Confsns of a gay Catholic // The Observer

Contents:

• WHAT SHOULD A GAY CATHOLIC DO?
• GAY UNSELOR'S FIRG BY INDIANAPOLIS CATHOLIC SCHOOL PERMTED BY FERAL APPEALS URT
• FIRG OF GAY CATHOLIC SCHOOL TEACHER ULD TT LATT SUPREME COURT LG
• THE GAY CHURCH
• I THOUGHT I WAS OVER MY CATHOLIC GUILT ABOUT BEG GAY. MAYBE I WAS WRONG?
• CAN CATHOLICS “PRAY AWAY THE GAY?”
• ST. JOHN HENRY NEWMAN: THE FIRST OPENLY GAY CATHOLIC SAT?
• ‘IT IS NOT A CLOSET. IT IS A CAGE.’ GAY CATHOLIC PRITS SPEAK OUT
• BLSG GAY UNNS
• FERAL URT L RONLLI CATHOLIC SCHOOL, ARCHDCE WAS ALLOWED TO FIRE A 2ND GAY UNSELOR
• GAY AND CATHOLIC - ACCEPTG MY SEXUALY, FDG COMMUNY, LIVG MY FAH
• VATIN BARS GAY UNN BLSG, SAYS GOD ‘N’T BLS S’
• EXCLUSIVE: TAYLOR MARSHALL SAYS POPE FRANCIS MAY CHANGE POSN OF CATHOLIC CHURCH ON GAY MARRIAGE
• POPE FRANCIS SAYS PRITS NNOT BLS SAME-SEX UNNS, DASHG HOP OF GAY CATHOLICS
• WHAT IS A CATHOLIC RPONSE TO GAY SUICI?
• HIGH-RANKG PRIT UGHT E-FUELED GAY Y VATIN APARTMENT

WHAT SHOULD A GAY CATHOLIC DO?

A gay layman I know who serv an important role a dce (and even wr some of his bishop's statements on social jtice) has a solid theologil tn and sir to serve the church, but fds impossible to be open the face of the bishop's repeated disparagg remarks about gays.

GAY UNSELOR'S FIRG BY INDIANAPOLIS CATHOLIC SCHOOL PERMTED BY FERAL APPEALS URT

Furthermore, the ten percent figure clus people who are not exclively homosexual but who only engaged  some homosexual behavr for a perd of time and then stopped—people who had gone through a fully or partially homosexual “phase” but who were not long-term homosexuals. The morn arguments favor of homosexualy have th been sufficient to overe the evince that homosexual behavr is agast dive and natural law, as the Bible and the Church, as well as the wir circle of Jewish and Christian (not to mentn Mlim) wrers, have always held. The term “homosexualy, ” while sometim nsired anachronistic the current era, is the most applible and easily translatable term to e when askg this qutn across societi and languag and has been ed other cross-natnal studi, cludg the World Valu Survey.

FIRG OF GAY CATHOLIC SCHOOL TEACHER ULD TT LATT SUPREME COURT LG

WASHINGTON – A feral appeals urt has led that a Catholic high school Indianapolis was ee to fire a gay guidance unselor bee she performed at least some relig duti, the latt legal setback for LGBTQ+ rights when they nflict wh Fzgerald had worked for 14 years as a guidance unselor at Ronlli High School when school officials disvered she was married to another woman. 'Authentilly myself'Ray said he had also stggled growg up gay the 1970s and 80s England, which was "tough" said his relig school "dmmed to you, 'you are gog to hell'" Adam returned home to Sdi Arabia, spe beg more than 3, 000 apart and later rtricted by the Covid-19 panmic, they kept touch daily and the romance years ago, Ray proposed on a vio ll and after succsfully applyg for a UK fiancé visa, Adam moved to Manchter December 2022.

THE GAY CHURCH

Adam said he had been aaid to even wear lours his home untry so the first thg he did when he moved was start to "grow my mullet, got my ears pierced and booked appotments for tattoos" relled how, ntrast, one of his gay iends Sdi had been forced to marry a woman, addg: "It has ed not only his life but the life of his wife. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circu Richmond is an early tt of how that major Supreme Court cisn ptg ee speech agast anti-discrimatn laws will play out beyond the hypothetil suatn that se, which volved a platiff who had never actually ma weddg webs or been asked to do so by a gay person.

