The Vatin's Gay Overlords

Contents:

• THE VATIN’S GAY OVERLORDS
• FOUR FIVE VATIN PRITS ARE GAY, BOOK CLAIMS
• THE VATIN'S GAY OVERLORDS
• THE VATIN’S GAY OVERLORDS

THE VATIN’S GAY OVERLORDS

WisemanMarvelg at the myster sanctum that his new book explor, the French journalist Frédéric Martel wr that “even San Francis’s Castro” there aren’t “que as many gays. It clus the claim that about 80 percent of the male Roman Catholic clergy members who work at the Vatin, around the pope, are gay. It ntends that the more showily homophobic a Vatin official is, the more likely he belongs to that crowd, and that the higher up the cha of mand you go, the more gays you fd.

Whatever Martel’s tent, “In the Closet of the Vatin” may be ls a nstctive reckong than a stockpile of ammunn for ant right-wg Catholics who already ch to nduct a wch hunt for gay prits, many of whom are exemplary — and chaste — servants of the church.

FOUR FIVE VATIN PRITS ARE GAY, BOOK CLAIMS

]Although Martel himself is openly gay, he sensatnaliz gayns by votg his quiry to Catholic officials who have had sex wh men, not on who have had sex wh women. The promise of celibacy that prits make forbids all sexual partners, and what vlat Catholic teachg isn’t jt gay sex but sex outsi marriage. In that ntext, Martel’s foc on homosexualy buys to the notn that ’s pecially troublg and tone don’t help.

” Inpennt studi put the percentage of gay men among Catholic prits the Uned Stat at 15 percent to 60 a telephone terview on Thursday, Martel strsed that the 80 percent isn’t his timate but that of a former prit at the Vatin whom he quot by name the book. It nam nam, and while many belong to Vatin officials and other prits who are ad or whose sexual inti have e unr public scty before, Martel also lavish nsirable energy on the suggtn that Francis’ precsor, Pope Benedict XVI, and other towerg figur the church are gay.

THE VATIN'S GAY OVERLORDS

All the while he promoted the church’s teachg that all gay men are “objectively disorred” and embraced s ban on prits who are believed to have “ep-seated homosexual tennci, ” whether they act on them or of my ncern about the book is the timg of s release, which cis precisely wh an unprecented meetg at the Vatin about sexual abe the church.

But the book “is also bound to shift attentn away om child abe and onto gay prits general, once aga falsely nflatg people’s mds homosexualy and pedophilia, ” said the Rev. He’s book don’t equate them, and fact mak the different, important pot that the church’s culture of secrecy — a culture created part by gay prits’ need to nceal who they are — works agast the exposure of molters who are guilty of David Clohsy, a longtime advote for survivors of sexual abe by prits, said to me on the phone a few days ago: “Many prits have a huge discentive to report sexual miseds by lleagu.

And gay men are creatur of stealth and agents of ceptn who band together eccentric societi wh odd ruals.

THE VATIN’S GAY OVERLORDS

If they read rrectly, he answered, they’ll realize that rootg out gays would mean riddg the church of some of their hero, who veigh agast homosexualy as a way of nyg and mouflagg who they really are. The rdals most acceptg of gays, he said, are those who are probably else asi, the book speaks to the enormo and seemgly growg tensn between a church that equently vilifi and margaliz gay men and a prithood nse wh them.

“This fact hangs the air as a giant, unstaable paradox, ” wrote Andrew Sullivan, who is Catholic and gay, an excellent ver story for New York magaze last month. It explas why so many gay men entered the prithood, pecially s ago: They didn’t feel safe or fortable a society that ostracized them. @FrankBni • Facebook A versn of this article appears prt on, Sectn SR, Page 3 of the New York edn wh the headle: The Vatin’s Gay Overlords.

Some of the most senr clerics the Roman Catholic church who have vociferoly attacked homosexualy are themselv gay, acrdg to a book to be published next per cent of prits workg at the Vatin are gay, although not necsarily sexually active, is claimed the book, In the Closet of the 570-page book, which the French journalist and thor Frédéric Martel spent four years rearchg, is a “startlg acunt of rptn and hypocrisy at the heart of the Vatin”, acrdg to s Brish publisher is beg published eight languag across 20 untri next Wednday, cidg wh the openg day of a nference at the Vatin on sexual abe, to which bishops om all over the world have been, a former adviser to the French ernment, nducted 1, 500 terviews while rearchg the book, cludg wh 41 rdals, 52 bishops and monsignors, 45 papal ambassadors or diplomatic officials, 11 Swiss guards and more than 200 prits and semarians, acrdg to a report on the Catholic webse the spoke of an unspoken of the “closet”, wh one le of thumb beg that the more homophobic a cleric was, the more likely he was to be alleg that one Colombian rdal, the late Alfonso López Tjillo, who held a senr Vatin posn, was an arch-fenr of church teachg on homosexualy and ntraceptn while g male prostut, the Tablet thor found that some gay prits accepted their sexualy and a few mataed discreet relatnships, but others sought high-risk sual enunters.