not be ordained as Catholic priests. NOT WHAT AMY WELBORN SAYS!
The text, which was approved by Pope Benedict at the end of August, says that homosexual men should not be admitted to seminaries even if they are celibate, because their condition suggests a serious personality disorder which detracts from their ability to serve as ministers. NOT WHAT AMY WELBORN SAYS!
WHAT THE VATICAN MAY NOT HAVE REALIZED IS THAT THE FIERCEST OPPOSITION TO A BLANKET BAN ON HOMOSEXUAL SEMINARIANS WOULD COME NOT FROM "LIBERALS" BUT FROM THE MOST CONSERVATIVE FANS OF THE NEW POPE, WHO ARE JUST AS LIKELY TO BE HOMOSEXUAL THEMSELVES AS THE LIBERALS ARE. FOR AN EXAMPLE OF A SELF-AFFIRMING GAY WHO IS AT THE SAME TIME AN ARDENT NEOCATH LOOK AT DREADNOUGHT'S WEBLOG (though this is not typical).
You apparently agree with the above account of what the Vatican intends to do. How can you then agree with Amy Welborn's account at the same time? She says there is no plan to root out homosexuals as such, only those likely to be in conflict with church teaching or the demands of celibacy. Who are the reporters you claim are distorting the Vatican plan? And can you give one example of such a distorted report so that your own position can be made a little less cloudy?
For the record, here is what Amy Welborn wrote in the New York Times:
THIS week, teams of examiners, led by Edwin O'Brien, archbishop for the United States military, are beginning a visitation of all 229 Catholic seminaries in the United States. Judging by press accounts, the effort is all about uncovering and expelling homosexuals - a purge, simply put.
In truth, it's about far more than homosexuality. And it's badly needed.
... The same goes for the presence in seminaries of gay subcultures that draw their identity from secular values rather than the Catholic moral vision. [NOTE -- SHE DOES NOT SPEAK OF INDIVIDUALS WHO HAPPEN TO BE HOMOSEXUAL BUT ONLY OF GROUPS WHO ADOPT VIEWS INCOMPATIBLE WITH CATHOLIC TEACHING!] Why is it considered unfair to expect priests and seminarians to live by the values of the institution they serve? [AGAIN SHE MAKES IT A QUESTION OF HOW YOU LIVE RATHER THAN WHO YOU ARE, IMPLYING THAT GAYS WHO LIVE ACCORDING TO CHURCH TEACHING WILL NOT BE AFFECTED BY THE PROPOSED WEEDING OUT.] Others may call it a purge, but I call it truth in advertising.
A seminary has a dual responsibility. It owes the future priest preparation for a life of sacrifice, unique witness and engagement with other human beings at moments of joy and pain in a society that has no respect for his vocation.
But a seminary also owes us, the people in the pews, psychologically mature priests who aren't engaged in an eternal and ego-driven struggle with their own problems, who are prepared to serve, to teach and preach - with integrity and honesty.
Okay, one more time:
Fr. O'Leary, the CWN report is a preliminary report, based on anonymous sources. That is, it's a rumor. Now, much if not all of that report may turn out to be correct, but we're going to have to wait and see. But based on what we're hearing, it does seem that the Church intends to bar homosexuals from the seminary, while not going on a "witchhunt" for already-ordained homosexuals. As far as I can tell, that's what Amy Welborn says too.
Elsewhere Amy writes in Ready to Rumble:
the self-identified political gay man shouldn’t be in seminary. But should the man who struggles with same-sex attraction and seeks to live chastely, who buys the whole package of Catholic moral teaching, be put into that category? Absolutely not. To me, that’s insane, and truth be told, it’s not that difficult to tell the difference. And if you think that your list of favorite, orthodox priests through the ages doesn’t include at least one who’s struggled with same-sex attraction, you’re mistaken, and I’ll bet you real money. Not that we can prove it, of course.
DO YOU AGREE WITH THIS, JORDAN POTTER?
DO YOU THINK THE FORTHCOMING VATICAN DOCUMENT WILL LEAVE THIS LOOPHOLE FOR GAY SEMINARIANS?
Jordan, no one here or anywhere has suggested that the Church has any intention of barring already ordained homosexuals. That is a complete red herring.
I see you now think it probable but not certain that the Church intends to bar homosexuals as such from the seminary, contrary to what Amy Welborn fondly imagines.
I notice the same ambiguity in Michael Liccione. One moment he salutes the idea of weeding out all homosexuals from seminaries, and the next he is agreeing with Amy Welborn that only those who identify themselves positively, ideologically as gays need to be weeded out (see his long quote from Welborn in his posting above).
The source of all this ambiguity and confusion seems to be the Vatican itself, not the media. To end the confusion, they had better issue their much-heralded document quickly.
In order to foreclose yet another misunderstanding from Jordan Potter, let me clarify that by the phrase *banning homosexuals from seminaries* I refer to exclusively to homosexual seminarians, not to homosexual priests already ordained.
On transsexuals, I note that an Italian priest who changed sex some 20 years ago had his ordination instantly invalidated by the Vatican. Raises interesting questions about the indelible sacramental character.
I don't know if the new document will leave that "loophole," but if the reports/rumors we're hearing are accurate, then the document will not leave that loophole. It would instead reiterate the policy from the 1961 document we've mentioned before -- which would presumably mean that most of the types of homosexual men that Amy Welborn mentioned ("the man who struggles with same-sex attraction and seeks to live chastely, who buys the whole package of Catholic moral teaching") would not be admitted to the priesthood. I think that's the best policy for the Church to have. Welborn apparently sees things differently.
Fine, clarity at last. You do not agree with Welborn on the issue in dispute. You agree that the exhumed 1961 document and the forthcoming Vatican document will demand a weeding out even of chaste homosexuals who strive to be celibate.
This also makes sense to me and concords with what the Archbishop in charge of the seminary investigations has loudly declared.
I suppose the Vatican will not be intimidated from the outcry against this policy and will proceed to publish it and enact it.
Of course the real problems will begin at the point of application. The US military has been wrestling with the problems of imposing such a policy for a long time, even under the lax *don't ask, don't tell* rule currently accepted. The Vatican is imposing a *do ask, do tell* rule -- every member of the staff and student bodies of the 229 seminaries must answer the question about homosexuality.
It is quite possible that the priesthood is gayer than ever before, that it has become a gay profession as Cozzens discerned. So the current weeding out is likely to develop into an embarrassing farce or fiasco.
"Jordan, no one here or anywhere has suggested that the Church has any intention of barring already ordained homosexuals. That is a complete red herring."
I beg to differ -- your friends in the homosexualist movement have indeed been claiming that the Church is going on a witchhunt to kick all homosexuals out of the Church -- priest and laity alike.
"I see you now think it probable but not certain that the Church intends to bar homosexuals as such from the seminary, contrary to what Amy Welborn fondly imagines."
I'm just hedging my bets -- the reports we're hearing are likely correct, but you can never be sure until you actually know, and that won't happen until the document is released.
"I notice the same ambiguity in Michael Liccione."
You've notice no such ambiguity in me -- you just have been paying very close attention to what I've said and what I haven't said. But then I've previously noted that you don't really seem all that interested in the beliefs and opinions of those who dare disagree with you.
"The source of all this ambiguity and confusion seems to be the Vatican itself, not the media."
Well, since the Vatican hasn't said anything one way or the other, the Vatican obviously can't be the source of the confusion -- so it can only be the ones who are purveying the anonymous reports/rumors and speculating about its contents, i.e. the media.
"On transsexuals, I note that an Italian priest who changed sex some 20 years ago had his ordination instantly invalidated by the Vatican. Raises interesting questions about the indelible sacramental character."
Really? How so? A spurious ordination, which is what that was, since women are incapable of receiving Holy Orders even if they pretend to be men, does not imprint an indelible character.
Okay, I'll have to retract this: "You've noticed no such ambiguity in me -- you just haven't been paying very close attention to what I've said and what I haven't said. . ."
I've gone back to this earlier comment of Fr. O'Leary's, which seems to be where I got confused:
"She says that the seminary inquiry in simply a general health check, nothing in it about rooting out those of homosexual orientation as long as they are soberly preparing for a celibate life."
My brain must have zeroed in on the words "rooting out those of homosexual orientation" and bleeped over the surrounding context -- for I agree that the Apostolic Visitation is not about getting all homosexuals out of the priesthood and seminary, let alone the Church. But that obviously isn't what Welborn is talking about.
I suspect that Amy Welborn is incorrect if she is saying, or suggesting, that the Apostolic Visitation is only going to lead to the expulsion of openly homosexual seminarians. That may be only wishful thinking on her part.
Can you give a reference for gays claiming that already ordained gay priests are to be kicked out? First I've heard of it.
A spurious ordination does not imprint the character, sure, but the guy was not a transexual when ordained; he BECAME a woman AFTER ordination so his ordination was retrospectively invalidated.
However, it may be that the reports were wrong and that what the Vatican did was the simple answer -- reduce him to the lay state.
To invalidate an ordination, surely a legal process would be required to show that some element of the ordination, such as consent, was missing?
Other possibility: the guy had some physical abnormality -- was in fact a woman or a hermaphrodite before undergoing his transexual operation -- and this physical abnormality would have sufficed to make his ordination invalid?
Actually, I think some Italian churchman claimed last year that homosexual priests were invalidly ordained. Neato! The clergy voided of gays at one fell sweep. No more "evidence of homosexuality".
"Evidence of homosexuality" is a very comic phrase. "Have you observed any evidence of homosexuality during your years in the seminary?" "Well, I can't speak of apodictic evidence, but I have had the feeling sometimes that there might have been homosexuality in the air..." "You would say, then, that you have noted certain indices, perhaps amounting to circumstantial evidence?" "You could put it like that, but I should rather speak of a certain aura, a je ne sais quoi..." "Thank you for your testimony. You've been most helpful".
Or to return to the original quip:
"I say, my good sir, have you observed any evidence of caffeine in this cafeteria?" "Well you might say as I 'ave and you might say again as I 'aven't. You see, sir, there's a lot of queer customer in these parts, and 'eaven knows what sort of drugs the might be smugglin' in 'ere right under our very noses". "You would not, then, rule out the possibility that this substance might be circulating here, invisibly, even as we speak?" "Lordie, sir, seein' as myself and the missus 'ave never set eyes on that substance, we'd be hard pressed to say, I'm sure". "Well, thank you. Now I must be on my way." "'ave another coffee before you set off, sir?"
Fr O'Leary wrote:
I notice the same ambiguity in Michael Liccione. One moment he salutes the idea of weeding out all homosexuals from seminaries, and the next he is agreeing with Amy Welborn that only those who identify themselves positively, ideologically as gays need to be weeded out (see his long quote from Welborn in his posting above).
The ambiguity arises not from the Vatican but from the word 'homosexual'. The men whom I agree with Amy Welborn must be kept out of the seminary are those who are openly and unambiguously homosexual and see nothing "disordered" about it. But there are many shades short of that, and it's not clear where the line should be drawn or even whether it can realistically be drawn at all.
In youth, for examples, a good number of males "could go either way" inasmuch as their psychosexual identity is not fully formed and, consequently, they experience episodes of SSA and/or experiment with homosexual activity. Would it be prudent to exclude men who get beyond that and establish a heterosexual identity? Of course not. And some post-adolescent young men who are homosexual in orientation nonetheless accept Church teaching on the topic without self-hatred. Such men cannot be considered unsuitable in themselves if they can live in an all-male environment, and after ordination work with youth, without having constantly to wrestle with temptation. But my position is that, in today's climate, the risks are not worth taking.
I suspect that is the Vatican's position too, though of course we won't know until the instruction is published.
For many this leads to suicide; it is a major cause of adolescent suicides.
Why, Fr. O'Leary, is the suicide rate for young gays exactly the same in oases of acceptance like San Francisco as it is elsewhere?
J.Potter go back and read a few of your posts! You're a simpleton, but then that's a quality best tempered by conversion To the Roman Catholicism. Although, your attitudes and numb-skulled dogmatism could perhaps class you as The Church's most promising Islamist....