“The Court rejected the dissent’s assertn that s cisn opened the door to discrimatn employment, ” ACLU attorney Josh Block wrote a reply to Becket’s the exampl raised the Supreme Court did not clu a relig anizatn or a gay employee, and Gorsuch repeatedly voked a 2000 cisn allowg the Boy Suts to expel a gay volunteer on “exprsive associatn” grounds. “We all said that thoands of relig anizatns all across the untry ask their employe to uphold their tradnal view of marriage word and ed, and if you terpret the statute that way, ’s gog to unleash lots of lawsus agast them, ” Goodrich the Supreme Court has specifilly said preventg racial discrimatn is a pellg ernment tert that jtifi rtrictg First Amendment eedoms, he noted that the Supreme Court has rejected such a fdg on discrimatn agast gay or transgenr people. “In all honty, if you had told as young boys who wasted untls hours of our liv church tryg to ‘pray the gay away’ that we someday would be standg ont of all of you our Catholic Church talkg about our fay on Father’s Day, we would never have believed you, ” they said their reflectn.

I THOUGHT I WAS OVER MY CATHOLIC GUILT ABOUT BEG GAY. MAYBE I WAS WRONG?

Yet, spe the welg signals, the Vatin’s Congregatn for the Doctre of the Fah issued a statement March 2021 banng the blsg of gay upl, cg the ncern that fahful might nsir such unns equivalent to marriage between a man and a woman and statg that the Catholic Church “nnot bls s. This cultural and moral shift has not only changed the nscns of most Amerin Catholics (67 percent of whom support civil marriage for gay upl) and gay prits (many of whom are close to qutg) but also broken the silence that long shroud the subject.

Alarmed by the possibily that divorced and remarried people might be weled as well as gays, tradnalists lnched a fierce rearguard mpaign agast the new papacy, wh a foc on what some lled a “Lavenr Mafia” nng the church, and broke new ground nnectg this directly to the horrifyg revelatns of sex abe that me to light 2002. ” Michael Hichborn, head of the ge-right Lepanto Instute, lled for a “plete and thorough removal of all homosexual clergymen om the church … It is gog to be difficult and will likely rult a very ser prit shortage, but ’s fely worth the effort.

At one pot as we spoke the next day the hospal, he was greeted by a woman who asked for an on-the-spot nfsn and he shooed me asi; later I met an anguished gay man om an ultra-Catholic fay he was unselg; and for a few hours on Sunday morng, he was wh the wife and teenage sons of a dyg man. For example, as the late historian John Boswell monstrated his groundbreakg, ntroversial book Christiany, Social Tolerance, and Homosexualy, a fourth-century Christian wrer, John Chrysostom, attacked the lears of the church for beg too acceptg of same-sex love and even sex: “Those very people who have been nourished by godly doctre, who stct others what they ought and ought not to do … the do not nsort wh prostut as fearlsly as they do wh young men … None is ashamed, no one blh … the chaste seem to be the odd on, and the disapprovg the on error. Carl Jung intified the archetypal gifts of the homosexual: “a great pacy for iendship, which often creat ti of astonishg tenrns between men”; a talent for teachg, athetics, and tradn (“to be nservative the bt sense and cherish the valu of the past”); “a wealth of relig feelgs, which help to brg the ecclia spirualis to realy; and a spirual receptivy which mak him rponsive to revelatn.

CAN CATHOLICS “PRAY AWAY THE GAY?”

He was also the theologian who monstrated a manic sire to police the slightt viatn om orthodoxy, who scribed gay people as “objectively disorred” and cled toward an “trsic moral evil, ” and who, after he banned gay prits, lled them “one of the miseri of the church.

“A distctn is drawn, and seems wh some reason, between homosexuals whose tenncy…is transory or at least not curable; and homosexuals who are fively such bee of some kd of nate stct… In the pastoral field, the homosexuals mt certaly be treated wh unrstandg and staed the hope of overg their personal difficulti and their abily to f to society.

ST. JOHN HENRY NEWMAN: THE FIRST OPENLY GAY CATHOLIC SAT?

