Are gay Catholics condemned to loneliness?

[reggieM]

However, I will not apologize for speaking the truth. My attitude is in line with the Doctors of the Church, and even with Jesus: “It is better for thee to go into life maimed or lame, than having two hands or two feet, to be cast into everlasting fire.” (Matthew 18:8.) Your issue is not with me, but with Him. I stand by my calling a spade a spade; to disagree with this is to deny what Hell is.

The sentiment you posted, which is shocking to some members here, is ordinary, common Catholic teaching. You certainly didn’t invent it. With a little time, someone could easily find a hundred references among the doctors, theologians, spiritual teachers and saints that say the same thing.
Most Catholics today have never read any classic Catholic literature - and virtually nothing by the saints. There is an ocean of material that would take several lifetimes to absorb – and yes, in there that view is expressed, just as strongly and even moreso (St. Alphonsus said something similar about venial sin).
Meditations on the pain of hell, pain of purgatory, judgement, penance, mortification of the senses … let’s just say you’ll generally wait quite a long time to hear such things in the parish church these days, and even on retreat they’re rare. But it’s all true nonetheless.

 

[Dorothy]

The sentiment you posted, which is shocking to some members here, is ordinary, common Catholic teaching. You certainly didn’t invent it. With a little time, someone could easily find a hundred references among the doctors, theologians, spiritual teachers and saints that say the same thing.
Most Catholics today have never read any classic Catholic literature - and virtually nothing by the saints. There is an ocean of material that would take several lifetimes to absorb – and yes, in there that view is expressed, just as strongly and even moreso (St. Alphonsus said something similar about venial sin).
Meditations on the pain of hell, pain of purgatory, judgement, penance, mortification of the senses … let’s just say you’ll generally wait quite a long time to hear such things in the parish church these days, and even on retreat they’re rare. But it’s all true nonetheless.

I am blessed to hear great Catholic teaching in my parish and on many retreats I have been on.

 

[reggieM]

Someone mentioned the idea something like “if I wasn’t Catholic I’d have no problem with gay marriage”.

I’d offer this suggestion – that with some spiritual maturity, your own belief should be firmly that the desire for gay-sex is “disordered” at best. With more time, purity and reflection – it really should come about that you know there is something profoundly wrong with gay-sex behavior. If that doesn’t happen, then there is a problem. Something is causing you to attach to an irrational thought, and actually a dangerous thought.

I’d use the example of someone who wants to get high by sniffing glue. Let’s imagine the act is illegal (not sure if it is). The person says, “I’ve been sober on sniffing glue because I don’t want to get arrested. But if it was legal, I’d have no problem with it.”
Clearly, the person needs to see the immense danger he’s doing to himself by the act, and want to stop whether it is legal or not. In fact, he needs to arrive at a point where sniffing glue is an abhorrent thing to do.

To say “there’s nothing wrong with glue”, or “there’s nothing wrong with having fun - everybody needs to relax” – would clearly be an absurd justification for a dangerous addiction.

It’s really the same with gay-sex behavior. It is a damaging thing to do - not only physically, but it is an expression of a disordered thought. In terms of logic and reason, it does not make sense - it’s an insane thing to want to do.

When people think what I said is harsh or uncaring or lacking understanding, it is because they don’t understand the complimentary of men and women and how marriage can only be that way. The union of man and woman, and the integrity and sacredness of each person is something we find in the teaching of Christ and gay-sex behavior is a violation of all of that.

Someone just coming out of a deep gay-lifestyle will take a while to heal from that (any by healing I do not necessarily mean a change in orientation).
To what extent is an interest in gay-sex an intellectual process? 10%, 50%, 90%? I don’t know - but it is some %.
Whatever that is, we know we can reprogram our minds to think of good rather than evil. We can break habits of thought by replacing with good habits of thought.
We can learn that gay-sex is something very bad and then learn to break an attachment to it.

 

[reggieM]

I am blessed to hear great Catholic teaching in my parish and on many retreats I have been on.

You are truly blessed to have that!

 

[mathematoons]

The sentiment you posted, which is shocking to some members here, is ordinary, common Catholic teaching. You certainly didn’t invent it. With a little time, someone could easily find a hundred references among the doctors, theologians, spiritual teachers and saints that say the same thing.
Most Catholics today have never read any classic Catholic literature - and virtually nothing by the saints. There is an ocean of material that would take several lifetimes to absorb – and yes, in there that view is expressed, just as strongly and even moreso (St. Alphonsus said something similar about venial sin).
Meditations on the pain of hell, pain of purgatory, judgement, penance, mortification of the senses … let’s just say you’ll generally wait quite a long time to hear such things in the parish church these days, and even on retreat they’re rare. But it’s all true nonetheless.

