[Two Pronged] Gay, Catholic, and feelg guilty

Contents:

• GAY, CATHOLIC, AND DOG FE
• WHAT DO LOOK LIKE TO BE GAY – AND A PRACTICG CATHOLIC?
• “GAY, CATHOLIC AND DOG FE”
• WHAT SHOULD A GAY CATHOLIC DO?
• FIRG OF GAY CATHOLIC SCHOOL TEACHER ULD TT LATT SUPREME COURT LG
• WHAT A GAY, CATHOLIC MAN IS DOG TO HELP THE L.G.B.T. MUNY
• [TWO PRONGED] GAY, CATHOLIC, AND FEELG GUILTY
• U.S. HOMOSEXUAL ACTIVIST WEBSE PROVIS LIST OF 'GAY FRIENDLY' CATHOLIC PARISH
• GAY CATHOLIC AND DOG FE

GAY, CATHOLIC, AND DOG FE

This blog by Steve Gershom, a Catholic, gay, young man, was origally published on the blog, Ltle Catholic Bubble. I have heard a lot about how mean the Church is, and how bigoted, bee she oppos gay marriage. Said when I told him recently about my homosexualy, “I gus if wasn’t that, would have been somethg else.

Actually, the only time I get shock or disgt or disbelief, the only time I’ve noticed people treatg me differently after I tell them, is when I tell someone who supports the gay liftyle. I’m grateful to gay activists for some thgs — makg people people more aware of the prevalence of homosexualy, makg homophobia ls socially acceptable — but they also make more difficult for me to be unrstood, to be accepted for who I am and what I believe.

WHAT DO LOOK LIKE TO BE GAY – AND A PRACTICG CATHOLIC?

So the Church don’t oppose gay marriage bee ’s wrong; she oppos bee ’s impossible, jt as impossible as livg on sand.

So, y, ’s hard to be gay and Catholic — ’s hard to be anythg and Catholic — bee I don’t always get to do what I want.

More than 10 years ago, Joseph Prever found himself surg the ter for anythg that might help him: he was gay, Catholic, and nfed. Rourc were srce for a man stgglg wh homosexualy and tryg to rema fahful to the Church's teachg.

“GAY, CATHOLIC AND DOG FE”

Google the words "gay Catholic" and one of the top s to appear will be Prever's own blog, a blog wh the tagle: "Catholic, Gay, and Feelg Fe. What follows is an eded versn of a nversatn about everythg om homosexualy and Batman to poetry and football. The blog is about what 's like to be a gay Catholic – a gay Catholic who is of urse, celibate – and I say 'of urse' bee that seems to me like the only optn if you're gog to be both gay and Catholic.

My iends and I joke that there's a gay Catholic renaissance on, or actually a gay Christian renaissance on, and we're proud to be at the foreont of – or at least we tell ourselv that we're at the foreont. It was hard the sense that I'd actually always said that people shouldn't be public about beg gay, bee was not anybody's bs and I felt that would lend legimacy to this ia that beg gay is a sort of a sgle way to intify yourself: I actually still sort of hold that posn – kd of. It's hard to scribe: I don't thk that beg gay is as sential of a way to intify yourself as say, beg male is, or beg Catholic, or beg human.

Your blog hear is, 'Catholic, Gay, and Feelg Fe, ' and you've been g the word 'gay' throughout our nversatn so far. ' I ed to joke that the only reason I ed the word 'gay' was so that I would tend to show up more on Google, which is only partially a joke, bee you know if you're gog to e the tools of technology to evangelize, then you have to be savvy about what Google is gog to fd and what isn't.

WHAT SHOULD A GAY CATHOLIC DO?

But I gus the shift maly happened as I began to approach beg more public about , bee as I beme more public I also me to ntact more openly wh people who intified as gay or who stggled wh same-sex attractn, or whatever. And what I found was that a lot of them had a lot of rentment towards people who sisted on not g the word gay.