Have you ever considered the sinfulness of flying kites or laughing out loud in public?
Who knows! Could a fascination with the beauty of kites, their whimsey and frivolity awaken a young boy's aesthetic sense and colour him lavender?
Play it safe and buy yer boy some pistols, ok!
You're knowledge of homosexuals needs to broadened, as well, and one or two points *hammered* home.
Some of us with disordered appetites are great pugilists and have even worked as bouncers...trouncing errant skinheads no matter their *incarnation*.
I don't agree with all of Spirit of Vatican II's postings, but it should be obvious to anyone here that he's a passionate and determined writer who's presented very important and cogent arguments that no one appears able to refute. A word warrior that the merely "post-protestant" have rarely encountered and never beaten.
It's unfortunate that more female posters haven't commented on them.
Then again, I'm not sure they 're allowed...
But it's not just that; the quantity of SVII's posts is astounding and their quality leaves many here grasping and floundering. Gives you some idea, doesn't it, of the intellectual gulf that often separate gay from straight.
He's also correct about Pope Benedict's initiative; it'll likely descend into a tragi-comic farce that will do a lot of harm.
Michael Liccione, I understand your fear of the risks and those risks are very real. The Church's reputation has suffered and financial loses resulting from court settlements is bankrupting certain parishes....including one near me.
I'm against a blanket ban on gays mainly because of people like Mr Potter, but I'm also in favour of some different rules for gay candidates in order to prevent future abuses.
They should be much older ( maybe 30 or 35 minimum). They should also have a good track record, and it would be preferable if they were "dropouts" from the mainstream gay world, men who've been there, done that, and who now have an honest heart and a sincere desire to faithfully serve The Church.
Besides, and as some "posts" have demonstrated, we need the grey matter.
John:
Your closing suggestions make sense, even though I assess the risk/benefit ratio differently from you. Who knows, perhaps a synthesis of what you and I advocate will become the norm.
As for the relative dearth of refutations of Fr. O'Leary, I can't speak for others but I can speak for myself. I have already written extensively about this topic, and about gay marriage, on my own blog (click Homepage below) and am active as a co-moderator on the Pontifications blog as well as in (gasp!) my offline life. I usually take the trouble to answer Fr. O'Leary when he addresses criticism to me specifically; but as for most of the rest of his stuff, I don't take it terribly seriously. For he has made very clear that he simply does not accept the ancient and modern teaching of the Church about homosexuality. He believes that homosexual orientation, when fixed and firm, is "God-given" and that the Church's constant teaching against homosexual activity is cruel as well as incorrect. Hence he doesn't share what I consider the most important premise of any discussion about the advisability of admitting homosexuals to the seminary.
Even so, I appreciate your contribution. I believe you and I could have a fruitful discussion when we both have time.
Best,
Mike
"Have you found evidence of homosexuality among your fellow students?"
"Yes, I think some of them flirt with unorthodoxy and are likely to internalize the pagan values of contemporary American culture."
"Do you personally suffer from homosexual impulses?"
"Well, yes, but I struggle against them and never question orthodoxy."
"I'm sorry, but in that case you must leave the seminary."
"What? But I am orthodox. I am not one of those 'gays'!"
"But what assurance have we that you will not become one? And we have not noticed that 'orthodox' are any less likely than 'liberal' to be the occasions of sexual scandal. So, sorry, but you have to go."
"This is an outrage! You can see I'm not one of them! I am orthodox, I tell you, orthodox!!!"
Michael Liccione thinks that the people to exclude are those who are openly and unambiguously homosexual and who see nothing disordered about their sexuality.
In other words, exclude the psychologically healthy gays and keep those who have a pathology (who homosexuality is ego-dystonic) -- according to the American Psychological Association.
Is it prudent, is it wise, to go against the wisdom of the psychological professionals in order to prove an ideological point? Such imprudence has led to the pedophile scandal -- and can only lead to further weird situations.
Suicide rate among adolescent gays in gay-friendly San Francisco is exactly the same as elsewhere? Proof of this assertion? (There are plenty of homophobic parents and clergy in the Bay Area too.)
"Such imprudence has led to the pedophile scandal -- and can only lead to further weird situations."
Again, 80% of the reported victims of priest sex abuse in the U.S. were teenage boys and young men, not children. 80% of the cases were not pedophilic.
Furthermore, it was bishops following the "wisdom" of psychological professionals in the 1970s that is one of the reasons we ended up with the shameful spectacle of priests being sent off to therapy, being pronounced cured, and then sent back so they could molest more little children and seduce more young men. So please pardon me if I pay no mind to the professionals who refuse to admit that there's someone seriously wrong with a man who wants to become intimate in a sexual fashion with other men.
Celibacy expert Richard Sipe urges that the investigation should begin at the top, not in seminaries. http://www.richardsipe.com/Comments.html
Eppur si muove...
Potter, all you are saying then is that the pedophile issue has been overblown and that what the faithful are really worried about is that gay priests are sexually active (with young men or teenagers who would not even count as minors in many countries). Certainly, if you want to eliminate sexually active gays, the easiest way is to eliminate gays. 30%-50% of clerics will be involved, according to Sipe, the lower figure representing genuine homosexuals, the upper figure representing those who might be involved in same-sex behaviors without being genuine homosexuals (if I understand his argument).
But begin at the top -- in the Roman Curia.
Whether you will then have a fully functioning celibate heterosexual clergy with little scandal I'm not sure.
Somehow I am skeptical of the idea that celibacy is universally popular among heterosexual priests and universally unpopular among homosexual priests.
Pedophilia is a problematic disposition that affects perhaps 3-6 per cent of priests. It is not to be confused with normal homosexual affectivity (directed to adult men or ephebes), which concerns perhaps 30% of priests or more. It is silly to talk of "curing" the latter.
I know a few heterosexual priests who are sexually active. Should they also be sent off to be "cured"?
I never found any transparency in my fellow priests' discourse on celibacy (most of them NEVER talk about it). The murk is deep.
Meanwhile some men who want to become sexually intimate with other men are forming couples and being recognized by many States and some Churches.
Gay bachelorhood (which has no particular moral qualms about a free sexual life) and gay marriage (which cultivates the classical christian virtues of mutual support, fidelity, etc.) are thriving models of gay living. Gay celibacy is not thriving at all it seems, and now the church is admitting that it has given up on that ideal; it does not believe that it can provide role models for gay celibacy in its own clergy. The message for all gays is clear: have sex, preferably with a steady partner; don't aspire for the unrealistic goal of celibate continence.
How can a young man in his twenties claim to be a "victim" if he has sex with another man? The whole business savors of a racket or a witch hunt. US priests are like lambs to the slaughter, it appears.
Amalgamating pedophilia with homosexuality, as has been done in 80% of the alleged abuse cases, has nothing to do with protecting children, and everything to do with a homophobic right wing agenda. This is becoming clear. Judith Levine's book Harmful to Minors is surely an important comment on that, though I have not yet found it.
Fr O'Leary wrote:
Catholic teaching on sexuality is simply wrong, and it's time for the Church and Western society to move beyond it to a healthy vision of human sexuality rooted in the Gospel.
Well, there we have it. A man, a priest no less, who rejects not just the Church teaching about homosexuality but also about "sexuality" in general, does not share even the basic premises on which policy about homosexuals in the seminary can be fruitfully discussed. I wouldn't admit a man with such views to the seminary even if he were straight as an arrow and virginal as the saints. It is the content and health of a man's faith, even more than those of his sexuality, that should be determinative.
Best,
Mike
Catholic teaching on sexuality is not simply wrong -- I was quoting someone else there.
But that there are problems with Catholic teaching on sexuality in its current state of development is rather obvious, I would have thought.
A person who could not see those problems, or was afraid to discuss them, would to my mind show a sign of mental rigidity that would be a poor recommendation for a future pastor.
Look at that quote again, Mike Liccione, it is from Nathan, the 21 year old self-affirming gay Catholic. I am 56 years old and not given to the simple statements a young lad like him can allow himself. Still, just as we learn from the peremptory utterances of our students we should be open to the testimony of such young people. Locking oneself up in an impregnable fortress of barren dogma is a good way to age without insight.
Fr O'Leary:
Sorry for the misattribution. Even so, two points.
Specifically, since you do reject Church teaching on homosexuality in particular, my point stands about the lack of a mutually held premise needed for discussing the advisability of continued admission of homosexuals to the priesthood.
More generally, I think you would do well to acquaint yourself more deeply with JP2's theology of the body, which continues the development of doctrine on marriage and human sexuality begun gingerly in Humanae Vitae. It integrates the latter's still- primarily natural-law approach into an overarching biblical personalism.
Best,
Mike
Michael, we DO share common ground:
NATURAL LAW and BIBLICAL PERSONALISM
These provide a solid basis for arguing the goodness of homosexuality and the right of gays to live our their affective potential to the full.
Ready to take the argument to that level, or would you prefer to leave it at a dill and cummin level?
The letter kills, it is the Spirit that gives life.
Fr O'Leary:
If you want to have that debate with me, I'm game (assuming you've studied TOB). But this comment box is not the place for it. I suggest you post something on your own blog; in due course I would reply on mine.
Best,
Mike
This quote from Cardinal Newman that I came across the other day seems somehow fitting in the context of our ongoing interaction with Fr. O'Leary and his errors:
"Quarry the granite rock with razors, or moor the vessel with a thread of silk, then may you hope with such keen and delicate instruments as human knowledge and human reason to contend against those giants, the passion and the pride of man."
The passion and the pride of man is shown also in prejudice, homophobia, talibanism.
By all means use the instruments of human knowledge and reason -- if your arguments or information fall short, however, don't blame the passion and pride of the other party.
I had been intending to gather my comments here into a response to the forthcoming Vatican document when published.
I may take up the challenge of posting a natural-law-cum-biblical-personalism argument for a more integral ethical vision of homosexuality. One wonder why the moral theologians have not been working on this; or rather, one doesn't, for they are working under the lash, and many who have come to results differing from Rome's have been unceremoniously banished -- Curran, McNeill etc. Hardly the climate for making the kind of progress that is so clearly required.
Mike Liccione, thanks for your response, I'll check out your blog! Sounds as if you've got some helpful ideas and suggestions because the way in which you write displays both the willingness and the discipline to think things through.
Two very admirable and badly needed qualities, Michael.
Fr O'Leary, some of what you say is true, but other opinions you express about homosexuality are embellished.
You're 56....I am 47...a difference of only 9 years, though it might as well be 90.
What amazes me about your posts ( although this IS a thread on ordinations) is the way in which you fail to distinguish between homsexuality and the lifestyle of gays as "dictated" by the industry that has emerged to cater to us.
The former is OK, the latter is not, and it is the latter that has come to define us.
The promiscuity rampant is SOME gay quarters in unnacceptable, dangerous, and has resulted in the deaths of more than 500,000 gay men in North America alone since the beginning of the AIDS crisis. That figure, by the way, is greater than the total number of American casualties during ALL of WWII, ALL theatres combined. Can you admit that?
If so, then what, exactly, do we have to brag about?
What you may not realise about SOME of you opinions is this: Your position on homosexualty often plays right into the hands of certain financial interests who make their profits on the backs of gay corpses. The "gay-lib" discourse is but the ideological superstructure of an exploitative economic substructure, nothing more.
Your generation has a peché mignon for denouncing the excesses of capitalism, does it not? Yet because these businesses, this gay industry "serves" the gay community, you've simply no critique to offer. To boot, it is one of the worst forms of exploitation of I've ever seen.
So capitalism is fine and greed is good? Just asking!
I laud you for being open about your homosexuality, but I see no reason to put it on a pedestal, or indeed to treat it as though it were a special ontic status.
You wave it in people's faces, you build it up into something it isn't or never was and you then complain when your fellow Catholics point that out.
You don't gain acceptance through excess and exaggeration.
In fact, in doing so you give ample ammo to bigots like Potter who, through faux concern for the souls of us gays, rudely demands that we be excluded from the priesthood!
Harry's Appalachian cousin, I guess!
I'll concede this, though: Free thought is dead in the Vatican and the present pope could well end up a lame duck that both people and media ignore.