I learned shortly after my conversion that if I wanted good Catholic teaching, I had to look for it myself. My favorites are The Sinner’s Guide by Luis de Granada, Sermons for All Sundays by St. Alphonsus, and The Spiritual Combat by Dom Lorenzo Scupoli.

But that one just seems obvious to anyone who does the math. It takes minutes to burn to death. It takes eternity to burn in Hell. The choice seems like a no-brainer.

 

[mathematoons]

Thank you for your post!

I’m glad you liked it.

 

[polki]

I decided to come back and check on this thread… you may have me on ignore, but this is for the benefit of others.

I didn’t know about your grandmother, so I didn’t know it would hit a nerve. I apologize for hurting your feelings like that.

However, I will not apologize for speaking the truth. My attitude is in line with the Doctors of the Church, and even with Jesus: “It is better for thee to go into life maimed or lame, than having two hands or two feet, to be cast into everlasting fire.” (Matthew 18:8.) Your issue is not with me, but with Him. I stand by my calling a spade a spade; to disagree with this is to deny what Hell is.

It’s not because I don’t have kids. I feel that way about my parents. My father has left the faith and is not long for this earth; if he went through a painful death and I learned (somehow) that it gave him the grace to repent at the last moment of life, I would rejoice. I have told my mother that I don’t ever want her to deny Jesus for ANY reason, not even for me. If my dog were human, I would feel the same way about him too. I would rather be with my family in Heaven than have them x years longer on earth and spare them y minutes of suffering. It is because I love them so much that I would be happy for them to go through a little earthly fire rather than suffer an eternity of Hell-fire. Does no one understand that?

I understand what you are saying. Many martyrs of the Church also felt death preferable to sin/disobedience to God.

 

[reggieM]

I learned shortly after my conversion that if I wanted good Catholic teaching, I had to look for it myself. My favorites are The Sinner’s Guide by Luis de Granada, Sermons for All Sundays by St. Alphonsus, and The Spiritual Combat by Dom Lorenzo Scupoli.

But that one just seems obvious to anyone who does the math. It takes minutes to burn to death. It takes eternity to burn in Hell. The choice seems like a no-brainer.

Yes, exactly!
The fact that Catholics here are troubled by what you said, and have actually never heard that is a major problem, as I see it.
The history of Catholic martyrs - it’s enormous. How can you miss it?
It’s even in the Bible. The Book of Maccabees. The mother of seven sons, encouraged them to die in fire with their tongues torn out, rather than to eat pork.

Most admirable and worthy of everlasting remembrance was the mother who, seeing her seven sons perish in a single day, bore it courageously because of her hope in the Lord.

Great reading choices also. The Sinners Guide and Spiritual Combat are “must reads” for any Catholic, in my opinion. I’d probably say the same about St. Alphonsus’ sermons - given the many others of his I’ve read. To me, this material is essential and will strip away the wordly thinking that is so easy to fall into.
St. Catherine of Siena, Doctor of the Church … her Dialogues with Our Lord are so powerful. Her famous quote on homosexuality is relevant.

 

[ConfusedLucy]

Someone mentioned the idea something like “if I wasn’t Catholic I’d have no problem with gay marriage”.

I’d offer this suggestion – that with some spiritual maturity, your own belief should be firmly that the desire for gay-sex is “disordered” at best. With more time, purity and reflection – it really should come about that you know there is something profoundly wrong with gay-sex behavior. If that doesn’t happen, then there is a problem. Something is causing you to attach to an irrational thought, and actually a dangerous thought.

I’d use the example of someone who wants to get high by sniffing glue. Let’s imagine the act is illegal (not sure if it is). The person says, “I’ve been sober on sniffing glue because I don’t want to get arrested. But if it was legal, I’d have no problem with it.”
Clearly, the person needs to see the immense danger he’s doing to himself by the act, and want to stop whether it is legal or not. In fact, he needs to arrive at a point where sniffing glue is an abhorrent thing to do.

To say “there’s nothing wrong with glue”, or “there’s nothing wrong with having fun - everybody needs to relax” – would clearly be an absurd justification for a dangerous addiction.

It’s really the same with gay-sex behavior. It is a damaging thing to do - not only physically, but it is an expression of a disordered thought. In terms of logic and reason, it does not make sense - it’s an insane thing to want to do.

When people think what I said is harsh or uncaring or lacking understanding, it is because they don’t understand the complimentary of men and women and how marriage can only be that way. The union of man and woman, and the integrity and sacredness of each person is something we find in the teaching of Christ and gay-sex behavior is a violation of all of that.