Unlike some other Christian groups at the time (and ntug today, unfortunately), when the Catholic Church regnized that homosexual people were, to borrow a phrase om a morn pop song, “born this way, ” they did not say that a person was sful bee of this part of their personaly. Third, the Vatin was llg for pastoral re for lbian and gay people, not to “change” them or punish them, but to help them bee more tegrated their personal and social liv, prumably bee of the tense rejectn and ostracizatn that lbian and gay people experienced almost everywhere at the time. So, this document opened two new areas of church teachg about gay and lbian people, addg to the tradnal teachg forbiddg sexual activy: affirmatn of the non-sfulns of a homosexual orientatn and a ll to church lears to provi appropriate pastoral re to gay and lbian people.

” (The phrase “new ways” ught the attentn of Sister Jeanne Gramick and Father Robert Nugent who chose to e the phrase to tle the workshops—and eventually the anizatn—they had veloped to foster more sensive pastoral re for lbian and gay people. Homosexualy had always been erned by the church’s sexual ethics tradn which strsed that the only moral sexual acts are those that are open to procreatn, which brg two people (one male, one female) closer together lovg timacy, and which are performed the ntext of Christian marriage. While none of the new official teachgs challenged or ntradicted the tradnal teachg agast sexual activy, a number of stanc, church lears enuraged gay and lbian people to velop strong, chaste iendships, and there were also a number of remrs about the church’s teachg on nscience.

) At the same time, the Catholic theologil muny began to velop criqu of the tradnal teachg about gay and lbian sexual relatnships, often emergg om the femist criqu of sexual teachg, dissent on ntraceptn, and new unrstandgs of sexualy based on new evince om the natural and social scienc. In 1986, the Vatin’s Congregatn for the Doctre of the Fah (CDF) issued a document entled Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on the Pastoral Care of Homosexual Persons (also known by s Lat tle, Homosexualatis problema) which they scribed the homosexual orientatn as an “objective disorr. ”The sexual revolutn happeng outsi semary walls might as well have happened on the moon, and natnal ton the fight for gay rights, like the Stonewall rts, on prit a ral dce said the l remd him of how his elementary school forced left-hand stunts to wre wh their right hand.

‘IT IS NOT A CLOSET. IT IS A CAGE.’ GAY CATHOLIC PRITS SPEAK OUT

Will Ain Catholic bishops, after chastisg the Germans or Fernánz, issue a siar statement regardg Cardal McElroy of San Diego, who has recently lled to qutn the ancient Christian ia that homosexual terurse is mortally sful, tellg that we 21st-century Catholics know much more about homosexualy than did ancient moral teachers (e. For another, sce Catholicism has always regard homosexualy as a particularly extreme sexual s – a s that is not merely an offense agast God but an offense agast our animal nature self – once you give the green light to homosexualy you will also have to give to other sexual ss, e. AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTMany of New York Cy’s most outwardly gay-iendly parish are ncentrated Manhattan, a center of both gay culture and efforts to build a gay-iendly Watts for The New York TimThe pews fill up quickly each Sunday at the Church of St.

Mistri; anizg events like spirual retreats, hik and happy hours at lol gay bars; celebratg Mass and other events durg Pri Month; and by speakg up for the gay Watts for The New York TimWhen the Vatin issued a statement March that said prits uld not bls same-sex unns, which rid as a form of s, the parish and a handful of others Manhattan issued statements of dismay or ed hoi durg Mass as an opportuny to fort L.

Lbian, gay and bisexual people are much ls likely than heterosexuals to attend relig servic, intify as a member of a relig group or believe that Scripture is the word of God, acrdg to Pew Rearch Center survey data om 80 percent of people surveyed that poll said they nsired the Catholic Church to be “uniendly” to the L. ”The efforts to create a gay-iendly Catholicism highlight the reful path the Catholic Church and s clergy mt walk liberal plac like New York, an important Amerin relig center where churchgoers often look askance at the Vatin’s stanc on admistered day-to-day by more liberal, self-erng relig orrs — cludg the Jus, the Plist Fathers and the Francisns — affords the parish and their prits the eedom to do thgs like preach hoi that extol the digny of gay people and the value of their relatnships a way that prits who work directly for the rdal tend to also giv the archdce some distance om activi that tradnalists might oppose, like the Pri march participatn of St. Gay rights advot say the antiquated laws are ed to jtify harassment, and pot to new legislatn, such as the “Don’t say gay” law Florida, which forbids stctn on sexual orientatn and genr inty krgarten through third gra, as evince of ntued efforts to margalize LGBTQ Uned Natns has repeatedly lled for an end to laws crimalizg homosexualy outright, sayg they vlate rights to privacy and eedom om discrimatn and are a breach of untri’ obligatns unr ternatnal law to protect the human rights of all people, regardls of their sexual orientatn or genr inty.