What's more, the exclusion of a whole class of men from the sacrement of ordination, just for "what" they are and not for what they've done will tarnish Catholicism's public image even further, will intensify accusations of bigotry and may even lead more Catholics to leave in disgust.
And a total ban on homosexual candidates (no thought re
"I laud you for being open about your homosexuality, but I see no reason to put it on a pedestal, or indeed to treat it as though it were a special ontic status."
John, Fr. O'Leary has never said he's a homosexual. IF he is, he's not being open about it.
You can mischaracterise my concern for the souls of homosexuals as "faux" all you like -- it doesn't make it any less genuine. Your jibe isn't all that different from the caricatures of my beliefs and positions that Fr. O'Leary has posted here.
"The passion and the pride of man is shown also in prejudice, homophobia, talibanism."
Very interesting, if irrelevant.
"By all means use the instruments of human knowledge and reason -- if your arguments or information fall short, however, don't blame the passion and pride of the other party."
Oh, I do use them. I also know their limits, on account of the wounding of the intellect from original sin. Sometimes it's not the deficiency of the arguments of information (though it is often enough with me), it's the passion and pride of the one who disagrees with the teachings of the Church.
Mr Palubiski,
If you can blame it all on Madison Avenue, then I guess Fr Joe can blame it all on capitalism. Personally, I blame it on the Bossa Nova. I suppose Fr Boff's followers will raise a stink.
Try blaming it on original sin, which ravages us all, and see how that works out for you.
I am now to do a critique of the gay scene as well? I would be happy to, but I would note that it cannot be spoken of as a merely commercial enterprise. It has provided the only platform for gays to speak up -- a platform the Church could and should have provided. Many gay locales are an oasis of community in the urban landscape and are sighed after by isolated gays in remote rural areas. They have provided much happiness to many people, and I see no reason to blast them, any more than I would blast dance halls or discos that cater to heterosexual customers. Or should I get out my blackthorn stick?
As to promiscuity, I would recall Feurebach's dictut that vices are unfortunate virtues. What I mean is, that much promiscuity is due to the social fabric that makes it impossible for gays to form stable loving relationships. The gay scene has been very unwise in this respect, but there is a change recently with the amazing popularity of gay civil unions and gay marriage.
AIDS should not be invoked directly as a moral argument. It is a plague, and plagues can be parasitic on any human behavior, as the now threatened Avian Flu pandemic shows.
Disagreement with a specific teaching of the church is not invariably the result of passion or pride. And passion or pride can thrive among those who invoke church teaching for talibanist proposals such as the criminalization of fornication, adultery etc. See Shakespeare's Angelo in "Measure for Measure". Jesus attacked the passion and pride of the Pharisees, the orthodox of the day; see Matthew 23.
The polio epidemic of 1956 was parasitical on the newfound modern hygiene of countries such as Ireland. So even healthy practices can give an opening to an epidemic! Nature is often quite amoral.
" The "gay-lib" discourse is but the ideological superstructure of an exploitative economic substructure, nothing more."
I do not see why you claim this. Would you say that writers like John McNeill SJ are just part of an economic substructure? This is outrageously sweeping talk.
"I laud you for being open about your homosexuality, but I see no reason to put it on a pedestal, or indeed to treat it as though it were a special ontic status. You wave it in people's faces, you build it up into something it isn't or never was and you then complain when your fellow Catholics point that out." I said nothing about my own sexuality; I leave that to you. I do not glorify homosexuality or claim it has a special ontic status. Rather I say is has an ORDINARY ontic status as a variant of human sexuality (a minor status to heterosexuality if you like).
"You don't gain acceptance through excess and exaggeration." What excess? What exaggeration? Please indicate concrete examples of what you claim.
"Free thought is dead in the Vatican" -- perhaps one might even say, "Thought is dead in the Vatican". Well next week's Synod on the Eucharist will give us a picture of thought there. Will the bishops have the courage and inspiration to speak up? Or is thought dead in the episcopacy also? Will the Vatican write its own conclusions to the Synod debates as on previous occasions?
"And passion or pride can thrive among those who invoke church teaching for talibanist proposals such as the criminalization of fornication, adultery etc."
Passion or pride also can thrive among those who use smears of an opponent's position as "talibanist" in place of valid arguments.
Ok, instead of talibanist, I shall say integrist, meaning those who would make fornication and adultery crimes punishable by the civil law.
"Well next week's Synod on the Eucharist will give us a picture of thought there. Will the bishops have the courage and inspiration to speak up?"
Ha! Ha! Ha!
What will they "speak UP" about? They have ruined the Eucharist throughout the Latin Church -- or at least have stood still while it was ruined. The age of bishops "speaking up" is dead. Let us bury its corpse. May the Apostolic See shut them down.
"Ok, instead of talibanist, I shall say integrist, meaning those who would make fornication and adultery crimes punishable by the civil law."
No, I think they should be punishable by the criminal law, not just adjudicated in civil law. I fail to see what's integrist about treating adultery and fornication as crimes. Is there anything in Catholicism that says a Catholic may not take the position I have? News to me if there is.
Sure Fr. O'Leary:
The following are some of Gibson's most tendentious and oft-repeated claims:
* gay and lesbian youths may account for one third of all youth suicides;
* homosexual youths are two to three times more likely to attempt suicide than their heterosexual peers;
* suicide is the leading cause of death among gay and lesbian youth; and
* gay youth suicide is caused by the internalization of "homophobia" and violence directed at gays.[5]
Although Gibson's report was denounced by Secretary Sullivan, homosexual activists have skillfully used it to claim that "government statistics" support their suicide assertions. Pro-gay articles routinely (and mistakenly) cite Gibson's unproven statistics as part of the HHS task force's official conclusions on youth suicide.[6] Gibson himself has declined an interview with the author to discuss his controversial assertions.[7]
http://www.leaderu.com/jhs/labar.../
labarbera.html
Glad I could be of assistance.
Tony, you quote a certain Gibson. But he is certainly not the source of my perception that homophobia drives many vulnerable adolescents to suicide. I was thinking of Irish rather than American adolescents.
Was it you who claimed that the suicide rate among gay adolescents is exactly the same in (allegedly) gay friendly San Francisco and other parts of the USA?
You seem to want to deny any link between adolescent suicides and parental homophobia.
Also, Tony, since your material comes from an avowedly anti-"homosexual movement" think tank, you should regard it with skepticism if you do not wish to avoid the danger of buying into bigotry.
I mean "if you wish to avoid the danger of buying into bigotry". DO you?
Would you buy information about Jews from a site that explicitly declared itself as war with "Jewish apologists"?
Would you buy information about blacks from a site that explicitly declared itself opposed to the "black agenda"?
IN REPLY TO THE FOLLOWING QUERY
I fail to see what's integrist about treating adultery and fornication as crimes. Is there anything in Catholicism that says a Catholic may not take the position I have? News to me if there is.
Jordan Potter | 09.28.05 - 3:44 pm | #
I WOULD SAY THAT THE TEACHING OF VATICAN II ON THE RIGHT OF FREEDOM OF CONSCIENCE WOULD BE APPOSITE.
Jordan himself has no doubt never "fornicated" but I suggest that if all "fornicators" were put in prison the world would come to a halt. Again I urge him to read Shakespeare's great play on the subject.
Recall St Augustine, quoted approvingly by Ratzinger in Salt of the Earth:
"Take away brothels, and what disorder would ensue in human affairs".
Brothels were for a society where any other form of "fornication" was criminal or socially inadmissible.
Vatty, you're HILARIOUS!! Thank you, Prof. Blosser, for continuing to allow him to post here. He's so much more entertaining than the pale imitations in the N.O.R. ads!
"I WOULD SAY THAT THE TEACHING OF VATICAN II ON THE RIGHT OF FREEDOM OF CONSCIENCE WOULD BE APPOSITE."
Well, by that logic we can't have any laws at all.
Laws exist to protect social order, not to force the individual conscience. Laws should respect the realm of privacy and individual freedom. Hence a law penalizing masturbation, for example, would be indefensible.
If such laws as you recommend were in force, would you say all fornicators should turn themselves in and serve their sentence? Would you have a statute of limitations? Would you be less or more severe on adolescent fornicators?
Would you recommend stoning for adulteresses, as the Bible does? If not, why not?
Here is an easy test for talibanism: if you support capital punishment for sodomy or adultery you are a Taliban.
What do you think of the Augustine quote? Augustine let it stand when he wrote his critical review of all his writings, the Retractationes. Ratzinger also refers to it benignly.
Perhaps Catholic morality is more recognizing of real life than you are?
"Here is an easy test for talibanism: if you support capital punishment for sodomy or adultery you are a Taliban."
It also helps if you adhere to some form of Islam . . .
Well then, but Fr. O'Leary's easy test, I'm obviously not a Taliban, even apart from the fact that I'm a Catholic.
"But"? Make that "by."
Me and my miswired brain . . . .
Laws exist to protect the social order from individuals and groups whose actions are perceived by members of that social order as detrimental or threatening to it. If the social order and the laws which protect it are rooted in a religious firmament, it is perfectly logical that actions perceived by that group to be "irreligious", or blasphemous, or impure -- say, masturbation, or, um, the insertion of various and sundry objects into the anuses of others for sexual purposes -- would be condemned, and their perpetrators subjected to punishments, up to and including the lopping off of this or that offending appendage. To tar such perfectly logical behavior with the inflammatory label of "talibanism" is shocking, coming as it does from a such a sophisticated cultural relativist as yourself, Fr Joe. It makes you a kind of cultural chauvinist -- a secularist inquisitor. After all, some of those true believers could be your brothers, mothers, sisters, cousins, and friends, scarred forever by your vindictive cultural bigotry.
Roister is joking -- I hope -- or is this real talibanism???
I am a cultural relativist, yes, but not a philosophical relativist or a doctrinal relativist or a moral relativist -- that is I believe in objective truth, though I realize that our apprehensions of truth are always culture-bound. Thus I believe it is objectively false that two and two are five, and objectively immoral to punish masturbation by castration.
If you believe that masturbation is a mortal sin, a sin capable of condemning you to the bowels of hell, could not castration be construed as a profound act of charity?
Really, Fr Joe, you seem to have greater love for the penis than for the soul.
You are saying that you are not a doctrinal relativist? Does this mean that Church doctrine is for you sacred and absolute? BWA HA HA HA -- just kidding, Fr Joe, don't take offense! It probably means that you consider "doctrine" simply irrelevant as a concept!
This new-found doctrinal absolutism of yours, Fr Joe, does it extend even to Buddhism? I recall that you are almost as ardent a proponent of Buddhism as you are of same sex attraction and Wagnerian opera.
Wagner... Attraction for Eastern spirituality... Interest in same-sex attraction...
This reminds me of someone... Corporal Shicklgruber, perhaps???
Schicklgruber... the mysteries of the Thule-Gesellschaft...
Since O'Leary is being hyperbolic with his insistent accusation of "talibanism" (which in olearyspeak means "faithfulness"), we can play with exaggerated ideas, too, can't we?
Talibanism is of course totally unfaithful to Vatican II, Dignitatis Humanae.
Nathan's exiledcatholic blog is such a refreshing contrast to this moldy site. Here is his latest comment:
September 30, 2005
Has the Rebellion Begun?
The New York Times is reporting today that the Conference of Major Superiors of Men, which represents more than 250 leaders of Catholic religious orders, is planning a trip to Rome to oppose the upcoming document which will bar the way to ordination for gay men. Meanwhile, The Washington Post is reporting that Fr. Gerald J. Chojnacki, SJ, the Provincial of the New York Province of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits), has publicly criticized the new policy, saying that he finds it "insulting to demean their memory [here he is referring to gay priests] and their years of service by even hinting that they were unfit for priesthood because of their sexual orientation."