Someone just coming out of a deep gay-lifestyle will take a while to heal from that (any by healing I do not necessarily mean a change in orientation).
To what extent is an interest in gay-sex an intellectual process? 10%, 50%, 90%? I don’t know - but it is some %.
Whatever that is, we know we can reprogram our minds to think of good rather than evil. We can break habits of thought by replacing with good habits of thought.
We can learn that gay-sex is something very bad and then learn to break an attachment to it.

I suppose for me it’s because I have met and spent time with plenty of gay people and it’s really not obvious how they are harming themselves, most of them live fairly ordinary lifestyles and at least superficially their relationships don’t seem that different to straight ones.

Personally I am just grateful that it’s a temptation I haven’t faced although I know that’s a total cop out.

 

[Peter_J]

I suppose for me it’s because I have met and spent time with plenty of gay people and it’s really not obvious how they are harming themselves, most of them live fairly ordinary lifestyles and at least superficially their relationships don’t seem that different to straight ones.

Personally I am just grateful that it’s a temptation I haven’t faced although I know that’s a total cop out.

Agree with all except what I boldfaced at the end. I don’t see what you’re criticizing yourself for. (It’s not like your previous comment had been “I thank you God that I am not like that tax collector.”)

 

[reggieM]

I suppose for me it’s because I have met and spent time with plenty of gay people and** it’s really not obvious how they are harming themselves**, most of them live fairly ordinary lifestyles and at least superficially their relationships don’t seem that different to straight ones.

Personally I am just grateful that it’s a temptation I haven’t faced although I know that’s a total cop out.

That is a good comment - thanks.
Where I bolded is what underscores the point I raised.
I don’t think you’re alone in that - I would guess the vast majority of Catholics in the United States today would agree. They don’t see the harm in it.
Of course, most people don’t spend a lot of time thinking about gay sex relationships. But a person who is suffering from those temptations would spend the time.
That is why, in my view, it’s important to make progress, grow in maturity and gain deeper purity and spiritual vision.
The beauty of chaste celibacy is that it gives a person more time to know God in direct communication. There’s more time for prayer, more time to contemplate who God really is. More time for worship, etc.
With that, a spiritual vision can be cleansed, empowered and enlightened.

What we learn with spiritual growth is that every sin, certainly every serious sin, does immense harm.

With gay-sex, there are a lot of dimensions to consider. I don’t want or need to get into all of them right here and now, but I’ll just say that the idea that it is basically the same as man-to-woman relationships is an illusion - it covers-up radical differences. It’s a very wrong notion that I would hope, those fighting gay-attraction would be the first to recognize and affirm in their own lives.

If we don’t make that step, then the prohibition against gay-sex will seem like an arbitrary rule. We want to follow the rules, but it will seem like the Church just made up this rule because it doesn’t like gay people (or something like that).

Like the sin of stealing. The Church says it is a sin. But if we just thought that was a rule that had no basis in reality, it wouldn’t be right. Most of us can see how stealing something harms people. So, the idea that it is a serious sin is easy to understand.

 

[mathematoons]

I don’t get it. Homosexual acts close the act to the gift of life, just like contraception. Yet we would not be having this debate about the sinfulness of contraception, because the people who defend it are limited to the people who use it (though, sadly, this is the majority). It’s as though people are letting their feelings about particular homosexuals get in the way of simple logic.

 

[reggieM]

I don’t get it. Homosexual acts close the act to the gift of life, just like contraception. Yet we would not be having this debate about the sinfulness of contraception, because the people who defend it are limited to the people who use it (though, sadly, this is the majority). It’s as though people are letting their feelings about particular homosexuals get in the way of simple logic.

Yes, good point…
People tend to think that gay-sex is “romantic love”, and in America that’s like a sacred thing for us. It’s about holding hands on a swing on the porch or “being together”.
But we’re taking about sex-acts and obviously nobody wants to talk or think about that.

But yes - just start with contraception. No need to get graphic. Gay sex is the pleasure without the responsibility of children. It totally excludes God’s creative power. Gay-sex is just lust. It is stealing the sex-act from where it rightfully belongs, from where God created it to be, within man-woman marriage. So, it’s theft, It’s pride against God, taking his gift of sexuality and using it wrongly, for unfruitful union.
There’s an enormous dimension with the unitive power of sex also. Man and woman compliment each other, In gay-sex, a man has to play the sex- role of a woman. It’s just fake - a pretend world of make-believe. This is mentally, spiritually, emotionally and physically damaging. It’s a complete violation of the purpose of sexuality as God intended, and of the integrity of men and women as God planned.
There’s no reason why men cannot simply have good, chaste friendships. In fact, men need that, as women do, with each other.
Introducing sexuality to those relationships is nonsensical.

