Rememberg Father Mychal Judge, the gay prit who perished on 9/11 - Queer Forty

Contents:

• FOC ON MYCHAL JUDGE AS A 'GAY SAT' IS PROBLEMATIC
• COULD FATHER MYCHAL JUDGE BE THE FIRST GAY SAT?
• REMEMBERG FATHER MYCHAL JUDGE, THE GAY PRIT WHO PERISHED ON 9/11
• WRG THE IN OF 9/11 - REMEMBERG FR MYCHAL JUDGE, THE FIRST GAY SAT? #ALLSATS
• SAT OF 9/11: REMEMBERG FR. MYCHAL JUDGE AS A GAY PRIT
• FATHER MYCHAL JUDGE: BELOVED OUT GAY PRIT WAS FIRST RERD ATH OF 9/11 –
• SUPPORTERS PH FOR GAY PRIT WHO DIED ON 9/11 TO BE MA A SAT
• A GAY SAT? L.G.B.T. GROUPS ARE PHG FOR 9/11 HERO FATHER MYCHAL JUDGE’S NONIZATN
• CHURCH ASKED TO NSIR SATHOOD FOR GAY 9/11 HERO MYCHAL JUDGE: ‘HEAVEN IS FILLED WH LGBT+ PEOPLE’
• SUPPORT MOUNTS FOR SATHOOD OF MYCHAL JUDGE, GAY PRIT WHO DIED ON 9/11

FOC ON MYCHAL JUDGE AS A 'GAY SAT' IS PROBLEMATIC

But the Slate article foced on somethg else, suggtg that Judge might bee "the first gay sat. " I spect the long history of the church, and the fact that nonizatns were for many centuri handled by lol bishops, not the Vatin Curia, there were at least a few gay sats beforehand.

COULD FATHER MYCHAL JUDGE BE THE FIRST GAY SAT?

Nohels, I thk this foc on the fact that Judge was reportedly gay is problematic at several levels.

I don't thk is news to anyone that there are some the Vatin Curia who will nsir the fact that Judge was gay a negative factor evaluatg his e, not a posive. And there are others who would be prepared to see the mere fact of his beg gay as a matter of difference to his e, but who worry about the propaganda purpos to which his nonizatn would be put by people who have no love for the church or who ny the church's teachg on homosexualy. Another ncern about the mpaign to create the "first gay sat" has to do wh Judge's privacy.

REMEMBERG FATHER MYCHAL JUDGE, THE GAY PRIT WHO PERISHED ON 9/11

Acrdg to the Slate article, Judge chose to disclose the fact he was gay to very, very few people. I add passg that I fervently wish more people, gay and straight, chose to be as private as Judge was about his private life.

But I do not wish this or believe this bee he was gay, but bee he was a lovg, joyful prit who brought the love and joy of Christ to so many and died brgg the nsolatn of Christ to those nontg the horrors of 9/11.

WRG THE IN OF 9/11 - REMEMBERG FR MYCHAL JUDGE, THE FIRST GAY SAT? #ALLSATS

Bgham, a former llege gby player wh a 6-foot-5, 220-pound build, was a gay public relatns executive wh an active datg life. And, acrdg to those who knew them, they both went through a journey of acceptg their a lot of young gay men of his generatn, Bgham stggled to some gree wh his sexual orientatn. Even when he first started playg a gay gby league San Francis, he had his face blurred photos the lol prs.

SAT OF 9/11: REMEMBERG FR. MYCHAL JUDGE AS A GAY PRIT

”Mark relled how one night, after Bgham reloted to New York and moved wh her, he nfsed he wanted “to wre the Great Amerin Novel — but gay.

”“So that you’d have to read high school, and people would unrstand that gay people were always among and were totally normal and a part of our liv, ” she Moulton, the Rev. He said the FDNY chapla “was out to iars and iends and people he uld tst — or people he thought g out to would help, like parents wantg to support their gay children. “In his journals, [Judge] talks about beg at peace wh his sexualy and grateful that God had ma him gay, ” said Francis DeBernardo, thor of the upg bgraphy “Mychal Judge: Take Me Where You Want Me to Go.

He even beme a key figure the creatn of the Internatnal Gay Rugby league months before he died, Bgham was at the league’s first vatnal May 2001, helpg the San Francis Fog feat the hometown team, the Washgton, D.

FATHER MYCHAL JUDGE: BELOVED OUT GAY PRIT WAS FIRST RERD ATH OF 9/11 –

C., Renegas, a 19-0 the time of the crash, Bgham was workg to brg a gay gby team to New York, which led to the formatn of the Gotham Knights. “Mark’s two worlds were gby and beg gay, and when those worlds llid, he was ecstatic, ” Mark Rev. Courty Brendan FayAfter the terrorist attacks, when beme public that Judge was gay “there was a big bate Catholic circl, ” said DeBernardo, executive director of New Ways Mistry, which advot for cln for LGBTQ Catholics.

