Posted on 07/13/2016 12:29:26 PM PDT by ebb tide
The real-life experiences of a Catholic mother with a “gay” daughter:
When my oldest daughter was a teenager she had her first same sex relationship.
As a Catholic mother, finding out was very upsetting. Several years afterwards seeing an ad in the Assumption Blessed Virgin parish bulletin for a “Catholic ministry” “for parents of gay and lesbians” I had hope that I had found supportive safe place of likeminded Catholic parents.
The meeting was held in the parish meeting rooms of Holy Family parish in South Pasadena, led by a woman psychologist, Dr Elizabeth Taylor; there was no priest present. I was one of the only new parents that night. Quickly away I realized the way the other parents all agreed that the Catholic Church was “wrong” in their opinion. They openly outright condemned the Church as responsible for making their loved ones “feel bad,” “unwelcome” and called for their children’s relationships with their partners to be recognized as marriage - just like sacramental opposite sex marriages and for those in those relationships to be considered full Catholics able to receive all the sacraments. The message was loud and clear – If I really loved my daughter then I had to join with them in accepting and promoting homosexuality as “how” my child was made. And in advocating for lgbt issues and fighting against the discriminatory ideas the Catholic Church used to teach.
Missing from the meeting was any suggestion that our sons or daughters should not be having sexual relations outside of marriage. Or that homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered and can never be encouraged/supported.
The facilitator passed out articles for me to take home; both were very contrary to Catholic teaching on homosexuality.
I was so upset I couldn’t even think of what to say. After the meeting I sat in my car and full of anxiety began to cry. In Los Angeles, the Catholic Ministry with Lesbian and Gay Persons (the official Archdiocesan outreach to the LGBT community) annually sponsors a special “Pride” Mass to coincide with the LA Pride festivities; they openly support such secular initiatives as the legal recognition of same-sex marriage, healthcare benefits for same-sex couples, and the presence of the Gay-Straight Alliance in Catholic schools; on the theological front, they have advocated for the removal of the term “intrinsically disordered” from the Church lexicon, the inclusion of “…positive language regarding LGBT Catholics, especially for same sex couples in long term relationships,” and celebrated an “indelible moment” at the 2016 LA Religious Education Congress when “…at the closing liturgy on Sunday…a gay couple and their son helped present gifts at the altar to Archbishop Jose Gomez;” they stated that this was a sign that: “Progress for LGBT Catholics is slow and happens in incremental pieces, and often includes setbacks.”
Another gay-affirmative ministry in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles is headquartered at the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary Catholic Parish in Pasadena; the name of the “Gay & Lesbian Outreach” is “Always Our Children;” which is taken from the title of a controversial 1997 pastoral message from the USCCB. Besides a “Link” to the Archdiocesan “Gay” Ministry, the only other link listed on the group’s parish website page is to “Fortunate Families.”
Fortunate Families is a pro-gay “Catholic” apostolate for the parents of homosexual children; according to their Mission Statement, Fortunate Families: “serves as a resource and networking ministry with Catholic parents of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender children.” Their website and Newsletter is primarily a collection of “stories” written by parents, usually expressing their great dissatisfaction with the Catholic Church’s teachings on homosexuality.
Fortunate Families is a strong advocate for the legalization of same-sex marriage:
“Fortunate Families celebrates with our LGBT children the opportunity to share in the same rights as their straight siblings. The Supreme Court decision brings legal stability to our children’s lives and security to our grandchildren. We applaud this decision and continue our work in the Catholic tradition seeking social justice for all our children, and we look forward to the next hurdle, the passage of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act,” said Deb Word, President of Fortunate Families.
In the February 2016 issue of the Fortunate Families Newsletter “Voices for Justice,” the parents of a “gay” man wrote about attending their son’s wedding: “Now I know that this was not just another wedding. Not just because everyone there truly wanted to be there fully embracing them. Not just because Douglas and Steve married. This wedding was different because I witnessed not just another wedding, but the sacrament of marriage.”
In the May 2015 issue of the same Newsletter the co-founders of Fortunate Families, Casey and Mary Ellen Lopata, published a “Letter” they wrote to Pope Francis, in which they detail their support for same-sex marriage and their experiences related to an ongoing 20-year friendship with a “married” “gay” male couple; the Lopatas are the godparents for the couple’s two adopted children. They describe the two men and their children as “a model Catholic family.” According to the “Letter,” the “married” “gay” couple is very active in their Catholic parish:
“They are very active in parish life: one or the other (or both) has served as president of the parish council, chair of the liturgy committee and on the diocesan liturgical commission, religious education teacher, lector, Eucharistic minister, cantor and choir member.”
