delenda est...
Posted on 09/26/2014 6:24:15 PM PDT by marshmallow
In light of recent firings of gays and lesbians from Catholic institutions, Benjamin Brenkert has left the Catholic church after 10 years of pursuing priesthood in the Jesuit order.
"I can't be a Jesuit priest because I can't be a member of the Catholic church right now," Brenkert told NCR. "I can't be an openly gay Jesuit discerning priesthood in the Catholic church if LGBT employees are being fired from Catholic institutions."
Brenkert said the last straw for him was when a food pantry worker was fired from St. Francis Xavier Parish in Kansas City, Mo., after her marriage to a woman was mentioned in a local newspaper article.
Upon his decision to leave the church, Brenkert wrote an open letter to Pope Francis, explaining both why he was leaving the Jesuits, and what he wants the pope to do in order to save his vocation to the church.
The letter, obtained by NCR and posted by other religion news outlets online, states, "I ask you to instruct the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops to tell Catholic institutions not to fire any more LGBTQ Catholics. I ask you to speak out against laws that criminalize and oppress LGBTQ people around the globe. These actions would bring true life to your statement 'Whom am I to judge?' "
(Excerpt) Read more at ncronline.org ...
Based on what I have seen, there are more than a few gay Jesuits.
delenda est...
That's actually not true. It's the other way around.
Most of the monsters (Birmingham, Goeghan, Shanley, etc) were formed in the 1940s and 1950s.
THEY did use their power and influence to open the seminaries to gay men - lots and lots of them. But most of the post-V II gay seminarians either had relationships with each other, or with one or two minors.
Their predecessors and enablers had hundreds and hundreds of victims EACH. Those men practiced sacramental abuse on a cosmic scale.
It's easy to blame the scandal on the post-V II homosexual surge into the clergy - but it's really not true.
really??? there have been more than a few gay ANYTHINGS...so what's the point of your comment??
the point - there are a lot of gay Jesuits.
In the entire history of the “pedophile” scandal, there were about five actual pedophiles in the U.S. The incessant repetition of the word “pedophile” was deliberate, intended to drown out the glaring fact that most of the abuse was of adolescent males and young adult males.
If you read his statement and his letter to the Pope, it’s easy to see that he has left the Church because it just isn’t worthy of him. It just doesn’t measure up.
So he finished his free education before he decided he had to leave. Sort of like those who went to college on an ROTC scholarship and then decided they were pacifists.
Yes, I thought this was supposedly corrected under Benedict.
Without reading the whole thread, I’m going to speculate that 90% of the responses are “Good riddance to bad rubbish,” “Don’t let the door hit you in the tuchus,” or “Great! What took you so long?”
Chickensoup, I absolutely agree that a man with obvious, ongoing homosexual tendencies should not be a seminarian or a priest or (as you mentioned) principal of a school!
But I wonder about this part: “He minced instead of walking, wore long scarves, had a dog that he was inordinately fond of” etc. Scarves, pets, and a less-than-virile stride do not constitute problematic homosexual behaviors.
If he crossed physical or emotional boundaries with boys, that’s a different story enrtirely: he should not be buddying-up to them, taking them on long rides in his car or overnights, doing PDA’s (”here’s a big hug!”), forming inappropriate out-of-school friendships, contacting them via Facebok or Twitter, texting, etc.
I think part of the problem is that we have a hard time defining what is a red flag (or should I say “rainbow flag”)-— like being Father Huggy Bear with boys OR girls -— and what is not.
Men that seem a little effeminate to you (”long scarf”, sashaying walk) might be more emotionally sound, more chaste and more holy than some Father Macho who has God-knows-what extracurricular activities on the side.
_________________
He was effeminate and used scarves as items to fling, wore his hair long and looked like he was partially cross-dressing. He was the laughing stock of the teens except among certain disaffected young men that he empowered.
Sounds like grooming kids to me
It is very true, one built upon the other
out of proportion to their membership????........if not, again what is the point of your comment???
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.