[Architect of Avalon]

Married straight priests are better than single gay priests.

[Mrs. Don-o]

It's not an and/or questoon between married priests and gay priests.

The Episcopalians manage to have both: sometimes both in the same man (check out Gene Robinson in Wikipedia).

[Mrs. Don-o]

Well, gay men are not appropriate for the priesthood at all. And I mean "not appropriate" even if they are striving to be totally sexually continent. A chaste man with persisting homosexual drives/temptations would find the seminary environment a "near occasion of sin" --- a place abounding in appealing, sympatico young men, and therefore a place abounding in temptations.

And it seems to me that a chaste person struggling with same-sex attractions would realize, himself, that the priesthood would present him with ongoing stress and turmoil because of his vulnerability to male attractiveness.

Gay men should not be in seminary, let alone in the priesthood.

In any context, they may have a long and lonely struggle. I would suggest a specialized spiritual support group, like Courage (LINK), a Catholic movement which ministers to persons with same-sex attractions and helps them flourish spiritually while living the way of chastity.