The Lopatas continued, with this message to Pope Francis:
“These two gay men have accepted their God-given sexual orientations and are striving to follow God’s will in their lives. Though our two godchildren are not being raised by their biological parents, their gay parents through their complementary (though not in the reproductive sense) and loving relationship have created a family every bit as authentic and holy—and life-giving—as that of any heterosexual relationship we know of including our own.”
In the same “Letter,” the Lopatas erroneously claim that: “Catholic teaching says sexual orientation is a ‘given,’ and a ‘deep-seated dimension of one’s personality’ whether heterosexual or homosexual [Always Our Children, USCCB, 1997];” This is an outright lie; “Always Our Children” was a “pastoral message” from the Bishops of the United States and had no power to interpret, let alone define, the origins of homosexuality for the Universal Church. Bishop Fabian W. Bruskewitz once boldly stated: “It is my view that this document carries no weight or authority for Catholics, whom I would advise to ignore or oppose it.”
The same dissident movement at Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary Catholic Parish is also present at Holy Family Catholic Parish, also in Pasadena, which has its own “gay” Ministry: “The Holy Family LGBT Ministry.”
For example, in 2014, at Holy Family Catholic Parish, Catholic dissident Phyllis Zagano, the author of the book “Women Deacons: Past, Present, Future,” spoke on the topic “Women in Ministry in the Catholic Church” during which she argued for the ordination of women as deacons. On the issue of “gay” marriage, she wrote: “As far as civil rights is concerned, I’m on the gay side…” Zagano also repeatedly debated the “born gay” theory in her blog for the National Catholic Reporter and argued that: “…if down the road science undeniably proves homosexuality is a status rooted in genetics — or at least is gestational biology — the church will be faced with a game changer.”
In 2016, on their Facebook site for the LA Religious Education Congress, Holy Family Parish highlighted certain progressive speakers with Karla Stephens, Member of the Education/Formation Commission, recommending an address to be given by Arthur Fitzmaurice, Resource Director of the Catholic Association for Lesbian and Gay Ministry. He formerly served as Chair for the Los Angeles Archdiocese Catholic Ministry with Lesbian and Gay Persons. The previous year, Fitzmaurice spoke at the Congress and had this to say about the Church’s stance on homosexuality:
“The paragraph on homosexuality, which describes it as ‘intrinsically disordered’ while also demanding respect for gays and lesbians, is placed in a section of the catechism paragraphs condemning ‘pornography, prostitution, and rape.’ To keep this abusive language in the Catechism and other Church writings is, in itself, gravely evil.”
In a 2013 video interview for The IN [Ignatian News] Network, made in cooperation with St. Monica’s Catholic Gay and Lesbian Outreach in Santa Monica, Arthur Fitzmaurice said: “I tried to be directed towards God…How do I be the person that God made me to be; and then it gets converted into a realization that God made me to be this gay person.”
One of the stated Purposes of The Holy Family Parish’s “LGBT Ministry:” “Dr. Taylor, facilitator, attends parish counsel meetings at other parishes to encourage them to begin formulating their own gay and lesbian ministries.”
Reprinted with premission from Joseph Sciambra's website.
Their “logic” (emotion)is that it isn’t their kids behavior that’s wrong, but the Law of God.
Sadly many Catholics do not want to believe that their religion has changed. That the Bible, like the Constitution, has been made irrelevant. It really is no longer a religion of God, or one that God would accept.
This “Pope” is turning RC teachings on their head. The fraud is almost indistinguishable from Maobama and Rotten.
I contend it is all about money and power. We know it isn't about God and the Bible.
I contend it is all about people not wanting to believe that their Pope is deceiving them, and that he is a disciple of Karl Marx, and not Jesus Christ. Where is the call for evangelism from this pretender? Nowhere.
There is too much invested in believing that the Pope, ANY Pope, deserves reverence. This one simply does not.
Our Catholic “religion” has not changed. The problem is clerics in high places, like Gomez and his predecessor Mahony,-— and their middle-management accomplices -— who are promoting bizarre mutant ideologies not recognizable as Catholicism.
The solution is for Catholics to live Catholicism, and to demand this of the false or cowardly shepherds.
“They are very active in parish life: one or the other (or both) has served as president of the parish council, chair of the liturgy committee and on the diocesan liturgical commission, religious education teacher, lector, Eucharistic minister, cantor and choir member.”
WHAT? How was this allowed to happen?
Zagano also repeatedly debated the “born gay” theory in her blog for the National Catholic Reporter and argued that: “…if down the road science undeniably proves homosexuality is a status rooted in genetics — or at least is gestational biology — the church will be faced with a game changer.”
National Catholic Reporter (consider the source)
The next schism is already here
I especially liked this statement of Zagano's:
Because they never did or at least no longer do find space in legitimate media, the self-appointed pontiffs build internet and other social media followings for their unfiltered personal attacks on anyone who strays beyond the boundaries of the church of their imaginings.