“People uldn’t rolve the fact that a gay person uld be holy and selfls, ” he said. I wasn’t even totally nvced he was a gay man until I started dog the rearch [for the book]. ”But, he add, Judge’s whole sense of mistry, of beg of service to others, me om his g to terms wh beg gay.

Bgham’s clost iends and fay were also ambivalent about his beg herald as a gay hero. “At first I really felt like his beg gay didn’t matter, ” Mark said. “Don’t put out ‘gay hero’; he was jt a hero.

SUPPORTERS PH FOR GAY PRIT WHO DIED ON 9/11 TO BE MA A SAT

“We cid at that time we should enurage that perspective, ” Mark said, “bee the tth was there weren’t any gay hero. ” The gay gby muny wasted ltle time cidg how to honor their fallen brother: In June 2002, ls than a year after the attacks, the gural Mark Kendall Bgham Memorial Tournament —monly known as the Bgham Cup — was held San Francis wh eight 2018, the last year the biannual event was held, the petn weled 74 teams om 20 different untri. Acrdg to DeBernardo, Eslante knew Judge was volved the gay muny and wanted New Ways Mistry to help fd people who knew him to provi firsthand acunts or documents “that will give a clearer, more tailed picture of his life, spirualy, and mistry, ” DeBernardo wrote a 2017 post on the mistry’s webse, pecially “any rmatn regardg a possible miracle attributed to Fr.

When Salvatore Sapienza saw the small classified ad the back of OutWeek, a gay news magaze New York, he thought seemed like a sign. Sapienza was gay—he had been out for years—but he was also a Marist Brother, a Catholic office siar to the prithood. New York Cy 1989 was not an easy place to be both gay and Catholic.

The AIDS crisis would claim more than 5, 000 people the cy that year, and the church was volly opposed to ndoms and homosexualy.

A GAY SAT? L.G.B.T. GROUPS ARE PHG FOR 9/11 HERO FATHER MYCHAL JUDGE’S NONIZATN

“Mychal really knew that gay Catholics were beg treated like send-class cizens by the church, ” Sapienza said. But he also “loved beg gay. But few the wi circle who adored him and relied on him were aware durg his lifetime that he was gay.

“And 9, 406 of didn’t know he was gay.

Daly, who had accs to Judge’s diari, reported his book that Judge had wrten about beg gay and had a long-term romantic relatnship wh a nurse named Al Alvarado who was 30 years his junr. When to the prospect of nonizg the first gay sat, Mart said, “Mychal Judge is a perfect tt se.

CHURCH ASKED TO NSIR SATHOOD FOR GAY 9/11 HERO MYCHAL JUDGE: ‘HEAVEN IS FILLED WH LGBT+ PEOPLE’

He is also someone who, the words of Pope Francis, as he nonized two former pop 2014, “giv directn and growth to the Church”—a church that, 2017, still regards homosexualy as “objectively disorred. When the Archdce of New York banned a Manhattan church om offerg a regular special Mass to a gay Catholic group, Digny, Judge ved the group to operate out of St.

Patrick’s Day Para—whose anizers were then engaged a legal battle to prevent gay groups om marchg—and the Pri Para, which proceed down Fifth Avenue the oppose directn. In 1999, Judge wrote his diary about how he stggled as a gay man. While Pope Francis has ma no dramatic mov to dismantle Catholic orthodoxy regardg homosexualy, he is wily perceived as havg taken a gentler tone than his precsors.

” he famoly asked 2013, answerg a reporter’s qutn about gay prits; he later expand on the ment, explag that he applied to all gay people. Wh a week of the Vatin’s announcement about the new sathood creria, Eslante reached out to Francis DeBernardo, an Amerin and longtime activist on behalf of gay Catholics, and asked him to help fd people who knew Judge. As of now, there are no Catholic sats who are known to be gay.

SUPPORT MOUNTS FOR SATHOOD OF MYCHAL JUDGE, GAY PRIT WHO DIED ON 9/11

It’s whether Catholicism is ready for a sat whose sexualy uld not be ignored or dismissed as a matter of historil terpretatn—a morn gay man who, as Sapienza put , loved beg gay and loved beg Catholic.

Even as Pope Francis has hted at a new relatively laissez-faire approach, the Vatin nfirmed last year that “persons wh homosexual tennci” should not be admted to tra as prits at Catholic semari. For gay Catholics, the rults of that lm tt matter. Judge’s nonizatn “would be a much clearer statement that you have a place the church, and the church don’t judge you by your temptatns but by livg a life of obedience, ” said Ron Belg, a celibate gay Catholic who has urged the Vatin to be more welg to LGBTQ people.

“Would the Francisns allow him to be known as a gay man? “Maybe, maybe a chapter a book by Mychal Judge—well rpected, loved by many, fahful to his profsn, loyal to his muny and iends … well if he is gay there mt be somethg okay about ‘them.