The New York Times also reported on September 25 that some Catholics are also pointing to Fr. Mychal Judge, OFM, a gay priest who sacrificed his life to minister to those who were injured and dying in the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. The former city fire commissioner, Thomas Von Essen, a Catholic, said that it would be "a shame" to prevent someone like Fr. Judge from being ordained to the priesthood, and also said: "To sacrifice your life to God and try to do so much good every day and to be prevented from doing that -- it's no wonder they can't get anyone to join the church to become a priest or a nun." Andrew Sullivan agreed, saying that the new policy "captures some of the cruelty and bigotry we see in the Vatican now." Even William Donohue, the ultraconservative president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, couldn't express support for the new Vatican policy.
Although the papacy and its curia have betrayed the Second Vatican Council many times over since its close, I think this may be the point when the faithful -- and by this I mean not only the lay faithful, but also the priests and the religious orders -- will stand up and say: "Enough. No more." Perhaps this will also embolden the bishops to reclaim their own apostolic authority, and the collegiality that was promised them during Vatican II. Wouldn't it be amusing if the flamers were the ones ultimately to cause the papacy to lose the power it has illegitimately claimed for itself since the end of the first millennium? God certainly does have an ironic sense of justice. St. Mychal Judge, priest and martyr, pray for us!
By Nathan @ 5:57 PM Comments (0) | Trackback (0)
Updated Sidebar
I've updated my sidebar, adding five new blog links to each of my four blogrolls, and adding a new blogroll called "Secular and Political." I should point out that even the secular and political are not always what we think of when we think of "secular and political" -- some of them do indeed also post spiritual things, but I would say that the predominant focus of the blogs listed there is secular and/or political.
I enco
"Fr. Gerald J. Chojnacki, SJ, the Provincial of the New York Province of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits), has publicly criticized the new policy, saying that he finds it 'insulting to demean their memory [here he is referring to gay priests] and their years of service by even hinting that they were unfit for priesthood because of their sexual orientation.'"
Yes, it's been suspected for quite some time that the Jesuits have been heavily infiltrated by heretical homosexual priests for whom there vow of obedience and faithfulness to the Pope is only words.
"it's no wonder they can't get anyone to join the church to become a priest or a nun."
Von Essen must not belong to the same Catholic Church that I do. Converts enter the Church every year, and some of them go on to become nuns. I personally know of two seminarians in our diocese who converted from Protestantism (one of them was my sponsor when I came into the Church). Ah, but I expect New Yorkers are a pretty provincial, isolated lot, and aren't as aware of what Catholicism might be like in the U.S. outside of the Big Apple.
Don't know about New York, but in Ireland it has been very difficult to get anyone to become a priest or a nun for quite some time now.
Also the conversion flow in Ireland is from Catholicism to non-Catholic churches rather than in the other direction.
In other words, religious people are voting with their feet against the Ratzinger-church that turned its back on Vatican II.
You are a shame to Catholic Ireland.
When one remembers the Irish martyrs who died for the One True Faith, your heterodoxy and sodomy-friendliness make my blood boil.
Saint Oliver Plunket, pray for us!
Yes, it's very true that the infidelity and heresy rampant in the post-Vatican II Church is greatly contributing to the bleeding of members that the Church has been experiencing in Ireland and elsewhere -- but where the Church is healthy, is faithful and orthodox, she is seeing conversions and vocations.
I think the Church in most of America is healthy, faithful and orthodox. Yet even that church seems to have a big vocation problem. See what Steinfels writes about the appalling intellectual level of those accepted. And we already know that the priesthood today seems to attract conservative neocaths who are "struggling with homosexual impulses". Do not blame the laity for the clerical machine that has failed them.
Why is New Cath exhibiting rage? What makes his blood boil is probably his complete inability to address or refute any of the observations put forward here, combined with a touch of homosexual panic. In any case, anger is a poor counselor, and he would do better to calm down before he posts his venomous and often calumnious messages.
"And we already know that the priesthood today seems to attract conservative neocaths who are 'struggling with homosexual impulses.'"
We know no such thing, because it isn't true. Lately it's been attracting faithful, orthodox men who are called to celibacy. Most of the priests who've struggled with homosexuality were ordained in the 1960s and 1970s. In the 1980s, however, we began to see fewer homosexuals attempting to pursue a vocation.
As for the spiritual health of the U.S. Catholic Church, I know we won't see eye-to-eye on that, because we don't agree on what Catholicism and faithfulness is.
"Most of the priests who've struggled with homosexuality were ordained in the 1960s and 1970s. In the 1980s, however, we began to see fewer homosexuals attempting to pursue a vocation."
I know of no evidence whatever for this claim -- and it contradicts all we have been hearing about a "lavender mafia" and the gay-club atmosphere of seminaries.
Sipe, who is an expert, says:
Celibacy is neither taught adequately nor practiced well by students or teachers in Catholic seminaries. (I will not make many friends in high places by saying so, but there is plenty of evidence of sexual activity among the students and faculties of Catholic training centers.)
... The Vatican is trying to sniff out, not only homosexual behavior, but also homosexual orientation.
Good luck. In many ways that search is a no-brainer.
...
Catholic clergy of every rank have always included a larger proportion of homosexually oriented men than exist in the general population. Father Donald Cozzens along with many other knowledgeable churchmen put the current proportion of homosexually oriented priests as upward of 50 percent.
...
I have estimated a smaller number of homosexually oriented priests (30-40 percent) than other researchers have because I have had long term contacts that can allow one to distinguish behaviors from orientation.
...
The Vatican, in the person of Bishop Edwin O’Brien, has suggested that any man who has had a same sex experience or is homosexually oriented should be barred from the priesthood. Supposedly the logic being that this will eliminate any homosexual behavior.
Good luck. That is equivalent to saying that the government will eliminate sex in prisons if heterosexual men are isolated from any gay prisoner.
POTTER says that this is a problem of the past, concerning priests ordained in the 1960s and 1970s and that the current crop of more traditionalist seminarians are also less likely to be gay. I see enough letters from gay seminarians on the internet -- revealing a quite widespread gay anxiety among seminarians -- to be very skeptical of such a claim!
First Things rejects Fr Donald Cozzens account of the gayness of seminaries:
Fr. Cozzens claims that statistics show that 50 percent of priests and seminarians are homosexually oriented. A gay culture in the priesthood or seminary, he says, makes it very awkward for heterosexuals, who as a consequence doubt their vocations and withdraw. ... First, I do not believe the statistics. The very few surveys and studies that have been done on homosexuality among priests are almost certainly flawed by the factor of self-selection. .. As for Fr. Cozzens' depiction of seminarians, I can only say that they must be very different from those whom I have known during fourteen years of seminary work. .. is there a dominant homosexual culture in seminaries that makes life difficult, if not impossible, for heterosexuals? That does not jibe with my experience.
It is very possible that in the 1970s and 80s there were a significant number of seminarians who were sexually confused, and were encouraged in that confusion by a sexually charged society. They were not challenged to harmonize their ideas and their lives with the teaching of the Church, and today some of them are priests. Some are effective and faithfully celibate, while some are actively involved in the gay subculture. The latter pose a very real problem, but the incidence of the problem, I am convinced, is nowhere near the figure proffered by Fr. Cozzens. His claims are both unsupported and irresponsible.
SO WHO TO BELIEVE?
planetout.com writes
I never knew any pedophile priests or seminarians, but I knew loads of gay priests, seminarians and even bishops.
As is often the case with gays and sex, the media is making some mistakes in its coverage of this scandal. For one thing, sex between a 30-year-old and a 15-year-old is not pedophilia. It's just sex between two people, who, in most cases, want to have sex together and know what they're doing. Sex between a 30-year-old and a 15-year-old is illegal in many, but not all, U.S. states, but it is not pedophilia. Pedophilia is a sexual attraction to youngsters. From what I'm reading, a small minority of the priestly "abuse" cases involve pedophilia.
Secondly, studies and statistics apparently have fully demonstrated that gays are no more likely to be pedophiles than straight people. So why has the priestly pedophilia scandal gotten so intertwined in the media and public mind with homosexuality? Two reasons:
1. Since half or two-thirds of priests are attracted to people of the same gender, perhaps half or two-thirds of priest pedophiles do their thing with individuals of the same gender. I've read that pedophiles often don't care about the gender of their victims, but that doesn't ring entirely true to me.
2. Because the bishops have their tits in the wringer big time for shuffling loser priests from parish to parish and diocese to diocese instead of firing them, the bishops are looking for scapegoats. Since Catholicism hates homosexuality, we are a convenient target.
Catholic doctrine considers gay sex "intrinsically evil," "objectively disordered," "deviant" and "contrary to the laws of nature." Gay relationships are "a deplorable distortion of what should be a communion of love and life between a man and a woman in a reciprocal gift open to life (pregnancy)." The church says any sex act that is not open to the possibility of procreation is a mortal sin which, if not absolved in confession prior to one's death, condemns one's soul to hell. The procreation doctrine also categorizes birth control, masturbation and oral sex (including between heterosexual spouses) as mortal sins.
Just between you and me, I hope this brouhaha tears the church apart. The Catholic Church does do some good in the world, but it does more evil. Most problematic, however, is the simple fact that the stuff the Catholic Church teaches is not true. Call me crazy, but I've never seen one iota of evidence for the existence of this God that everybody carries on about. All evidence suggests that humans created God to make themselves feel better about the fundamental quagmires of our existence.
The truth of the matter -- as I finally figured out after immersing myself in Western philosophy and Catholicism/Christianity 20 years ago -- is that we don't know "why" we're here, life has no big objective meaning, and when we die the same thing happens to us as happens to the ants we squash when we walk down the
inoohr.org has this on priests and AIDS
Most priests, however, said the church failed to offer an early and effective sexual education that might have prevented infection in the first place. Two-thirds said sexuality either was not addressed at all or was not discussed adequately in the seminary. Three of four said the church needed to offer more education about sexual issues.
"Sexuality still needs to be talked about and dealt with," said the Rev. Dennis Rausch, a priest with AIDS who runs an AIDS ministry program for Catholic Charities in the Archdiocese of Miami.
"I've been trying to get into the seminary here for the last several years to do an awareness course for the guys, so when they come out, they at least have some knowledge."
Many priests and behavioral experts argue that the church's adherence to 12th-century doctrine about the virtues of celibacy and its teachings on homosexuality have contributed to the spread of AIDS within the clergy. Unwittingly, the church has kept fledgling priests -- some of whom were as young as 14 when they entered seminary in the '60s and '70s -- uneducated about the reality of a sexual world and its temptations.
Moreover, by treating homosexual acts as an abomination and the breaking of celibacy vows as shameful, the church has scared priests into silence, some say.
"I think this speaks to a failure on the part of the church," said Auxiliary Bishop Thomas Gumbleton of the Archdiocese of Detroit. "Gay priests and heterosexual priests didn't know how to handle their sexuality, their sexual drive. And so they would handle it in ways that were not healthy.
"How to be celibate and to be gay at the same time, and how to be celibate and heterosexual at the same time, that's what we were never really taught how to do. And that was a major failing."
Roman Catholic cardinals in the United States and high-ranking church officials in Rome declined requests to discuss the issue. The Vatican referred questions to local bishops.
In a statement released Saturday, the Rev. Patrick J. Rush, vicar general of the Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, said: "The numbers of HIV-AIDS deaths of ordained clergy pale in comparison to the tidal wave in our country and throughout the world. Through their ministries, all of our priests offer their lives to serve others."
Rush said the Catholic Church has responded with compassion to those who suffer from AIDS.
"Faith reminds us that the afflicted are our brothers and sisters, men and women in God's image. They deserve our care, respect and support."
In an earlier interview, Bishop Raymond J. Boland of the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph said the AIDS deaths show that priests are human.
"Much as we would regret it, it shows that human nature is human nature," Boland said. "And all of us are heirs to all of the misfortunes that can be foisted upon the human race."
Boland thinks church leaders now are
Boland thinks church leaders now are doing a better job.
"I do feel today that a lot of our men get many opportunities -- the standard of spiritual direction, the standard of formation is much higher," Boland said. "And in all of the seminaries, we have people who are trained counselors."
..
The Rev. Tom Casey, an Augustinian priest from the Boston area, cared for a priest who died of AIDS in 1991. Casey said the church bears some of the blame for his death.
