Dolan: Catholic Church needs better outreach to gays

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rossum said:
The Church has a wide range of stances on an equally wide range of subjects. It is possible to be more flexible about what is emphasised, especially when reaching out to non-Catholics.
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It is a general rule—not only for Catholics but for any group concerned with morality—that one focuses on what has been called into question. There is little dissent on ‘thou shalt not steal’ but there is massive dissent (among Catholics) on contraception, abortion, euthanasia, fornication, the ordination of women, and same-sex “marriage.” These subjects deserve extra attention because so many of the students in morality class keep getting the answers wrong.
 
jwinch2 said:
The “New” Tone of U.S. Bishops Sounds Very Familiar

crisismagazine.com/2013/the-new-tone-of-u-s-bishops-sounds-very-familiar

So, a year ago the Bishops had not been speaking out enough and were afraid to preach the Truth of the evil of homosexual acts and the inherent wrongness of “gay marriage” and now all of a sudden, they have been too harsh? We barely heard a peep from Cardinal Dolan when “gay marriage” was being pushed through in New York until the 11th hour, and now all of a sudden the the tone has been too strident? This simply does not add up.

I am not suggesting attacking people with SSA or demeaning them in any way. However, we must also proclaim the truth boldly and with clarity. Suggesting that we have been mean or harsh when the reality is that the overwhelming majority of bishops and priests never talk about this issue creates a false narrative and plays right into the hands of those pushing this agenda.
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I was wondering whether anyone saw that article…glad you posted it. You’re absolutely right. It doesn’t add up. Just some more confusion…and, based on some other posts, I’m being told that I shouldn’t worry about this…that it’s not my concern. Granted, I may not be able to do anything about this, but we should be concerned about this.
 
A “better outreach to gays” would entail
  • Clergy having the spine to teach to Catholics in general about the sexual issues, such as cohabitation, sex outside of marriage, and homosexual behaviors
  • Dioceses and Catholic universities offering the Courage apostolate, with parishes advertising such
Truthfully, I am tired of too many clergy being apologetic and pandering to gays, instead of teaching with charity and truth. Gays know what we believe, and if they choose to be offended by the teaching, and if they choose to not participate in the life of the Church, then so be it. We can pray for them.
However, for those with same sex attraction who do want to consider living the faith, the Church does need to acknowledge how difficult it is to be chaste, and to offer truthful and compassionate support by providing the Courage apostolate, which provides support for homosexuals striving to be chaste.
 
Luigi_Daniele said:
I am wondering if there has been a call for a special outreach to blasphemers? Adulterers? Liars? Those who dishonor their parents?

I am so tired of this act getting “most favored sin” status. sigh
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Good point.
 
quiet52 said:
A “better outreach to gays” would entail
  • Clergy having the spine to teach to Catholics in general about the sexual issues, such as cohabitation, sex outside of marriage, and homosexual behaviors
  • Dioceses and Catholic universities offering the Courage apostolate, with parishes advertising such
Truthfully, I am tired of too many clergy being apologetic and pandering to gays, instead of teaching with charity and truth. Gays know what we believe, and if they choose to be offended by the teaching, and if they choose to not participate in the life of the Church, then so be it. We can pray for them.
However, for those with same sex attraction who do want to consider living the faith, the Church does need to acknowledge how difficult it is to be chaste, and to offer truthful and compassionate support by providing the Courage apostolate, which provides support for homosexuals striving to be chaste.
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A lot of them don’t and a lot of Catholics don’t.
 
This makes me revert to "cast the first stone!"i have a friend who is gay. But he chooses in his life to be chaste.He is considering RCIA. I being a married Catholic (to my wife), find it admirable for him to see that the one Holy universal church would be willing to accept. His so called “stained heart” He says that to him being gay is some what like me being Irish raised Catholic but, not going to northern Ireland t o fight the Protestants. Hes a good soul! His blood is as red as mine and when you walk into your church our Lords open arms out stretched welcoming ALL OF US.I will continue to Pray forBLESSINGS AND PRAYERSto TO ALL…that those in his situation will come and be embraced by our Faith an Gods unendind lo ve for his children.
:console::bible1:
 
Amen.

For people will view the kind of false inclusivity and appeasement that the Church is doing today as endorsement of mortally sinful acts. And you can hardly blame them.
 