BLSG GAY UNNS

Wrten by an openly lbian and celibate wrerHer journey om atheism to fahful CatholicismHow to accept your sexualy and live as a fahful CatholicHow gay Catholics n pour their love to iendship, muny, and serviceA fahful perspective on a difficult social issue First Place Wner of a 2015 Catholic Prs Award the Genr Issu CategoryIn this first book om an openly lbian and celibate Catholic, wily published wrer and blogger Eve Th reunts her spirual and tellectual journey om atheism to fahful Catholicism and shows how gay Catholics n love and be loved while adherg to Church teachg. Gay and Catholic: Acceptg My Sexualy, Fdg Communy, Livg My Fah is the u of Th’s searchg: what she learned studyg Christian history and theology and her articulatn of how gay Catholics n pour their love and need for nnectn to iendships, muny, service, and artistic creatn. ”In the new document and an acpanyg unsigned article, the Vatin said qutns had been raised about whether the church should bls same-sex unns a sacramental way recent years, and after Francis had sisted on the need to better wele gays the church.

FERAL URT L RONLLI CATHOLIC SCHOOL, ARCHDCE WAS ALLOWED TO FIRE A 2ND GAY UNSELOR

It was an apparent reference to the German church, where some bishops have been phg the envelope on issu such as pritly celibacy, ntraceptn and the church’s outreach to gay Catholics after g unr prsure by powerful lay Catholic groups mandg change. ”Other cril mentators noted the Catholic Book of Blsgs ntas blsgs that n be btowed on everythg om new hom and factori to animals, sportg events, seeds before plantg and farm Carlos Cz, a Chilean survivor of sexual abe who is gay and close to Francis, said the document was out of step wh Francis’ pastoral approach and was tone af to the needs and rights of LGBT Catholics.

GAY AND CATHOLIC - ACCEPTG MY SEXUALY, FDG COMMUNY, LIVG MY FAH

In the new document and an acpanyg unsigned article, the Vatin said qutns had been raised about whether the church should bls same-sex unns a sacramental way recent years, and after Francis had sisted on the need to better wele and acpany gays the church. ”A former high school teacher, Archbishop Wter said bullyg n be pecially toxic for young people who are tryg to e to terms wh their sexual orientatn, pecially when eher they or others misterpret church teachg on homosexualy to nvey the notn that beg gay self is Catholic Church teach that homosexualy is “objectively disorred” and nmns sexual acts between people of the same sex as sful.

Image source, RtersImage ptn, Pope Francis' statements are a parture om prev ments about LGBT rightsPope Francis has said that he thks same-sex upl should be allowed to have "civil unns" ma the ments, which observers say are his cleart remarks yet on gay relatnships, a documentary directed by Evgeny Afeevsky. " He add that he "stood up for that", apparently referrg to his time as Archbishop of Buenos Air when, although opposg same-sex marriag law, he supported some legal protectns for same-sex film Franc, about the life and work of Pope Francis, premiered as part of the Rome Film well as the Pope's ments on civil unns, the film also shows him enuragg two gay men to attend church wh their three Francis's bgrapher, Aten Ivereigh, told the BBC he was "not surprised" by the latt ments. "Unr current Catholic doctre, gay relatnships are referred to as "viant behavur" 2003, the Vatin's doctral body, the Congregatn for the Doctre of the Fah, said that "rpect for homosexual persons nnot lead any way to approval of homosexual behavur or to legal regnn of homosexual unns" words but no sign of doctral changeThe remarks have set tongu waggg among Vatin-watchers - and they mark Francis's cleart support for the issue sce beg Pope.

" he 2014 was reported that Pope Francis had exprsed support for civil unns for same-sex partners an terview, but the Holy See's prs office nied 2018, Pope Francis said he was "worried" about homosexualy the clergy, and that was "a ser matter" on this story. Jam Mart, has lled the Church’s teachgs on homosexualy “ unfortunate” and “hurtful”and he has weled homosexuals  to the Cathedral Basili Newark as a part of an LGBT pilgrimage where Catholics “married to same-sex spo” were ved to participate the Sacrament of Holy Communn. Gay rights advot say the antiquated laws are ed to harass homosexuals, and pot to new legislatn, such as the “Don’t say gay” law Florida, which forbids stctn on sexual orientatn and genr inty krgarten through third gra, as evince of ntued efforts to margalize LGBTQ people.