"They have created a tremendous amount of homophobia," Casey said. "They're schizophrenic in the sense that they're wonderful when it comes to caring for people, but on the other hand, most churches don't generally have a healthy understanding of sexuality."
Casey said his friend, a deeply spiritual man, contracted AIDS through sexual relations.
"Part of it was repression, denial, and an acting out, which he realized was inappropriate," Casey said. "But because of that one part of his life that he had not addressed openly, it turned out, unfortunately, to be deadly."
..In 1995, Bishop Emerson J. Moore left the Archdiocese of New York and went to Minnesota, where he died in a hospice of an AIDS-related illness. His death certificate attributed his death to "unknown natural causes" and listed his occupation as "laborer" in the manufacturing industry.
After a Minnesota AIDS activist filed a complaint, officials changed the cause of death to "HIV-related illness." The occupation, however, has not been corrected.
"I think there's still a lot of shame and dysfunction there," said Sue Ledbetter, who helped form an AIDS support group in Wichita in the early 1980s. "In the early days, they wouldn't even recognize AIDS on death certificates. They would put things like `died of pneumonia, hepatitis.' And the priests probably did have those things. But they got those things because of complications from HIV and AIDS."
In the early 1990s, experts who counseled and treated priests with AIDS estimated that about 200 in the United States either had died of AIDS or had contracted the disease. Now, those who work with infected priests say the numbers are higher.
"You're talking several hundred," said the Rev. Jon Fuller, a Jesuit priest and physician who serves as assistant director of Boston Medical Center's Clinical AIDS Program.
The Star alone -- through death certificates and interviews with fellow priests and family members -- found information on about 100 priests who have died of AIDS nationwide since the mid-1980s.
And many priests and medical experts now agree that at least 300 priests have died. That translates into an annualized AIDS-related death rate of about 4 per 10,000 -- four times that of the general population's rate of roughly 1 per 10,000 and about double the death rate of the adult male population.
Other statistics and experts suggest that those estimates are too conservative.
For example, the annualiz
For example, the annualized death rate of priests confirmed by The Star to have died of AIDS in Kansas and Missouri from 1987 to 1999 is 7 per 10,000, or seven times that of the general population.
That death rate is consistent with the rate calculated by The Star after reviewing death certificates of priests who died in California, Missouri and Massachusetts in 1995. The finding: six priests -- or 7.3 per 10,000 -- died of AIDS in those states that year. The AIDS death rate of the general population in those three states in 1995 was 1.8 per 10,000.
A.W. Richard Sipe, a former priest who has spent more than 30 years studying sexuality issues in the church, thinks that about 750 priests nationwide have died of such illnesses. That would translate into an AIDS-related death rate eight times that of the general population.
Joseph Barone, a New Jersey psychiatrist and AIDS expert, puts the number of U.S. priests who have died at 1,000 -- nearly 11 times the rate of the general population.
Barone directed an AIDS ministry from 1983 to 1993 for students at North American College in Rome. While there, he set up an underground AIDS testing program. Over seven years, he tested dozens of seminarians. Barone gave them false names, drove them to their tests in an unmarked car and paid for the tests himself.
"I didn't know who they were; they didn't know who I was," Barone said.
Of those he worked with, he said, 1 in 12 tested HIV-positive.
By the time Barone left Rome, he had treated about 80 priests with AIDS. Most of them were gay, he said, and contracted the disease through sexual activity.
"The tragedy is many of them have been so duplicitous and so closeted," said Barone, a member of the National Catholic AIDS Network.
"They didn't realize what they were doing, not only to themselves, but to other individuals, because of the exponential transmission rate."
Another researcher who has extensively studied the issue of AIDS within the church is the Rev. Thomas Crangle, a Franciscan priest in the Capuchin order in Passaic, N.J. In 1990, Crangle conducted a mail survey of hundreds of priests selected at random.
Crangle said that of the 500 surveys he sent, 398 were returned. About 45 percent of those responding volunteered that they were gay, and 92 -- nearly one-fourth -- said they had AIDS.
"I was surprised," Crangle said. "I felt there was a problem, but I didn't think it was of that magnitude."
`It's never fair to presume'
Many Catholics say it is irrelevant how the priests contracted AIDS. Some caution that it would be wrong to assume that all priests with HIV became infected by engaging in homosexual activity.
"I would never ask a priest how he got it, just like nobody asked me two years ago how I got cancer of the colon," Boland said. "But I would provide for him. I would not write him off and say, `Because you've got AIDS and because there are doubts about how one ca
I would not write him off and say, `Because you've got AIDS and because there are doubts about how one can acquire it, therefore you're not a good priest.' "
As long ago as the early 1980s, the Rev. John Keenan discovered that Catholic priests were contracting AIDS at an alarming rate.
"We looked at what was taking place in the gay Catholic population, and there was a lot of concern about the epidemic proportions of HIV," said Keenan, a Blessed Sacrament priest and clinical psychologist who runs Trinity House in Chicago, an outpatient clinic for priests.
Keenan and his staff developed an anonymous AIDS testing program, then notified priests, bishops and superiors of religious communities.
The response surprised him.
"Originally, it was just for people in our region," Keenan said. "And then we started getting people from all over."
Keenan now runs weekly support sessions for infected priests. He believes most priests with AIDS contracted the disease through same-sex relations. He said he treated one priest who had infected eight other priests.
Charlie Isola, a New York City social worker and psychotherapist, said all the priests with AIDS that he has treated are gay men in their 40s to early 60s who became infected through same-sex relations.
"Some of them had sexual contact in the seminary which continued after ordination, and some of the men had their first sexual contact with other priests or with laymen after they were ordained," Isola said.
Other means of transmission, however, can't be ruled out, since many priests have served as missionaries in countries that have poor medical practices.
The Rev. Luis Olivares, 59, pastor of Our Lady Queen of Angels Church and an activist who ministered to poor immigrants in Los Angeles, died of AIDS in March 1993. Doctors thought Olivares contracted HIV from contaminated needles while being treated for an injury during a visit to Central America.
"I think it's important for people to remember that it's never fair to presume how somebody got it," said Fuller, the Jesuit priest and doctor. "It isn't really relevant."
More important, Fuller said, is the question of when a person contracted AIDS. Because the virus has a long incubation period, a priest may have become infected before taking his vows, Fuller said.
Others argue that failing to address how the priests were infected shows that the church is in denial about the issue.
"The thing about this is it's a public manifestation of the fact that this guy is sexually active," said Maureen Fiedler, director of Catholics Speak Out, a national group based in Hyattsville, Md., that is critical of some of the church's positions.
"And the church just doesn't want to admit it."
On the basis of that report, I can only conclude that the American priesthood is predominantly gay and sexually active. That this has now changed, in recent years, I find hard to believe. What evidence of such a change can Jordan Potter offer?
"I don't think the real problem is HIV/AIDS but rather the basic dishonesty of the church with regard to all sexuality," wrote one gay priest. "Priests and others have to disguise and hide their sexuality in all sorts of ways and of course this leads to unhealthy sexual expression."
Some priests say the church was warned nearly 30 years ago that such problems could develop but failed to take steps to prevent them.
In 1967, the U.S. Catholic bishops voted to conduct an extensive study of the life and ministry of the American priest. The U.S. Catholic Conference published the findings in a 1972 book called The Catholic Priest in the United States: Psychological Investigations.
Most significant among the findings was that a large proportion of priests were psychologically underdeveloped and had failed to achieve a healthy sexual identity.
"For whatever reasons, these priests have not resolved the problems which are ordinarily worked through during the time of adolescence," the report said. "Sexual feelings are a source of conflict and difficulty and much energy goes into suppressing them or the effort to distract themselves from them.
"Most report that their education about sexual development was negative or non-existent; many report no normal developmental social experience."
Gumbleton said the church missed an opportunity in the '70s when the bishops received the report.
"They made it very clear that we had major problems because of underdevelopment of two-thirds of the priests of this country," he said. "It brought out the facts and would have been the basis for developing programs within the seminary to help people to grow into healthy adults with integrated sexuality.
"The report was given to the bishops, and they just said `Thank you.'...It was a disaster. That study was one of the best things we ever did. I was totally frustrated at the time, and I still remain frustrated. I've always thought that was a huge failure on the part of the conference of bishops."
In 1983, the National Conference of Catholic Bishops' Committee on Priestly Life and Ministry followed up with a 59-page booklet called "Human Sexuality and the Ordained Priesthood."
The booklet's purpose was to provide "a structured, objective basis for priests and bishops to reflect personally and talk about some important realities -- realities which otherwise might not get looked at or dealt with helpfully."
Topics included celibacy, loneliness and relationships. Three pages dealt with homosexuality.
It was, said a priest responding to The Star's survey, "one of the most neglected documents in recent years."
12 May 2001 The Tablet
Sexuality in the seminary
James O'Keefe (Rector of Ushaw Seminary)
Mark Dowd writes in his Tablet article that Archbishop Bertone, secretary to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, declared recently that "men with a homosexual orientation should not be admitted to seminary life".
... The current presumption is that there are more gay seminarians and priests today than there were in the past. How can we know? I started in junior seminary in 1959; we simply did not have the language to talk about the affective side of our lives, or about sexuality or orientation. It is true, however, that a significant number of priests gave up active ministry after 1968, and many of them married. It may be that these departures left a higher proportion of homosexuals in the secular priesthood.
Certainly, the proportion of gay men in formation for ministerial priesthood in the Catholic Church is higher than that in the population as a whole. I am very cautious about the percentages suggested by the American seminary rector Donald Cozzens, who appeared on the television programme, and the researcher Richard Sipe. Some of my colleagues in the United States are very critical of the ways they have reached these conclusions. None the less, the proportion of gay men in Catholic seminaries and the Catholic priesthood does raise questions.
One adverse effect of these large proportions of homosexuals may be that heterosexuals who have made the sacrifice involved in accepting celibacy for the sake of the kingdom begin to feel that the sign value of what they have done is being negated. For while they have had to give up the prospect of marrying, becoming a parent and having children, no such choice has been made by gay men. Some (not many) seminarians have given as their reason for leaving the seminary and formation the preponderance of homosexual seminarians in the community. Men whose own human development needs to include relationships with women are at some disadvantage.
Homosexual students and priests have their own difficulties to overcome. There are very few role models for them. As one friend of mine says: "What is missing is the narrative." In other words, the story of gay priests cannot yet be told; many of us might not know how difficult it is for gay clergy to operate in a society which is still so prejudiced.
I do not believe for one moment, however, that Sr Jeannine Gramick is right, as quoted by Mark Dowd, when she says that "homosexuality is a time bomb ticking in the Church". I am certain that seminary rectors are more concerned about the personal, spiritual, academic and pastoral formation of all their students than the sexual orientation of any of them.
..
I do not believe that a seminarian should be asked to leave a seminary just because his orientation is homosexual. It is far more important that he is passionate about being a herald of the Gospel, can preach and preside in the local c
The work and guidance of the Holy Spirit is what fundamentally attracts us to the Catholic priesthood, but it is always useful for us to reflect at the human level on our motives, which are unconscious as well as conscious. We could benefit from some honest reflection on what it is about the local worshipping community that attracts a preponderance of gay men to enter the priesthood. Various explanations have been advanced: that these men feel safer in a virtually all-male environment; that gay seminarians are relieved at not having to admit that they are not attracted to women; that the priesthood has resemblances to the caring and acting professions, for elements of both are included in the role of the priest. Others wonder if the pull is towards a cultic or conservative priestly profession which can appear to give clarity and security in a complex world.
It seems that we are not yet able to have an informed and honest discussion about such things. We certainly need clarification about judgements such as "intrinsic disorder". I would have serious concerns about a student who seemed only interested in pursuing comfort or status. I am inclined to call these intrinsic disorders, yet we do not use such language about the abuse of power. The effects of original sin are alive and well in all of us. At the same time, our baptismal commitment invites us to make moral choices which are increasingly life-giving and motivated by real love.
So there are questions to be asked about the sexual integration and maturity of all future priests, including those who are gay. We need to look carefully at the basic principles involved in human and personal development, affirming that we are all loved by God and that our sexuality is a gift from God.
