Posted on 07/27/2002 8:06:59 AM PDT by sinkspur
In all his years as a Catholic priest, he has never experienced anything so threatening to him and his ministry: being questioned and doubted, not for what he has done or what he believes, but for who he is.
He is a seasoned priest with a record of faithfulness and commitment to the Dallas-area parishes he has served.
He's also gay, although not many people know it: some friends and fellow priests, a number of whom also are gay.
With the scandal exploding in unexpected directions, no one hears the continued ticking louder or clearer than priests who are gay.
And rightly or wrongly, he is afraid these days as Roman Catholic leaders and laity continue to reel from the church's cover-up of sexual abuse and try to figure out which way to go from here.
"I'm terrified now," said the priest, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "People are trying to make oversimplified connections between sexual abuse and being gay, and they're saying, 'Let's get rid of all of them.'
"Any priest who is gay feels at risk. We're not used to living under suspicion. We're used to being trusted."
With the scandal exploding in unexpected directions, no one hears the continued ticking louder or clearer than priests who are gay. Their numbers, like those nationally, are significant in the Dallas Diocese, church officials said.
They hear the voices in the church that equate them with sexual abusers, and that want them out as part of a move to bring the priesthood in line with church teaching that homosexual acts are immoral.
More liberal Catholics say the church should embrace gay priests and end the secrecy before devoted priests are forced out or quit.
The waves of distrust already have broken at the steps of two parishes in the Dallas diocese, offering a look at how the church's next chapter may unfold.
Two priests – including the one who didn't want his name published – came under suspicion after a conservative group resurrected 2-year-old accusations that the men participated in a defunct Internet support group for gay priests.
The unidentified priest wasn't disciplined because he said nothing untoward; the other pastor stepped down because of sexually suggestive remarks about Hispanic men in an old e-mail.
To some, the priests' sin was – and is – being gay.
The call from American bishops for openness about past abuse has not extended to homosexuality itself and what many consider the ecclesiastical don't-ask-don't-tell policy for priests.
Instead, the rising tide of scandal has floated a fundamental question that could chart the church's course in years to come: What place does the Catholic Church want for gay priests?
"There's always been a good deal of sexual activity in the church from the top down, and not just homosexual activity," said psychotherapist and author A.W. Richard Sipe, a former priest who has studied clerical celibacy for 42 years. "What's changed is the revelation of that activity, including sexual abuse of minors. The secret system has been blasted open.
"The church is in a very funny position because its teaching says that homosexuality is so immoral, and the church has so many gay priests. The church could not function without gay priests."
Polarizing viewpoints
Homosexuality in the priesthood, shoved into the glare of public debate, is polarizing viewpoints inside the church and out. Many moderates and liberals contend that gays are being made scapegoats for a corrupt system in which bishops and priests abetted abusers by failing to expose them.
Many conservatives believe that gay priests are the root cause of the church's problems and all its layers of secrecy.
Last spring, Pope John Paul II's press secretary said that besides not ordaining gays, the church should consider removing gay priests.
A cardinal in Detroit recently said the church faced "not truly a pedophilia-type problem but a homosexual-type problem." The cardinal in Philadelphia prohibits gays from entering seminary.
Bishops, who determine which candidates get ordained in each diocese, are split over acceptance vs. a crackdown on gays. The Dallas Diocese does not weed out candidates because they are gay, although scrutiny is heavy, officials said.
A few bishops and at least one cardinal have said gays aren't suitable to become priests.
Vatican officials, after American cardinals met with the pope this spring, vowed to launch the first intensive seminary inspections in 20 years, concentrating on applicants' "suitability" and the schools' "fidelity" to church teachings.
Although some Catholics fear a sexually-oriented witch hunt to bar gays from ordination, orthodox groups consider such hurdles just what the priesthood needs.
"I think that has to happen, keeping homosexuals out of the seminaries and priesthood," said the Rev. Charles Dahlby, a priest in rural Illinois. "The church is desperately trying to avoid looking at that.
"The bishops haven't shown they have that courage."
Others worry that despite a new one-strike-and-out-of-public-ministry policy for abusive priests – adopted last month at the bishops conference in Dallas – unwarranted suspicion of gays threatens to drive them deeper into their closets.