Sailor_Kenshin said:
Amen.

For people will view the kind of false inclusivity and appeasement that the Church is doing today as endorsement of mortally sinful acts. And you can hardly blame them.
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Give some examples of this " false inclusivity".
 
While I would never want homosexuals (or anyone) to feel hurt or marginalised by the Churchs teachings, we should not kid ourselves for one minute that anything other than a complete abandonment of Catholic sexual morality would be acceptable to homosexual activists.

We cannot abandon our sexual morality, as it is part of the truth.

Is it the truth that homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered (refer to human biology). For many people, this is a difficult and challenging truth. A hurtful truth, even. But it is not written anywhere that the truth must always be pleasant and easy to accept. Homosexuals know fine well the teaching is true, but moan about it nonetheless.

If we lie, then we have no credibility. So we are at an impasse essentially. The truth should never be relegated behing the feelings (or the arrogance) of anyone. Truth is what makes us free.

Ultimately, until homosexuals are mature enough to accept the reality of their sexuality - then there will be no fruitful engagement between the Chuch and them.

I dont think they will be mature enough any time soon, given the wide range of well-meaning idiots who rush to agree with them that our bodies mean nothing, human biology is meaningless and that our physical bodies and their functions suggest nothing about fundamental human sexuality.

In the meantime, they will continue to snipe and moan about “homophobia” etc -which is entirely fine by me.

Essentially, they seek to use the Catholic Church as a whipping boy, to create the illusion that all their problems are down solely to our opinion (i.e down to the truth). But in reality their problems come from being sexually attracted to the wrong gender, sexually attracted to people with whom their bodies are neither physically nor biologically compatible.

It is fruitless for them to moan at us - our opinion of homosexuality could only credibily change if human biology somehow changed.

Essentially, they take out their negative feelings on us, to vindicate themselves and feel better about themselves - at least for a while.

The best engagement the Church can have with homosexuals is to rigourously explain its teaching and use facts and statistics to demonstrate the negative pathologies of homosexuality (which is, for example, the main driving force of HIV in the developed world -western homosexual men now have worse HIV rates than even Africa).

There is no room for sentimentality or equivocation on any point relating to human nature.
 
GWright said:
We cannot abandon our sexual morality, as it is part of the truth.
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You do not have to, all you need to do is remember that there is more to Catholic morality than just sexual morality.

For example, you could approach a gay group saying, “We support your campaign against homophobic bullying.” That is in accordance with Catholic morality, and far more likely to gain acceptance from the gay group.

I suspect that it is this sort of thing that Bishop Dolan had in mind. There are many different possible ways to present all of Catholic morality. He is suggesting that you look for the most effective ways of doing so.

rossum
 
The problem with off the cuff remarks like Cardinal Dolan made is that the Churches opponents pick them up , twist them around and use them to attack the church. An example a homosexual “rights” advocate pushing to have the the Catholic Chaplain at GWU removed because he counseled homosexuals to remain celibate because, after all, the church is evolving on this issue and then she quotes Dolan to back up her assertion
 
There is always room for improving love for our neighbor. Unfortunately, what I read here is that somehow we should be ashamed that the Church’s teaching’s are offensive to some. Cardinal Dolan’s repeated apologies to the Gay community says it all. Let me say that most of these Gay community members have no intention of repenting and any same-sex attracted individual who is living a chaste life would be staying away from that crowd. Come on now. If I was a sex addict, the last place I want to be is in a singles bar. It is sad how our leadership is known for putting the hammer down on faithful Catholics for kneeling during communion or for wanting the Latin Mass, and being called RAD TRADS, but we should be sensitive to people who blatantly offend our Lord by their lifestyle.
 
jking1962 said:
There is always room for improving love for our neighbor. Unfortunately, what I read here is that somehow we should be ashamed that the Church’s teaching’s are offensive to some. Cardinal Dolan’s repeated apologies to the Gay community says it all. Let me say that most of these Gay community members have no intention of repenting and any same-sex attracted individual who is living a chaste life would be staying away from that crowd. Come on now. If I was a sex addict, the last place I want to be is in a singles bar. It is sad how our leadership is known for putting the hammer down on faithful Catholics for kneeling during communion or for wanting the Latin Mass, and being called RAD TRADS, but we should be sensitive to people who blatantly offend our Lord by their lifestyle.
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All of which leads to things like:
California Lawmakers: Accept LGBT lifestyle or lose tax exempt status
California lawmakers are considering taking tax exemptions away from youth groups that do not accept gay, transgender or atheist members.
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It’s a slippery slope…
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What next? Pedophile Pride?
 