Observers and commentators such as Mark Dowd are pushing a political agenda alongside pastoral concern for gay people in general and seminarians in particular. There is nothing wrong with that, but the two need separating out. The political debate needs to be carried on with rigour and consistency. Pastoral attitudes must be compassionate and open to change. But conversion of heart must always be the beginning and end of any truly Christian approach.
Note that Cozzens and O'Keefe, seminary rectors, have no doubt that there is a preponderance of homosexual candidates for the priesthood.
Well, since all we've got now is cut-and-paste, I have some words for O'Leary, too.
On the "Reformation" and other false reformations:
"In those days passions ran riot and knowledge of the truth was almost completely twisted and confused. A continual battle was being waged against errors. Human society, going from bad to worse, was rushing headlong into the abyss. Then those proud and rebellious men came on the scene who are 'enemies of the cross of Christ . . .Their god is the belly...they mind the things of earth.' These men were not concerned with correcting morals, but only with denying dogmas. Thus they increased the chaos. They dropped the reins of law, and unbridled licentiousness ran wild. They despised the authoritative guidance of the church and pandered to the whims of the dissolute princes and people. They tried to destroy the Church's doctrine, constitution and discipline. they were similar to those sinners who were warned long ago: 'Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil.' They called this rebellious riot and perversion of faith and morals a reformation, and themselves reformers. In reality, they were corrupters. In undermining the strength of Europe through wars and dissensions, they paved the way for those modern rebellions and apostasy. This modern warfare has united and renewed in one attack the three kinds of attack which have up until now been separated; namely, the bloody conflicts of the first ages, the internal pests of heresies, and finally, in the name of evangelical liberty, the vicious corruption and perversion of discipline such as was unknown, perhaps, even in medieval times. Yet in each of these combats the Church has always emerged victorious."
On modern "reformers", such as O'Leary:
"The reformers that Borromeo opposed [...] tried to reform faith and discipline according to their own whims. Venerable Brethren, it is no better understood by those whom We must withstand today. These moderns, forever prattling about culture and civilization, are undermining the Church's doctrine, laws, and practices. They are not concerned very much about culture and civilization. By using such high-sounding words they think they can conceal the wickedness of their schemes.
"All of you know their purpose, subterfuges, and methods. On Our part We have denounced and condemned their scheming. They are proposing a UNIVERSAL APOSTASY even worse than the one that threatened the age of Charles. IT IS WORSE, We say, BECAUSE IT STEALTHILY CREEPS INTO THE VERY VEINS OF THE CHURCH, hides there, and cunningly pushes erroneous principles to their ultimate conclusions.
"Both these heresies are fathered by the 'enemy' who 'sowed weeds among the wheat' in order to bring about the downfall of mankind. Both revolts go about in the hidden ways of darkness, develop along the same line, and come to an end in the same fatal way. In the past the first apostasy turned where fortune seemed to smile. It set ruler
rulers against people or people against rulers only to lead both classes to destruction. Today this modern apostasy stirs up hatred between the poor and the rich until, dissatisfied with their station, they gradually fall into such wretched ways that they must pay the fine imposed on those who, absorbed in worldly, temporal things, forget "the kingdom of God and His justice." As a matter of fact, this present conflict is even more serious than the others. ALTHOUGH THE WILD INNOVATORS OF FORMER TIMES GENERALLY PRESERVED SOME FRAGMENTS OF THE TREASURY OF REVEALED DOCTRINE, THESE MODERNS ACT AS IF THEY WILL NOT REST UNTIL THEY COMPLETELY DESTROY IT.
"WHEN THE FOUNDATIONS OF RELIGION ARE OVERTHROWN, THE RESTRAINTS OF CIVIL SOCIETY ARE ALSO NECESSARILY SHATTERED . Behold the sad spectacle of our times! Behold the impending danger of the future!"
Sancte Pie, ora pro nobis!
Jerry Filteau
Catholic News Service
http://www.jknirp.com/filteau5.htm
A study of priests in 2001 found that substantial numbers believed there were homosexual subcultures among priests in their dioceses and religious institutes, but priests were more concerned about such subcultures in seminaries.
In a paper delivered Aug. 16 at the meeting in Chicago of the Association for the Sociology of Religion, the researchers said younger priests were more likely than older ones to describe their diocese or religious community or the seminary they attended as having a homosexual subculture.
..Authors of the paper were Dean R. Hoge, a sociology professor at The Catholic University of America in Washington, and his doctoral student and research assistant, Jacqueline E. Wenger. ..The study was based on responses to written surveys by more than 1,200 priests in 44 dioceses and 45 religious orders, randomly chosen, from across the United States. In addition, 75 priests participated in individual interviews or focus-group sessions where views on various topics in the questionnaire were explored in greater depth. ..The researchers said their questions about homosexual subcultures in the priesthood or seminary life were occasioned by the views of several prominent researchers who "consider the impact of homosexual subcultures the single most important issue in the overall topic of homosexuality in the priesthood."
..
When asked if such a homosexual subculture existed in their diocese or religious institute, more than half answered "Yes, clearly" (19 percent) or "Probably but not clearly" (36 percent). Only 17 percent said "No," and 28 percent answered "Don't know."
When asked about the existence of such a subculture in the seminary during their student days, 15 percent said yes, 26 percent probably, 44 percent no, and 15 percent don't know.
When respondents were broken down by age groups, younger priests were considerably more likely than older ones to be certain of a homosexual subculture as part of their seminary environment.
Only 3 percent of priests age 66 and older said there was "clearly" a homosexual subculture at the seminary they were in. That rose to 8 percent in the 56-65 age group, 28 percent among those 46-55, 39 percent among those 36-45 and 45 percent among those 35 and under.
NOTE, JORDAN POTTER, THAT in 2001 there is evidence of an upward movement of statistics regarding gay subcultures in seminaries. Where is your evidence that the trend is now in the other direction?
Hoge and Wenger said they tested separately for years from ordination to control for possibilities of older priests not recognizing a homosexual subculture as readily or for weaker memory among older priests.
"Years since ordination has a strong independent effect," they said. "Our conclusion, based on these data and on our focus groups, is that homosexual subcultures (in seminaries) increased in visibility, and probably also in numbers, in recent decades."
From focus group findings, the researchers reported that "no priests described negative impacts in their diocese or institute" from homosexual subcultures.
"But we heard numerous negative reports about homosexual subcultures in seminaries," they added.
One priest called it "extremely corrosive." Another described some seminarians as "kind of predators to other people in the seminary community." A third said it "categorized everyone in that if you want to be a priest, you have to be sexual."
The researchers concluded, "A principal reason why subcultures had a greater effect in seminaries than later (in priestly life) is that in seminaries, men preparing for the priesthood are thrust into a close, communal setting. Once out in the parish, priests interact much less with each other and are less affected by whatever subcultures might exist."
On celibacy questions, the researchers found that priests now ages 56-65, most of whom were ordained around 1963-72, are the most liberal. Among them, 73 percent agreed that celibacy should be a matter of choice for diocesan priests and 68 percent thought the church should invite resigned priests back to active ministry, even if they are married.
Among priests ages 25-35, only 33 percent agreed with making celibacy optional and only 23 percent wanted resigned priests to be welcomed back. Among priests ages 36-45, those figures rose to 41 and 34 percent, respectively, and in the 46-55 group the numbers went up to 64 and 53 percent.
Among priests over 65, 48 percent supported optional celibacy and 50 percent backed the return of resigned priests.
When the results of the 2001 survey were compared with surveys that asked the same questions in 1970, 1985 and 1993, the researchers found that the priests ordained in the 1960s consistently held more liberal views than all the others on those issues.
Successive groups ordained since then have been increasingly conservative and increasingly like the oldest priests in the 1970s or '80s. For example, the two lowest points of agreement with the idea of returning resigned priests to ministry come in the views of the over-65 priests in 1970 (22 percent) and the under-36 priests of 2001 (23 percent).
The researchers said those findings reflect "a pattern found more generally in our series of priest surveys -- that the new vision held by the Vatican (Council) II priests was a temporary, not a permanent, vision, and which later priests turned away from, beginning in
religioustolerance.org has this:
Father Donald Cozzens wrote that several studies have concluded that about 50% of priests and seminarians are gay.
David France of Newsweek, referring to St. John's Seminary in Camarillo, CA, wrote: "Depending on whom you ask, gay and bisexual men make up anywhere from 30 percent to 70 percent of the student body at the college and graduate levels."
Rt. Rev. Helmut Hefner, rector of St. Johns Seminary "accepts that his gay enrollment may be as high as 50 percent."
Gay journalist Rex Wockner commented: "When I was in the Catholic seminary in my early 20s (St. Meinrad College, St. Meinrad, Ind., 1982-1983; University of St. Mary of the Lake, Mundelein, Ill., 1983-1984), at least 50 percent of the students were gay....At St. Mary of the Lake, the straight students felt like a minority and felt excluded from some aspects of campus life to such an extent that the administration staged a seminar at which we discussed the problem of the straight students feeling left out of things..."
Author and sociologist James G. Wolfe estimated that 55.1% of seminarians were gay.
new Cath quotes Editae Saepe (Pius X) -- a dead letter.
Let the dead bury the dead.
Rancid texts used for purposes of spiritual abuse are not of Christ or his Gospel.
especially when used to contradict the mind of the Church as expressed in Vatican II
We in Ireland know to what crimes and misery the parroting of such abusive rhetoric led.
The responsible and discerning us of texts from the past is governed by a theological discipline known as Hermeneutics. Otherwise one could preach the stoning of adulterers, the extermination of men, women and children in holy wars, the taking of virgins as war booty, the burning of heretics, the depravity of Jews, the liceity of slavery, the falsehood of Copernicanism, and a thousand other barbarities. The refusal of hermeneutics is known as fundamentalism.
us of texts, shd be use of texts
One can use texts to make oneself a mental zombie -- the letter killeth.
The Church today recognizes that the Reformation played a role in salvation history.
Not only today, alas! The Protestant Revolt prompted the greatest council in History, the glorious and most holy Tridentine Synod.
The Council of Trent learnt much from the Reformation. But both the Catholic and Protestant Churches are rooted in the Gospel and all serious Catholics today recognize that the special care of Protestants for Scripture, admired by Vatican II, makes them in many ways our teachers on the essence of the Gospel. New Cath's posturing has little to do with this sober concern for gospel truth.
"NOTE, JORDAN POTTER, THAT in 2001 there is evidence of an upward movement of statistics regarding gay subcultures in seminaries."
Okay, if you say most seminaries are under the control of the Lavender Mafia, I won't argue with you. It's all the more reason why homosexuals must not be allowed into our seminaries any longer. Once we eliminate the problem of homosexual seminarians, then we can turn to the gradual elimination through age, attrition, and, if necessary, defrocking, of actively homosexual priests.
By the way, I'm sure I'm not the only person here who has noticed how much more at home you seem to be with folks who say things like this --
"Just between you and me, I hope this brouhaha tears the church apart. The Catholic Church does do some good in the world, but it does more evil. Most problematic, however, is the simple fact that the stuff the Catholic Church teaches is not true. Call me crazy, but I've never seen one iota of evidence for the existence of this God that everybody carries on about. All evidence suggests that humans created God to make themselves feel better about the fundamental quagmires of our existence."
-- than you are with folks who actually believe what the Church teaches.
"The responsible and discerning use of texts from the past is governed by a theological discipline known as Hermeneutics. Otherwise one could preach . . . the falsehood of Copernicanism . . . . The refusal of hermeneutics is known as fundamentalism."
So there's no such thing as fundamentalist hermeneutics? Or are you unaware of the fact that there are different kinds of hermeneutic?
FYI, there's no more dispute that Copernicanism was false than there is that flat-earthism is false.
Of course I disapprove of the tenor of the posting Jordan Potter quotes -- I posted it merely and solely for its statistical comments on gays in seminaries, which he now accepts.
Copernicism is false? I suppose you are making some esoteric history-of-science point. Or would you say that since the Church is always right it cannot even have been wrong and therefore the sun must really be going round the earth and not vice versa?