And fact, I rarely feel strongly about whether I should e the word gay or not, but the one time I do feel strongly about is when somebody starts upbraidg me for . It's the sort of thg where people feel, and I thk rightly, that they have been nstraed to keep silent for most of their liv – and a lot of people have, whether 's nstraed by actual explic homophobia among the people that they love and/or are related to, or whether 's jt sort of a general culture unrstandg that you don't talk about this sort of thg. ' This is tratg and across as very patronizg bee the are people who don't have any sight to the experience of what is to be gay tellg you what is or is not ok to talk about, and what is and is not ok to ll yourself.

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

Would you also apply that cricism to the Church who never the word 'gay' her documents?

WHAT A GAY, CATHOLIC MAN IS DOG TO HELP THE L.G.B.T. MUNY

This is reason that I haven't yet e to a solid opn on this qutn – bee the problem is that secular people and Christian people mean two different thgs by the word 'gay. When I told my roommate I was gay, the first thg that he said to me was, 'do you mean same-sex attracted? Now I thk that one reason Christians tend to dislike the word 'gay' is bee if somebody says that they are gay, then they are ually implyg that is an unchangeable aspect of their personaly.

Whereas the sort of flt posn among a lot of Christians is that homosexualy is changeable.

[TWO PRONGED] GAY, CATHOLIC, AND FEELG GUILTY

The unspoken implitn is that if you intify yourself as 'gay, ' then you're probably not tryg hard enough to be straight. And I believe that this why is so offensive to be told that they shouldn't e the word gay.

What do you thk we should be dog as a Church, as a Christian muny, to be helpg people who stggle wh homosexualy? I'll start first by sayg that I'm extremely grateful for the anizatn People Can Change, which is an anizatn found precisely on the ia that radil change wh rpect to homosexualy is possible. I'm grateful for them not bee they 'ma me straight' or somethg, but bee they gave me a space which to work out some of my issu, many of which turned out not to be related precisely to homosexualy particular, but were jt sort of emotnal issu that need alg wh.

I thk a lot of gay men and women do have emotnal issu that aren't gog to be alt wh if they're told that everythg is already ok.

U.S. HOMOSEXUAL ACTIVIST WEBSE PROVIS LIST OF 'GAY FRIENDLY' CATHOLIC PARISH

But on the other hand, this is dangero bee you have a lot of Christian people already assumg om the get-go that if somebody is homosexual, then they mt have var and many emotnal issu that need workg on, and that's not necsarily the se. If the unrstandg the Christian world is that homosexualy is a "disorr, " and homosexual activy is a s, then logilly would seem like as Christians, we would want to help our fellow Christians who are "dis-orred" to be "orred.

The Church has to be clear wh rpect to 'what is the nature of homosexualy self, ' but n't make a pronouncement on whether is a mental disorr, for example.

GAY CATHOLIC AND DOG FE

Many people assume that when the Church says 'homosexualy nsists of a disorred clatn, ' they take that word 'disorr' and assume that She means 'mental disorr. What do you thk the unrlyg prcipl are that are dictatg what the Church is sayg about homosexualy?

I'll tell you how I see myself and what I do, which is not only wh rpect to homosexualy but wh how I try to live the Catholic fah general. The Roman Catholic Church, the largt Christian nomatn the Uned Stat wh an timated 62 ln members, has weled celibate gay and lbian people to s church life but creasgly is beg more tolerant even of this populatn. The Catechism of the Catholic Church, a text which ntas dogmas and teachgs of the Church, nam “homosexual acts” as “trsilly immoral and ntrary to the natural law, ” and nam “homosexual tennci” as “objectively disorred.

” While the Catholic Church do not nsir “homosexual orientatn” sful and of self, do have a very negative attu toward . The 1986 Letter stat, “Although the particular clatn of the homosexual person is not a s, is a more or ls strong tenncy orred toward an trsic moral evil; and th the clatn self mt be seen as an objective disorr. A 2005 Vatin document, approved by then Pope Benedict XVI, stcted that the Church “nnot adm to the semary or to holy orrs those who practice homosexualy, prent ep-seated homosexual tennci or support the so-lled ‘gay culture.