Luigi_Daniele said:
I am wondering if there has been a call for a special outreach to blasphemers? Adulterers? Liars? Those who dishonor their parents?

I am so tired of this act getting “most favored sin” status. sigh
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As far as I have heard, there has not been a call for special outreach for any sin, and in fact, there has not been an identification of sin or anything about sin for the last 40 odd years. Nothing that would make the congregation feel “uncomfortable”, you know.:rolleyes: Just a few months ago our Pastor (and the Associate) talked about the real definition of marriage, and that intimate relationships are only to be had between one man and one woman…and people that are already married at that. Most of the congregation wanted to give them a standing ovation after the homily, but we all controlled ourselves.👍 A week or so after that there was a firestorm from a few of our parishioners, who were so angry they were practically shouting from the rooftops how “bigoted” those homilies were, etc, etc. How dare these priests call out people with “alternative” lifestyles. I do believe maybe one parishioner has already left the parish since, although I’m not positive.

The sin of sexually intimate homosexual relations is the one that the country is presently screaming about, and is the reason it is the focus of the Church’s attention at the present. But truthfully, parishioners are not accustomed to hearing anything from the pulpit that would make them feel uncomfortable about any sin because*** sin*** has been a taboo subject for far too long in our Church. The “kill them with kindness” philosophy has not exactly worked as we all have seen by dwindling parishes, and even some parish closings. Parish priests have not been preaching the fullness of truth in the past 40 odd years, and now that some of them have started to, they are seeing somewhat of a backlash. What’s the old saying?..once the milk has spilled, how do you get it back in the glass?
 
Teelynn said:
But truthfully, parishioners are not accustomed to hearing anything from the pulpit that would make them feel uncomfortable about any sin because*** sin*** has been a taboo subject for far too long in our Church. The “kill them with kindness” philosophy has not exactly worked as we all have seen by dwindling parishes, and even some parish closings. Parish priests have not been preaching the fullness of truth in the past 40 odd years, and now that some of them have started to, they are seeing somewhat of a backlash. What’s the old saying?..once the milk has spilled, how do you get it back in the glass?
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Or better known as the “pastoral approach”.
 
Teelynn said:
As far as I have heard, there has not been a call for special outreach for any sin, and in fact, there has not been an identification of sin or anything about sin for the last 40 odd years. Nothing that would make the congregation feel “uncomfortable”, you know.:rolleyes: Just a few months ago our Pastor (and the Associate) talked about the real definition of marriage, and that intimate relationships are only to be had between one man and one woman…and people that are already married at that. Most of the congregation wanted to give them a standing ovation after the homily, but we all controlled ourselves.👍 A week or so after that there was a firestorm from a few of our parishioners, who were so angry they were practically shouting from the rooftops how “bigoted” those homilies were, etc, etc. How dare these priests call out people with “alternative” lifestyles. I do believe maybe one parishioner has already left the parish since, although I’m not positive.

The sin of sexually intimate homosexual relations is the one that the country is presently screaming about, and is the reason it is the focus of the Church’s attention at the present. But truthfully, parishioners are not accustomed to hearing anything from the pulpit that would make them feel uncomfortable about any sin because*** sin*** has been a taboo subject for far too long in our Church. The “kill them with kindness” philosophy has not exactly worked as we all have seen by dwindling parishes, and even some parish closings. Parish priests have not been preaching the fullness of truth in the past 40 odd years, and now that some of them have started to, they are seeing somewhat of a backlash. What’s the old saying?..once the milk has spilled, how do you get it back in the glass?
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I had a similar experience with my Sister-upset with a priest whom gave a very “inappropriate” sermon just before the election. Turns out he was commenting on the problem of voting for candidates who supported unrestricted taxpayer funded abortion on demand and homosexual marriage. She said he shouldn’t be expressing his “opinions” from the Pulpit.
 
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