 

[Norseman82]

Gay-sex is just lust. It is stealing the sex-act from where it rightfully belongs, from where God created it to be, within man-woman marriage. So, it’s theft,

On the “theft” angle of this…

A little over seven years ago, I went out to lunch with my aunt, another cousin, and her daughters. One of the daughters used this occasion to inform my aunt that she was in a same-sex relationship. When I was driving my aunt back home, she said that it was too bad that the daughters didn’t have any friends that they could introduce me to. Well, I almost “lost it” due to the irony and said to her regarding the same-sex relationship - “right there - that’s two men who can’t find wives”.

 

[Sarcelle]

Yes, good point…
People tend to think that gay-sex is “romantic love”, and in America that’s like a sacred thing for us. It’s about holding hands on a swing on the porch or “being together”.
But we’re taking about sex-acts and obviously nobody wants to talk or think about that.

But yes - just start with contraception. No need to get graphic. Gay sex is the pleasure without the responsibility of children. It totally excludes God’s creative power. Gay-sex is just lust. It is stealing the sex-act from where it rightfully belongs, from where God created it to be, within man-woman marriage. So, it’s theft, It’s pride against God, taking his gift of sexuality and using it wrongly, for unfruitful union.
There’s an enormous dimension with the unitive power of sex also. Man and woman compliment each other, In gay-sex, a man has to play the sex- role of a woman. It’s just fake - a pretend world of make-believe. This is mentally, spiritually, emotionally and physically damaging. It’s a complete violation of the purpose of sexuality as God intended, and of the integrity of men and women as God planned.
There’s no reason why men cannot simply have good, chaste friendships. In fact, men need that, as women do, with each other.
Introducing sexuality to those relationships is nonsensical.

I think we are reaping the bitter fruits of the contraceptive mentality.

I don’t remember the Pope who warned us against artificial contraception, but his words were prophetic.

 

[Norseman82]

I wouldn’t marry a converted gay person, I wouldn’t want to risk a loveless marriage with someone who was never even attracted to me.

How do you know it would be loveless? What if you were the person that caused him to “go straight”?

Back to the original topic the problem is us Catholics aren’t offering anything different to the world’s message of marriage or loneliness.

But what if there isn’t anything different? Remember, it was God Who said that it is not good for the man to be alone (Genesis 2). According to CCC 1603, it is the vocation to marriage (obviously heterosexual) that is written into our very nature, and although celibacy (under the term “virginity for the sake of the kingdom”) is considered better, it is not the natural state - it requires supernatural graces, and not everyone is granted those graces (read what Jesus Christ said regarding the “eunuchs for the kingdom”). It’s not something everyone can handle. That is why I cringe when I hear terms like “imposed celibacy” - it is just as sickening as “forced marriages”. The only time celibacy is mandated by the Bible is when a person is divorced and his/her spouse is still alive (see one of St. Paul’s letters). Forcing celibacy on someone who can’t handle it but is canonically eligible for a heterosexual marriage is like trying to “force a round peg into a square hole”. That’s why I’m against outlawing “conversion therapy” - what if a person wants to convert? And what about those who turn to same-sex experiences due to early sexual abuse? Should we deny them healing until they are 18? What if that’s too late?

 

[Norseman82]

I think we are reaping the bitter fruits of the contraceptive mentality.

I don’t remember the Pope who warned us against artificial contraception, but his words were prophetic.

Pope Bl. Paul VI’s encyclical Humanae Vitae is what first pops into my mind; there may have been other Popes as well.

 

[Norseman82]

Solution: stop being gay.

“But that’s impossible!”

No it isn’t. It’s just difficult.

21:50-22:45:

youtube.com/watch?v=jXz558DgprQ

 

[mathematoons]

Solution: stop being gay.

“But that’s impossible!”

No it isn’t. It’s just difficult.

I’ve met people who lost even the desire to engage in homosexual activity after they became Christians. So, yes, God can and does work that kind of miracle.

 

[mathematoons]

I think this is a gross simplication of life. It also completely devalues friendship. Not everyone is called to marriage and some of those people aren’t called to religious life. Some due to circumstances are pushed into an unchosen celibacy. Does it mean they are alone and without love. Current culture says YES but that should be a resounding NO.

Maybe it should and maybe it shouldn’t (actually, given divine providence, everything is exactly as it should be), but that question is irrelevant. Because current culture says yes, that makes it a yes. When everyone else obeys the cultural mandate, it’s either obey along with them or be alone. I learned that the hard way and wasted quite a few years in doing so. You’re talking about a dream, an ideal, but you cannot change the culture to conform to your ideal. You can keep on living in a dream world, or you can get in line with the world God actually gave us. Guess which option is more pleasing to Him.