Yes, Copernicanism is false -- that's why nobody today believes in it. Copernicus claimed the orbits of the earth and other planets around the sun were perfect circles. His mathematics eliminated several of the problems of the erroneous Ptolemaic theory, but still didn't match what scientists were observing about the movements of the heavenly bodies. In other words, Copernicus was wrong -- which is one of the reasons why his hypothesis was never accepted by scientists. Kepler had to introduce modifications into Copernicus' hypothesis -- only then did it become plausible, although empirical verification did not happen until some 200 years after Copernicus had tentatively proposed his hypothesis.
"I posted it merely and solely for its statistical comments on gays in seminaries, which he now accepts."
Read more carefully -- what I said is that in the 1980s, we began to see a decline in the numbers of homosexuals being ordained. I didn't say anything about whether or not any of our seminaries are under the control of heretical homosexuals.
There is not such decline in the numbers of homosexuals ordained. ALL the sources I quoted point in the opposite direction.
The Church condemned not the trimmings of Copernicus but his basic claim that the earth goes around the sun and not vice versa. Permission to teach this was first given in 1822.
But if his hypothesis hadn't been erroneous, it would have stood a better chance against those who erroneously thought the Bible's language was to be taken literally. Of course, another thing that would have helped was empirical proof, which was lacking.
Finally, as you well know, the Church did not "condemn" the idea that the earth orbited the sun -- she just forbade it from being taught, because there weren't adequate grounds to justify abandoning geocentrism back then. Unless, that is, you're aware of an "anathema sit" regarding heliocentrism that no one else has been able to discover? Catholicism would have to be rejected out-of-hand if the Church had ever solemnly proclaimed that it is contrary to the doctrine and faith of the Church to say that the earth orbits the sun.
I'm well aware that you've brought up the Copernicus/Galileo canard before, and your errors have been pointed out to you, but you persist in your error even though it wouldn't take too much study to find out how the Galileo debacle came to pass. It seems to me that you aren't really interested in discerning and adhering to the truth, just in pushing your dissenting, heretical agenda.
"There is no such decline in the numbers of homosexuals ordained. ALL the sources I quoted point in the opposite direction."
Does that include the sources you quoted that disagree with the sources that support your contention that the numbers of homosexuals hasn't declined?
Unfortunately, Jordan, I would have to agree with the "Spirit". Never have so many sodomites been ordained... I would say few seminaries are free of the problem (and those of most religious orders, as well as male monasteries and convents live a homosexual crisis).
Like I said, I'm not saying there's not a problem -- I was only referring to a leveling off that seems to have begun in the 1980s. Some seminaries would have a worse problem than others, but I don't know -- and doubt anyone really knows -- how bad the problem is. That's one of the reasons for the Apostolic Visitation, to get an idea just how bad things have gotten.
The baseball playoffs begin tonight. Hey, that reminds me of this study about anal sex among professional athletes! Turns out that 97% are homosexuals, and the other three percent are liars. Balls, gentlemen, balls, work with me, fellas! Surely I don't have to explain the significance "choking up" on the bat to repressed bunch of cro-magnons like you! And the "suicide squeeze"! -- non-procreational sex as self destruction -- pure homophobia, oh the repression, oh the heartbroken third cousins!! Hey, lighten up, I'm orthodox! Must be a fundamentalist crowd!
So a priest, a rabbi and a mullah are in a rowboat, the rowboat springs a leak, and sharks are circling. Looks bad. The mullah commends his soul to Allah. The rabbi commends his soul to Yahweh. The priest, he says "hey, 'soul' is a semantically suspect theological place-holder, doesn't mean squat, but you know, those stiffly erect fins circling out there reminds me of this gay bar in Tokyo, full of wonderful young men of style and verve -- hey, put me down, don't throw me overboard, you homophobic relics of an outmoded theocratic mindset, HEY, I'M ORTHODOX!!!!!!!"
Here is Carroll's piece in the IHT
ROME To be a Roman Catholic in Rome this week is to remember, among so much else, the way in which leaders of this church have squandered their moral authority in recent years.
In 1968, it was the disastrous anti-birth control encyclical "Humanae Vitae," which opened a gulf between the hierarchy and the laity and which lately has the church on the wrong side of the global fight against HIV/AIDS.
The coterie of American bishops chosen by Pope John Paul II failed their greatest test by protecting abusive priests instead of the children who were their victims. Now, church authority stands on the edge of yet another act of moral self-mutilation with a coming "instruction" banning homosexuals from seminaries. Such a policy threatens to turn an imminent program of "apostolic visitations" of U.S. seminaries, which overtly targets "heresy," into a full blown sexual witch hunt.
Over the last couple of weeks, I have had direct and indirect contact with well-connected Catholics here - hardly a hotbed of liberalism - and the coming instruction is regarded as a catastrophe in the making.
With boards of Vatican-appointed investigators poised to swoop down on American schools in which new priests are trained, interrogations of candidates and loyalty tests for teachers already betray a nostalgia for the bygone era of thought-control and snitching. A formally licensed obsession with homosexuality will push the investigation into a realm, as one senior priest put it to me, more of Joseph Stalin than Jesus Christ.
Instead of asking hard questions about the root causes of the priestly sex abuse scandal - facing problems of the clerical culture itself, including celibacy, authoritarianism, discrimination against women, the immaturity of church teachings on sexuality - Rome is preparing to scapegoat homosexuals.
The idea is astoundingly foolish, based on fantasies of sexual deviance. Supposedly aimed at seminarians, the new discipline is an attack on the priesthood itself, especially on those openly gay men who have proven themselves as faithful servants of the church. It is an invitation for such men to return to the closet, a retreat into psychological imprisonment. Such demonizing of homosexuals is profoundly unjust.
But the policy, combined with the investigation's threat against all nonconformity, infantilizes every present or would-be member of the American Catholic clergy. During the abuse crisis, the ineptness of bishops brought stern challenges from the middle ranks of clergy. Are bishops now attempting, with this ruthless discipline, to eliminate the capacity for independent moral thought that made those challenges not only possible but necessary?
From Boston, the epicenter of the crisis, comes the chilling news that one of the brave priests who saved the church's soul by calling for Cardinal Bernard Law's resignation, the Reverand Walter Cuenin, has been unjustly fired from
From Boston, the epicenter of the crisis, comes the chilling news that one of the brave priests who saved the church's soul by calling for Cardinal Bernard Law's resignation, the Reverend Walter Cuenin, has been unjustly fired from his position as pastor at Our Lady, Help of Christians in Newton.
Cuenin is an exemplary priest. That he has been slandered by the archdiocese in the process of his removal is a mortal betrayal. There are reports that many of the other pastors who challenged Law have been shunted aside as well.
Cardinal Law, the icon of failure, is ensconced in a prestigious position here in Rome. He is an icon of denial, too. Instead of a reformation of all that made the sex abuse crisis possible, the hierarchy is circling its wagons. Good people are being sacrificed. Cruelty as a mode of church governance is back. Sexual imperialism is reasserted as a method of control. The culture of dishonesty lives.
Will it work? The people I talk to here think not. There are gay bishops in the church, some of whom will feel forced to support the new scapegoating. What happens when, in return for their hypocrisy, they are "outed"?
Theologians, whose work of rational inquiry requires a free play of the mind, will reject the strictures of a heresy hunt. Gay priests will refuse to be closeted again, and their straight brothers will not participate in the denigration. Religious orders will defend their members. When the grand inquisitors arrive at seminaries, candidates for the priesthood who have any self-respect will simply walk away. The Catholic people will not allow their good priests to be insulted further.
Can the church be spared this disaster? As of now, the power to avert it rests with one man. The new policy has not been formally promulgated. Pope Benedict XVI could call it off. Whether that is likely to occur is not the point. The world has been awaiting the revelation of his capacity for moral leadership. It is here.
"Shecky O'Leery, Stand-up Comic", that joke was hilarious! Keep them coming -- in the other comment boxes, too.
Potter in excelsis: "Finally, as you well know, the Church did not "condemn" the idea that the earth orbited the sun -- she just forbade it from being taught, because there weren't adequate grounds to justify abandoning geocentrism back then. Unless, that is, you're aware of an "anathema sit" regarding heliocentrism that no one else has been able to discover? Catholicism would have to be rejected out-of-hand if the Church had ever solemnly proclaimed that it is contrary to the doctrine and faith of the Church to say that the earth orbits the sun."
Shown the instruments of torture, Galileo abjured as heretical the idea that the earth orbits the sun. That is very well known and not in dispute. Too bad if it does not square with your dogmatism and your conviction that the church can never alter its teaching on anything.
In 1633, the Church used its temporal, political power to force Galileo to stand trial before the Inquisition. Under the threat of torture, Galileo renounced his findings. Despite his recantation, Galileo was placed under house arrest for the rest of his life. During these years, Galileo was kept under close clerical supervision and denied the right to write, travel, or have contact with the outside world.
Must I post the texts for you???
I, Galileo Galilei, son of the late Vincenzo Galilei, Florentine, aged seventy years, arraigned personally before this tribunal, and kneeling before you, most Eminent and Reverend Lord Cardinals, Inquisitors general against heretical depravity throughout the whole Christian Republic, having before my eyes and touching with my hands, the holy Gospels -- swear that I have always believed, do now believe, and by God's help will for the future believe, all that is held, preached, and taught by the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Roman Church. But whereas -- after an injunction had been judicially intimated to me by this Holy Office, to the effect that I must altogether abandon the false opinion that the sun is the centre of the world and immovable, and that the earth is not the center of the world, and moves, and that I must hold, defend, or teach in any way whatsoever, verbally or in writing, the said doctrine, and after it had been notified to me that the said doctrine was contrary to Holy Scripture -- I wrote and printed a book in which I discuss this doctrine already condemned, and adduce arguments of great cogency in its favor, without presenting any solution of these; and for this cause I have been pronounced by the Holy Office to be vehemently suspected of heresy, that is to say, of having held and believed that the sun is the center of the world and immovable, and that the earth is not the center and moves:
Therefore, desiring to remove from the minds of your Eminences, and of all faithful Christians, this strong suspicion, reasonably conceived against me, with sincere heart and unfeigned faith I abjure, curse, and detest the aforesaid errors and heresies, and generally every other error and sect whatsoever contrary to the said Holy Church; and I swear that in the future I will never again say or assert, verbally or in writing, anything that might furnish occasion for a similar suspicion regarding me; but that should I know any heretic, or person suspected of heresy, I will denounce him to this Holy Office, or to the Inquisitor and ordinary of the place where I may be. Further, I swear and promise to fulfill and observe in their integrity all penances that have been, or that shall be, imposed upon me by this Holy Office. And, in the event of my contravening, (which God forbid) any of these my promises, protestations, and oaths, I submit myself to all the pains and penalties imposed and promulgated in the sacred canons and other constitutions, general and particular, against such delinquents. So help me God, and these His holy Gospels, which I touch with my hands.
I, the said Galileo Galilei, have abjured, sworn, promised, and bound myself as above; and in witness of the truth thereof I have with my own hand subscribed the present document of my abjuration, and recited it word for word at Rome, in the Convent of Minerva, this twenty-second day of June, 1633.
I, Galileo Galilei, have abjured as above with my own hand.
In short the church was even louder against Copernicus then than it is against the new thinking on sexual orientation now. Eppur si muove...
Your ignorance of Catholicism apparently knows no bounds. How can a Catholic priest, of all people, not know that a verdict of the Inquisition is NOT an infallible declaration of the Church's Magisterium? Galileo's unjust condemnation was a disciplinary action of the Church, not a formal definition of a matter having to do with faith and morals.
You also don't seem to care a whit that back then there wasn't a shred of confirmatory proof of Copernicus' and Galileo's opinion (for it was then only an opinion, and very, very far from established fact) that the earth orbits the sun instead of vice versa. Eventually that proof was forthcoming, but in the 1600s Galileo had to present erroneous arguments in favor of heliocentrism and an earth that rotates on its axis, such as the tides supposedly being caused by the earth's motion (they aren't, and Galileo's inquisitors made the most of his scientific error on that point).