As if her rag has ever been legitimate media. Between Zagano and M.S. Winters, they're starting their own religion.
“Our Catholic “religion” has not changed.”
But without a Catholic Hierarchy to support the laity, Catholicism is difficult (if not impossible) to practice. When the hierarchy begins to implement pastoral changes that reject 2000 years of prior Papal and Magisterial teaching, the cognitive dissonance becomes too great to avoid.
It would be different of Bergoglio and the Cardinals were merely whoring around and living immoral lives without tinkering with doctrine (and stealthily tampering with dogma), but it is just the opposite. The are Modernist Populists who are transforming the Faith through what they sand and do (and DON’T say and do).
I commend you on your attempt to remain true to the Church. I tried, but I ended up concluding that “The Body of Christ” must be greater than the RCC (perhaps even largely different), since “The Gates of Hell” have obviously prevailed against the Roman Leadership (both Pope and Magisterium).
Did you ever look at the SSPX or FSSP?
bkmk
That’s a possibility as well.
What you have here is not a failure of doctrine, but of discipline; of pastoral practice; of corrupt, confused, or cowardly churchmen. This is a failure based on human weakness and sinfulness, and has been a constant, waxing and waning, in Christ's Church since Our Lord hung on a cross.
Yes, Peter denied Him and Judas betrayed Him, and the rest of them --- with the exception of John --- ran sweating and quaking toward the tall grass. These are the picked men, the select men, for whom Jesus Himself prayed, just hours before, that they should have faith, unity, and strength. (John 17).
The Church is not defeated by the faults of men, even if those faults are grave and nearly unanimous.
I recommend the reading of Catholic history. Once the shock passes, it steadies one.
All we're promised --- and it's a limited promise, but an essential one --- is that in the midst of all the vagaries of foolish or wicked churchmen, error will not finally prevail. In the practical sense, this means that their errors will never be formally promulgated as doctrines to be accepted de fide by all the faithful.
I'd go on, but I have to go to a parish meeting in about 10 minutes. Let me leave you with this 2-minute video. It's humorous --- it may make you laugh, in an ouchy sort of way --- but it makes a valid point:
The tagline quote is from Oscar Wilde.
AND, if the current occupant of the papacy, Bergoglio offends YOU in some way, imagine how offended CATHOLICS are. Nonetheless, with scant research, I can give you ten utterly notorious papal predecessors of Bergoglio. Familiarize yourself with the late 15th century disgrace Alexander VI (maiden name Borgia and father of poisoner Lucretia Borgia and warlord Cesare Borgia).
You seem to operate under the common non-Catholic assumption that papal infallibility (defined in the mid-nineteenth century) suggests impeccability (sinlessness of popes ex officio). It means nothing whatsoever of the sort. Popes are as eligible for hell as anyone else. Dante in his great Catholic literary work The Divine Comedy places many of them in hell together with specific reasons. Of course, what actually happened to their souls was God's call and not Dante's but Catholics have no tradition of believing popes sinless or ineligible for permanent consignment to hell.
Reflection should lead you to the conclusion that the pope has an incredible spiritual burden on his shoulders and that failure to adequately bear that burden is a near occasion of hell.
I generally avoid arguing here with the "reformed" Christians but your posts demand a Catholic response. If you respond, I may not feel moved to respond to you but you do not know what you are talking about whatever YOU may imagine. If you imagine yourself Catholic but disagreeing with Bergoglio, that is a different matter.
As to Bergoglio, he is a rank disgrace but he is not going to drive me from Catholicism to error. He will be dead soon enough and his election or that of someone like him is not likely to be repeated by the next conclave. I cannot imagine the lies that must have been told artfully at his conclave to get him elected.
Like Saint John Paul II and Pope John Paul I and Pope Benedict XVI having to clean up the mess of John XXIII and Paul VI, the next pope will have the task of cleaning up Bergoglio's mess. The truly evil cabal of cardinals who conspired in his election will be dead or forcibly retired by old age (Kaspar, Marx, Schoenbrun, Madariaga, O'Malley, Bergoglio himself, and others collectively known as the St. Gall Society originally formed to make the radical Jesuit Jose Maria Martini of Milan pope but he aged out an died before they could elect him) Finally, Jesus Christ founded this Roman Catholic Church on Peter or (if you prefer) on Peter's confession of Faith and promised to be WITH that Church ALL days until the end of the world. It was in all the Bibles.
I regard Jesus Christ's promises as valid. How about you?
God bless you and yours!
Beautiful response. Thank you.
The National “Catholic” Distorter is my daily penance. Bad as Winters and Zagano and Jamie Manson and Joan Chittester and the rest are, the readers who post responses are worse. Today they are rationalizing abortion on demand because woman knows best.
Thank you! May God bless you and yours!
I can’t believe Gomez and his court put up with it.
I miss faithful leadership
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