"It's a very threatening climate right now," said Mark Jordan, an author and religion professor at Emory University in Atlanta. "These are priests who have never broken their vows of celibacy, and they're afraid of being taken out of ministry.
"Rather than focus on the institutional problem, people want to go after easy targets."
The focus on homosexuality, Mr. Jordan said, pre-empts the church from discussing more complex issues. He listed the climate of secrecy and clerical power, the discipline of celibacy and its frequent failures, church teachings on sexuality and a growing gay priesthood.
There's no definitive figure for the percentage of gay priests in America. The most rigorous studies estimate 30 percent to more than 50 percent. The latter figure comes from veteran researcher, professor and former seminary rector, Father Donald Cozzens.
Can't be ignored
In The Changing Face of the Priesthood, which openly discusses homosexuality, he said that although questions about gays in the priesthood may seem homophobic, "the proverbial elephant in the living room" can't be ignored. "The longer the delay, the greater the harm to the priesthood and to the church," he said.
Catholic officials must distinguish between priests, gay or straight, who struggle and sometimes fail to remain celibate and those who exploit the priesthood for the cover it provides or its gay network, he said.
To lay activist Stephen Brady, there must be no such distinction.
"Gays should not be ordained," said Mr. Brady, a restaurateur from Illinois who heads a group called Roman Catholic Faithful. "There is justifiable discrimination against a homosexual. The church teaches that."
Parts of the church's stance on gays seem colored in gray.
Opponents of gay ordination often cite a 1961 Vatican document that said gays should not be ordained. The document, "Careful Selection and Training of Candidates for the States of Perfection and Sacred Orders," isn't widely known among Catholics.
Mr. Brady says bishops have virtually ignored that document. Bishops say canon law never specifically prohibited gays from being priests.
Homosexual acts, on the other hand, have always been immoral in the eyes of the church since they can't create life.
In 1975, a Vatican document, "Declaration on Certain Problems of Sexual Ethics," indicated that simply being gay – without sexual activity – isn't sinful. That was followed by another document that said homosexuality is "intrinsically disordered," which gets conflicting interpretations.
The church needs to clarify all this, Mr. Brady said, "so we know where the hell we stand."
Last month, he used the bishops conference to recirculate charges that Catholic officials have overly protected gay priests, including 10 that his group identified by monitoring e-mails at an Internet site.
Confession wasn't enough for the Rev. Cliff Garner, who apologized to parishioners at St. Pius X Catholic Church in East Dallas for a 1999 message about Hispanic men. It said, in part, "I do have a very special place in my heart for those Latin blooded ones!"
Among more than 300 people who attended, some were forgiving; others wanted him removed.
Father Garner asked to leave the East Dallas parish after an anonymous threat to hurt him.
This month, the pastor at St. Pius criticized parishioners for "the hate and vengeance exhibited by some people."
'What a tragedy'
"When Father Cliff begged for forgiveness, some yelled, 'How many times are we supposed to forgive?' " Monsignor Larry Pichard wrote. "What a tragedy for our parish! What a tragedy for Father Cliff!" Those close to Father Garner said the priest was traumatized and wouldn't comment.
"We just need to let him rest and let him heal," Father Pichard said.
Mr. Brady said he got no satisfaction from the victory. He blamed both Father Garner, whom he said "brought this on himself" with his comments, and higher-ups who allowed him to become and remain a priest.
"I'm not saying he's evil. I'm saying he doesn't belong as a Catholic priest," Mr. Brady said. "I feel sorry for him because he was lied to all along.
"The fact that the bishops are unwilling to discuss the homosexual issue is an indictment against them."
Like many of his peers, Dallas Coadjutor Bishop Joseph Galante concludes that the sexual orientation of a priest or seminarian is irrelevant; they should have "psycho-sexual maturity" and be spiritually and socially healthy.
This moderate view emphasizes that whether homosexual or heterosexual, a priest must fulfill his call to a celibate, chaste life.
Sexual orientation "becomes a moot point," Bishop Galante said, adding that a priest shouldn't think of or identify himself as "a gay priest," as though that were his defining quality.