VATIN BARS GAY UNN BLSG, SAYS GOD ‘N’T BLS S’

The Uned Natns has repeatedly lled for an end to laws crimalizg homosexualy outright, sayg they vlate rights to privacy and eedom om discrimatn and are a breach of untri’ obligatns unr ternatnal law to protect the human rights of all people, regardls of their sexual orientatn or genr inty. "Acrdg to the dce, those same-sex relatnships or trans people n't be baptized or nfirmed or receive munn, and they also n't act as wns to Catholic baptisms or the document, to repent would mean to end a same-sex relatnship for a gay person, while a trans person would have to live as the sex they were assigned at News reports the document rurfaced when Jam Mart, a prit and LGBTQ+ advote, wrote on Twter, "It is not a s to be transgenr.

Marianne Duddy-Burke, the executive director of DignyUSA, which advot for LGBTQ+ rights the Catholic Church, told NBC News the document was part of a trend Catholic dc of "makg statements that look like they're tryg to be helpful to gay, queer and transgenr people but that are really dog harm to the spirual, emotnal and physil health of our muny and to fai. “This is Francis dog much the same — shockg progrsiv by affirmg the church’s teachg that sexual activy outsi of the marriage of one man and one woman is ntrary to the good of human digny, ” Pecknold church said Monday that s termatn was not tend to be “a form of unjt discrimatn” and lled on prits to wele those wh “homosexual clatns” wh rpect and sensivy.

EXCLUSIVE: TAYLOR MARSHALL SAYS POPE FRANCIS MAY CHANGE POSN OF CATHOLIC CHURCH ON GAY MARRIAGE

14, 2021The reports h the Roman Catholic Church rapid succsn: Analys of cellphone data obtaed by a nservative Catholic blog seemed to show prits at multiple levels of the Catholic hierarchy both the Uned Stat and the Vatin g the gay hookup app first report, published late last month, led to the rignatn of Msgr.

POPE FRANCIS SAYS PRITS NNOT BLS SAME-SEX UNNS, DASHG HOP OF GAY CATHOLICS

) “I would also say that I thk there are very qutnable ethics around the llectn of this data of people who allegedly may have broken their promis, ” he only app explicly named the reports has been Grdr, which is ed almost exclively by gay and bisexual men, although The Pillar has ma vague referenc to other apps says are ed by heterosexuals.

WHAT IS A CATHOLIC RPONSE TO GAY SUICI?

Flynn said on the said Newark was the only Amerin dce they wrote about bee was once led by the former Cardal Theodore McCarrick, who was ocked 2019 and charged last month wh sexually assltg a child Massachetts their cisn to vtigate the e of a gay datg app suburban New Jersey, stead of a cy wh a large gay populatn, has raised spicn that their real goal may have been to unrme Cardal Tob, an ally of Pope Flynn and Mr. Many factors have ntributed to the 50- or 60-year cle of Catholicism Ameri, but one of the most important – and recent s THE most important – is the sympathy felt for homosexualy among many prits, bishops, and laypeople, pecially liberal or progrsive laypersons.

I’m talkg also about a more general sympathy, the sympathy felt by those who say somethg like this to themselv: “Well, ’s unfortunate, but ’s not really horrible – at least not when they rea om moltg unrage boys, a dreadful thg that has ltle to do wh homosexualy.

Whether is fallac reasong or somethg else, perhaps somethg even worse, a wispread sympathy for homosexualy is helpg to the Catholic Church Ameri – for to approve of homosexualy is tantamount to sayg that the Church has been teachg a false sexual moraly for 2000 years, and this turn is tantamount to sayg that Catholicism is a false relign. In fact, when we nsir the 300-page document on the homosexual lobby that was hand to Pope Benedict XVI jt before he rigned, the probabily is that many who work the Vatin were fully aware of what Capozzi was dog, and that such activi are takg place among other clergy as well, ” he add.

HIGH-RANKG PRIT UGHT E-FUELED GAY Y VATIN APARTMENT