Now, if you think science will someday be able to prove that homosexuality was created by God, you're living in a fantasy world.
Science is already proving that homosexuality is universal in the animal kingdom, in no way pathological, and gays themselves are proving that it is possible to live fulfilled and responsible lives while giving judicious expression to their sexuality.
So the church is running into another potential Galileo scandal -- except that the church, too, is gently modifying its views.
Scripture and the universal magisterium always presumed that the earth was the centre of the universe -- just as certain presumptions about homosexuality have prevailed in the same sources. The injunctions of the inquisition in 1618 or 1633 cannot be viewed as merely disciplinary. The inquisition was concerned essentially with doctrine, not discipline. Their statements were similar in status to those of the CDF today.
You desperately seek to evade the parallel I draw between the issue of Copernican cosmology and the issue of contemporary enlightened understanding of homosexual orientation. But you have failed to discover one point on which the parallel does not hold. The parallel does not of course prove that the church is wrong about homosexuality now as it was wrong about homosexuality then.
"The inquisition was concerned essentially with doctrine, not discipline."
Right. A Church tribunal, a court that judges whether or not a person is a heretic and dispenses penalties to those it convicts, is concerned essentially with doctrine, not discipline. Sure.
What happened to you, Father? You can't always have held to the false doctrines and erroneous morality that are so dear to you today.
What happened to me? I lived and learned! Try it.
On Galileo, see what I posted on another thread. The actions of the inquisition in this case and in subsequent condemnations of copernicianism involved the papal teaching authority very heavily. They did not confine themselves to disciplining an individual. They very explicitly condemned a doctrine and maintained the condemnation for a long, long time. The doctrine they condemned is now universally regarded as true. In fact they could not have picked a worse doctrine to condemn, because though our senses and our Scriptures tell us that the sun goes round the earth, the irrefragable, undeniable, proven, impregnable, eternally irreformable truth is that the earth goes round the sun. The church sinned by hubris and humiliated itself big time. And it risks doing the same again with contraception etc.
Notes on heterodox theologians with homosexual obsessions from:
http//www.renewamerica.us/columns/abbot/051004
"The upcoming Vatican document on barring men from the seminary who have a homosexual orientation is a prudent and reasonable continuation of the 1961 'Instruction on the Careful Selection and Training of Candidates for the States of Perfection and Sacred Orders,' which stipulated that 'ordination should be barred to those who are afflicted with tendencies to homosexuality.' This is based on the understanding that the homosexual orientation is 'objectively disordered' as stated in the Catechism #2358.
"One of the problems, however, will be the determination of who possesses a homosexual orientation. Obviously, those who engage in homosexual activity on a regular basis demonstrate their orientation by what they do. A chaste and non-sexually active person, on the other hand, either admits his orientation or keeps it secret. We are therefore left to an honor system regarding those who have the homosexual orientation but who do not engage in the homosexual activity.
"The more immanent and significant threat, though, is with those who are in fact sexually active, whether it is homosexual or heterosexual. Sexual misconduct of seminarians and clergy with other men or women, even when not minors or children, is a problem which merits immediate attention and response. Identifying the orientation when there is no activity is a difficult project but when the misbehavior involves sexual intercourse by seminarians or by clergy, then the objective actions speak for themselves. Fornication and adultery are grave matter and extremely scandalous when done by those who represent the Church.
"The biggest crisis we face is a three headed monster, i.e., bad theology, bad liturgy and bad morality. Dissident theologians who teach intellectual dishonesty and disobedience to the official Magisterium are only encouraged and sustained by horrendous liturgical abuses which in the extreme lead to complete irreverence for the sacred, especially the Real Presence and the Sacrifice of the Mass. These combined will inevitably nurture and spawn rampant immorality. Why?
"Look at the dissent from Humanae Vitae in 1968. Once the Papal Magisterium was openly attacked, the next shoe dropped, i.e., liturgical abuses. Pedestrian celebrations which lack any reverence or any hint of the sacred let alone a sacrifice were proliferated by the cadre who usurped the 'spirit of Vatican II.' Hiding tabernacles, reducing the Mass to a mere 'meal,' using invalid matter and form, etc., showed that like Humanae Vitae, the GIRM was open for disobedience. These two spearheads created a third monstrosity, the disregard and then the denial or repudiation of the moral law.
"If theologians and liturgists could misbehave, then why not married couples with regard to contraception? If the laity could that way, then why not the clergy? Sexual misbehavior in seminar
[Continued]
"If theologians and liturgists could misbehave, then why not married couples with regard to contraception? If the laity could that way, then why not the clergy? Sexual misbehavior in seminaries usually coincides with heterodox teaching in the classroom and liturgical abuse in the chapel. What is learned there is then brought to the parish. Lex orandi, lex credendi, lex agendi (in other words, how one prays is related to what one believes and both influence how one behaves).
"Not every seminary went bad and even some which did have made significant improvements over the past 25 years, but there are still a few which remain cesspools of heresy, irreverence and sexual immorality. The ironic thing is that those are the places that instigated witch hunts not for perverts or heretics but to indentify and remove orthodox and pious men who would be loyal to Rome. These dangerous Catholics were labeled 'conservative,' 'traditional' and, of course, the infamous term 'rigid.'
"The upcoming Vatican investigation of seminaries is needed. Not a 'visitation' as done in the past where orthodox bishops were deceived, mislead and fooled into believing all is well. A papal legate with authority to close a seminary or to issue binding corrections or even to consolidate and restructure regional and national seminaries is what we need now more than ever. Faculty members who dissent from the Magisterium need to be removed.
"Orthodoxy, especially as elucidated in the Catechism, should be the norm and mandate of what is taught and adherence to the universal rubrics of the Mass and sacraments needs to be practiced and promoted to the future priests. Lastly, immorality, like alcohol abuse, sexual relations (of either orientation), and other addictive and destructive behavior cannot be tolerated in seminaries or by seminarians.
"When sound doctrine is accompanied by reverent worship then virtuous living makes sense and is easier to practice. When dissident teaching is combined with liturgical abuse and irreverence, then sinful activity is not far behind. What guys learn in formation they will proliferate in the parish. The seminary investigation team needs to ascertain if orthodoxy is taught, if the sacred liturgy is celebrated properly and if everyone is acting morally. With the devil launching a three front war, we have no choice but to address all three attacks."
Oops, forgot to mention, the author of the preceding is Fr Robert Tergilio, author of "Catholicism for Dummies", a book Fr Joe needs to read immediately.
"The upcoming Vatican document on barring men from the seminary who have a homosexual orientation is a prudent and reasonable continuation of the 1961 'Instruction .. which stipulated that 'ordination should be barred to those who are afflicted with tendencies to homosexuality.' This is based on the understanding that the homosexual orientation is 'objectively disordered' as stated in the Catechism #2358." (Is it? The document was written 25 years before Ratzinger brought in the "objectively disordered" claim.)
"One of the problems, however, will be the determination of who possesses a homosexual orientation. Obviously, those who engage in homosexual activity on a regular basis demonstrate their orientation by what they do. A chaste and non-sexually active person, on the other hand, either admits his orientation or keeps it secret." (actually, no -- often the chaste homosexual is known to be such, while the practicing homosexual keeps his sexuality well hidden; remember that many chaste gays have looks or mannerisms or personality traits that instantly leads to suspicion about their orientation)
"We are therefore left to an honor system regarding those who have the homosexual orientation but who do not engage in the homosexual activity." (what about seminarians, gay or straight, whose sense of honor prompts them not to cooperate with the inquiry?)
"The more immanent and significant threat, though, is with those who are in fact sexually active, whether it is homosexual or heterosexual." Is he suggesting that only sexual intercourse should be investigated and that "evidence of homosexuality" should be interpreted to mean evidence of sexual activity? That's rather a neat solution actually.
In any case, the problem is not seminarians who are sexually active, but seminarians who become sexually active after they are ordained. The Vatican inquiry is focused on the latter -- it is a pre-emptive inquiry in fact. You might ask why not inquire into the activity of priests rather than of seminarians. Or why not make all priests swear they are observing celibacy under pain of dismissal from the presbyterate? That would be more logical. More practical? Well...
"They very explicitly condemned a doctrine and maintained the condemnation for a long, long time. The doctrine they condemned is now universally regarded as true."
Yes, yes, as I've read many, many, many times before. Do you think I didn't tackle problems such as the Galileo debacle when I investigated Catholicism's truth claims? You haven't brought up a single argument that I haven't already seen addressed in the pro-and-con literature on the Galileo problem. We even delved into the Galileo debacle in some great depth in a college course on the Renaissance.
I will say once more, and then leave this subject, that geocentrism has no magisterial paper trail to back it up prior to Galileo's unjust condemnation, whereas homosexuality does fall under the Church's disapprobation from the very beginning. Where in the Old and New Testaments is geocentrism presented as a doctrine of the faith? Where in the Fathers? Where in any synodal or conciliar decree during the first 1,500 years of the Church's history? Where in canon law? We can find the subject of homosexuality addressed in most if not all of those organs of Church teaching and faith, but nothing comparable on geocentrism until Galileo's enemies conspired to have him falsely and unjustly accused of heresy, leading to a Church censure on a scientific hypothesis that touches only tangentially, if at all, on matters of faith and morals. So please don't hold your breath waiting for the Church to renounce everything she's ever said about homosexuality. It just isn't going to happen.
Geocentrism was tangential to faith and morals, as we NOW see.
The intrinsic disorderedness of the homosexual orientation is equally tangential, as we are beginning to see. It is an old superstition, comparable to the impurity of menstruation. The church lives and learns, outgrows old-fashioned idea, discovers ever more clearly the heart of the Gospel, which is good new for gays as well as straights. You have satisfactorily resolved the Galileo scandal. I am resolving the homosexuality scandal. In both cases the resolution demands an apology from the church, which has been tendered -- more or less -- in the first case (by John Paul II) but not yet in the second.
Like I said, don't hold your breath.
I know he has unfair advantages of leisure time, that he cheats and twists facts [NO EVIDENCE OF THIS ALLEGATION] and regularly resorts to ad hominem attacks on persons (which carry no logical weight but are dirty and demeaning POT -- KETTLE ). And one might expect more from a priest. Even a heretical one. [NO EVIDENCE OF THIS ALLEGATION] But one expects some of that. Back to his usual crowd-pleaser tricks, O'Leary writes: "To find homosexual affectivity per se disturbing is like finding Judaism or being black disturbing." Never mind that this over-simplistically conflates matters of consciously chosen lifestyle with matters of unavoidable color and race, it plays well. HOMOSEXUALITY IS UNAVOIDABLE TOO, AS THE VATICAN ITSELF RECOGNIZES, SO MY ALLEGED CONFLATION IS PERFECTLY LOGICAL.
ALSO THE PHRASE "HOMOSEXUALITY PER SE" IS DESIGNED TO INDICATE ORIENTATION TO THE EXCLUSION OF CHOSEN LIFE STYLE, SOMETHING BLOSSER IN HIS IMPULSIVE PHOBIC REACTION FAILED TO GRASP.
Pelt, Pelt, Pelt, Pelt!
SQUIIIISHHH!!!
Potter, Blosser, New Cath, Garton-Zavesky, Roister would tell their gay son, "Sorry kid, your personality is tainted by an unnatural orientation. You should have been heterosexual. God messed up."
Now how much better to say: "No need to worry about your gayness, son. Gayness is universal throughout the natural kingdom. It opens just as great perceptions of beauty and capacities of love as heterosexuality. You may suffer from the prejudice of homophobes, but if you do, just come to me and I'll stand up for you."
"Potter, Blosser, New Cath, Garton-Zavesky, Roister would tell their gay son, 'Sorry kid, your personality is tainted by an unnatural orientation. You should have been heterosexual. God messed up.'"
No I wouldn't. I would tell him the truth -- God did not create homosexuality, for He did not create sin and death.
All in favor of a moratorium on arguments with Fr. O'Leary (or with anyone else) on the subject of homosexuality, say, "Aye."
Aye!
Potter would tell his son, "you are bad seed. God did not create your brand of sexuality."
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