"I don't like hyphenated priests," the bishop said.
He played down the fears of some priests that being gay has made them targets.
"If they're not acting out, if they're living a devout good life, they have no reason to be fearful," he said. "There are no grounds to remove anybody. They can't be punished."
Some Catholics, however, see an inherent risk in affording gays the respect of the cloth.
Although he acknowledged that many fine, celibate priests are gay, Father Dahlby said he would close the priesthood to gays if he could.
"We don't know they'll have the spirituality to live a celibate life, and we're surrounding them with incredible temptations," he said. "It's unfair to them."
Those who blame gays for the crisis often assert that most of the victims were teenage boys, not children.
Others say that there are no statistics on the victims, which include many females – girls as well as women – and that the crisis is about abuse, not homosexuality.
Many of the worst abusers came through the old seminary system as teenagers in the 1960s and '70s.
'Bing Crosby priests'
"These were Bing Crosby priests," Mr. Jordan said, "products of the supposedly ideal period of American Catholicism." Yet they seem to have had sexual problems as teens that went unresolved and arrested their development, said Monsignor Francis Maniscalco, a spokesman for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
"This may be a question of late adolescent behavior and accessibility to victims as much as fixed gender orientation," he said.
Mr. Jordan said the church's mishandling of the crisis is ominous.
"The abuse is not coming from out priests," he said. "It's coming from tightly closeted priests who won't be targeted.
"Five years from now, when the seminaries have been investigated and troublesome priests have been ousted, we'll have another rash of abuse cases."
Transcending his own apprehension, the Dallas-area priest who didn't want to be identified expressed hope.
"As scandalous and unsettling as this is, it's not new in the church's history. The church survives," he said. "A period of renewal ultimately will follow from all this ugliness, a period of grace.
"I can not believe otherwise. God's grace pervades all."
There's no mystery. These guys don't "long" to be priests because they want to be PRIESTS. They enter the priesthood because word has gotten around in the homosexual underground that they will be sheltered, coddled, and encouraged in their homosexual predations in the Catholic priesthood, and the priesthood is a good place to meet BOYS.
"I work for myself."
You are right, you can protect your life and family from the vermin. You won't live on easy street but you will keep those dear to you safe.
In the church we talk about the, "people in the pews".
The people in the pews have very little knowledge of the state of the church and they don't have a clue what is happening in the priesthood.
I live in the San Francisco area. Every sermon is about accepting others as they are. No sin. No contrition. No Christianity just do your own thing!!
I have not heard a homily in my Church that mentions sin, hell, authentic Catholic sexual morality, or confession, in the last 10 years, or that mentions the true nature of this scandal in the last, for that matter. Those who commit evil within the Church (not an insubstantial number) relie on the goodness and faith and trust of the 'people of the pews.' As one of those, we have been horrendously betrayed, by those we would have trusted most.
You bet they do. And they're still bitter because the young men in the Boy Scouts were declared off limits to them.
As long as any CELIBATE queer priest remains CELIBATE, obeys the laws of the Church, teaches the Magisterium correctly, prays in private, goes to confession frequently, and just in general behaves himself the way a priest should behave, I have no problem with him being my pastor. However, the chances of a priest with homosexual tendencies being able to meet the above criteria is a little on the slim side.
Shocking as it is, many priests have abandoned Christianity in many of its aspects - or they never accepted it to begin with.
You get it.
"the priesthood is a good place to meet BOYS."
I was an altar boy in a very conservative parrish in the 50's. Before there was a "Gay Menace". The priests were truly dedicated to the Lord and the Church.
In the 60's as a teenager I met up with "CHICKEN HAWKS" which are gay men (secular in the 60's) who prey upon young nieve boys and introduce them to gay sex. I didn't sucumb!
By the grace of God only I was not influenced by the slime and their devious ways. The priests of my youth taught me to resist evil and love Christ.
"trust of the 'people of the pews.' As one of those, we have been horrendously betrayed, by those we would have trusted most."
Yes, the betrayal!
I learned about it in 1984. A priest told me the semenaries were corrupt. I didn't accept it and I kept my mout shut.
A homosexual guy made an physical advance on me once in college in the men's showers. I slammed his head against the wall and told him that if he ever did that again, he would face consequences he would never forget. Then I told everyone on my hall what happened. He never came to our showers again.
I've known homosexual priests before, and I assumed they were holy men. But after reading Goodbye Good Men, and the reports emerging from this scandal, I've changed my mind. The priesthood is full of active homosexual men who pray in Church and then go hump themselves in the evening. And then they go looking for boys. There's a threshold. A few might be OK. Too many, and sexual, financial, moral corruption bring down the Church and ruin kids' (and their families') lives.
Are you really so naive? Imagine a few years in a close knit seminary with 50% of homosexuals. Can you imagine co-ed monastery?
Homosexuals can struggle with their addiction as laymen (as believing drug addicts and alcoholics do). If they are really cured then can marry (with a woman that is) if not they should stay away from young men. There are many more other vocations or professions than priests.
BTW, are you a Christian, sinskspur?
Even with men and women, you usually have pairs that form. With homosexuals, it's just sex all the time. Putting a whole lot of homosexual men together in close quarters is a recipe for wanton and unrestrained (and filthy and depraved) sexual behavior. Putting them around teenage boys is a recipe for ruined innocent lives. Those priests who are active homosexual (what, 1/3 of the priesthood?) have no business being around my sons, ever.
Those who are already priests and are proven to be good and faithful should be left alone. But there is no need to let new homosexuals into seminaries. Especially that times are very corrupt and homosexuality is being promoted left and right. Being a priest is not a right or privilege, it is a service. The Catholic Church cannot afford more experimentation.
Could you direct this newbie to the precise reference in the Cathechism of the Catholic Church, as to where it teaches this?
Of course this is NOT Christian.
agree with you there. We read the bible, and site that homosexuality (and the acts that go along with it) are an abomination.
Catholic dont' believe that through God ALL things are possible. Catholics don't believe that.
Funny, that was the key topic of Fr. Joe's homily last weekend ;o). Seems to be a key thing at my parish.
If you look at the Exodus website that helps gays straighten themselves out, you'll see that it is ONLY the Catholics that find being gay acceptable.
I certainly hope you are not basing your feelings on The Church entirely on this ridiculous website. If you are, your comments explain your ignorance about what the church actually teaches.
But like I said, please site for me where in the Cathechism the Church teaches that "it's okay to be gay," I'd be most interested to read it, so I can go to my bishop and tell him where to stick it.
A parish priest in the town next to us methodically befriended six vulnerable boys (ages 13, 14), and over the course of a year or two, got them to watch homosexual pornography, and to allow themselves to be fondled by the priest. In the most evil way, he told them this was normal sexual behavior for men, and that they should be pleased that a priest was introducing them to this. It shortly proceeded to weekly anal rape. All the while, the horrified boys were told that this was part of manhood and that they needed to keep it quiet - and that everyone else did the same! God, please be with these abused people, as they struggle to live their lives in the aftermath of such mental and spiritual and physical torture.
You are confused. Probably because most discussions in the media twist this around. They make gayness an innate part of personality, unchangable.
Gay means defining one's personality according to one's sexual orientation, and going along with the so called gay lifestyle.
People with sexual temptations who do not act on them are not sinners.
Sin is an action, not the temptation. So God indeed does love someone who is tempted and tries to stay pure.
Catholics consider such temptations a personality defect, similar to personality defects toward drinking and drugs and promiscuity. They are probably partly innate, but mainly developmentally defined. They can be cured, but not in all cases. Like alcoholics, they must take one day at a time.
As for God not liking people who are tempted with same sex attraction: ah, if you only knew how wide and deep is the love of God who showed us this love when Jesus died for us.
Then how can the priest in the article say this "Any priest who is gay feels at risk. We're not used to living under suspicion. We're used to being trusted." - it must be a topic of conversation among the homosexual priests or the speaker has taken it upon himself to speak for all homosexual priests.
Exactly.
Furthermore if they even identify themselves as "gay" when they know homosexuality is prohibited by God and the Church, what do they expect the reaction to be?
This is their own fault.
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.