How can the church have a gay priest?

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This is my understanding of what our faith teaches.
  1. Yes, it is gravely disordered and should not be accpeted.
    2 Yes, it closes the gift of life to those involved, but since this man is a priest this is a moot point.
  2. Many people feel this way and feel compelled to this behavior.
  3. The priest or anyone else with these feelings or tendencies is called to prayer WITH GOD. As long as a person does not act on these tendencies they are not out of Communion with the faith or GOD and they should offer their sufferings up to GOD. When they offer their sufferings up to GOD they are called to perfection with GOD.
  4. If a person is formed in faith as I hope a priest is. He will realize the consequence of this behavior and know what to do about it. But since I am not GOD, I cannot judge this man. I know God will help him find a way if he seeks God. God loves us more and in more ways than I can ever imagine. So I know all things are possible with GOD.
  5. This priest as well as anyone else MUST remember by the words of Jesus to the disciples when asked how to pray to the Father, Jesus replied.
    Our Father who art in heaven… Thy will be Done.
    (not my will Lord, but yours)
    I hope this helps
    God’s Peace
 
Hello all,

I was surprised to see that in this old and now resurrected thread, the following instruction from the Vatican hasn’t been posted. The Vatican search engine is being updated, so here is the document from the Zenit site: zenit.org/article-14693?l=english
On Priesthood and Those With Homosexual Tendencies
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Instruction From Congregation for Catholic Education
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VATICAN CITY, NOV. 29, 2005 (Zenit.org).- Here is the text of the new Vatican instruction “Concerning the Criteria for the Discernment of Vocations with Regard to Persons with Homosexual Tendencies in View of Their Admission to the Seminary and to Holy Orders.”
…
Deep-seated homosexual tendencies, which are found in a number of men and women, are also objectively disordered and, for those same people, often constitute a trial. Such persons must be accepted with respect and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. They are called to fulfill God’s will in their lives and to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross the difficulties they may encounter.(8)
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In the light of such teaching, this dicastery, in accord with the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, believes it necessary to state clearly that the Church, while profoundly respecting the persons in question, cannot admit to the seminary or to holy orders those who practice homosexuality, present deep-seated homosexual tendencies or support the so-called "gay culture."(10)
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Such persons, in fact, find themselves in a situation that gravely hinders them from relating correctly to men and women. One must in no way overlook the negative consequences that can derive from the ordination of persons with deep-seated homosexual tendencies.
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Different, however, would be the case in which one were **dealing with homosexual tendencies that were only the expression of a transitory problem **-- for example, that of an adolescence not yet superseded. Nevertheless, such tendencies must be clearly overcome at least three years before ordination to the diaconate.
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I do hope that helps.

Obviously, there have been some priests with strong homosexual inclinations who were allowed to be ordained in the past. As someone said, their ordinations are valid. Hopefully, we are doing a better job of screening during the process of discernment.
 
Lighten up, already. We have had popes who were murderers, kept misteresses, raised illegitimate sons to church offices and all manner of other unsavory things. God did not put the church in the hands of angels; He left it with a batch of weak kneed, cowardly sinners. We have even gone so far as to work out a theology that says the ministry of such people is effective in terms of the grace imparted through the sacraments. Don’t worry about what is inevitable.

Matthew
 
drafdog said:
Lighten up, already. We have had popes who were murderers, kept misteresses, raised illegitimate sons to church offices and all manner of other unsavory things. God did not put the church in the hands of angels; He left it with a batch of weak kneed, cowardly sinners. We have even gone so far as to work out a theology that says the ministry of such people is effective in terms of the grace imparted through the sacraments. Don’t worry about what is inevitable.

Matthew
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To whom are you speaking?

For that matter…what in the world does the rest of your paragraph have to do with gay priests? What is it that is “inevitable?”
 
I am addressing anyone who is concerned about the inevitability of having a homosexual ordained a priest. The concern is that somehow this is shocking to the poor simple faithful. As I said in my earlier post, God left the church to us humans. We are not to be shocked by the fact that we are humans, and that a certain percentage of us are homosexuals. God made all of us. To forbid someone a sacrament because he is what God made him is just unconscionable. Even if the person is a “public and notorious sinner” the sacraments administered by such a priest are valid.
Stop being judgmental and get on with your own life.
Our own lives should consist of picking one another up, dust us off and helping us do better.

Matthew
 
jmcrae said:
As long as he is celibate, he is fine. Being gay is not a sin - only the actual act of sex outside of marriage, regardless of who with. Feelings are not sinful in and of themselves.
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Being ‘gay’ is not a sin? have you read what the Lord has to say about homosexuality?

Rom.1:18-32 will give you the answers you seek.
I don’t believe men or woman are born this way. We are created in the image of God. How we live our life is our choice.
Although men knew God they neither glorified him or gave thanks to him. They exchanged the glory of God and made him to look like mortal men or birds and animals and reptiles Verses.21-23.

"Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with onother. 25They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served things rather than the Creator "
You can read the rest of the story if you care to. 🙂

God bless,
jean8
 
jean8 said:
Being ‘gay’ is not a sin? have you read what the Lord has to say about homosexuality?

Rom.1:18-32 will give you the answers you seek.
I don’t believe men or woman are born this way. We are created in the image of God. How we live our life is our choice.
Although men knew God they neither glorified him or gave thanks to him. They exchanged the glory of God and made him to look like mortal men or birds and animals and reptiles Verses.21-23.

"Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with onother. 25They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served things rather than the Creator "
You can read the rest of the story if you care to. 🙂

God bless,
jean8
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Yes, indeed, how we live our life is our choice. And for a person with homosexual attraction to live a chaste life is the Godly choice, wouldn’t you say?

Homosexual or gay doesn’t have to mean actively gay.
 
jean8 said:
Being ‘gay’ is not a sin? have you read what the Lord has to say about homosexuality?
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He is referring to the act itself; not to the condition of having same-sex attraction.
Rom.1:18-32 will give you the answers you seek.
I don’t believe men or woman are born this way. We are created in the image of God. How we live our life is our choice.
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People are often born with disabilities - blindness, Down’s Syndrome, and many others - same-sex attraction is just one more condition that some people are born with. As long as they never act on it, they will be just fine - in the same way that a blind person will be just fine, as long as he never attempts to drive a car, or other activities more suitable for sighted people - we are all equal in dignity, but we are not all equally capable of all the same things.
 
jmcrae said:
He is referring to the act itself; not to the condition of having same-sex attraction.

People are often born with disabilities - blindness, Down’s Syndrome, and many others - same-sex attraction is just one more condition that some people are born with. As long as they never act on it, they will be just fine - in the same way that a blind person will be just fine, as long as he never attempts to drive a car, or other activities more suitable for sighted people - we are all equal in dignity, but we are not all equally capable of all the same things.
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Great post! Just wanted to add (for clarity) that, someone who HAS acted on same-sex attraction is always free to repent and approach the confessional for forgiveness.
 
PS: I know someone who is divorced and remarried, and we have a mutual acquaintance who is a lesbian. She asked me one time whether my attitude to our lesbian acquaintance is any different than my attitude towards herself (as a straight person) since my conversion to the Catholic faith.

I told her (truthfully) “I think you both have an equal chance of making it to heaven.”

:rolleyes: 😃
 
CatherineofA said:
I saw a priest or monk in the news who was supposedly known to be gay. This is my question: How can a man be in the church in this position and be allowed to stay? If he is acting in a way that conflicts with church teaching, why isn’t he let go?
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Individuals with same sex attraction are called to live the life of chastity and be pure. The sin of homosexual acts is condemned by the Catholic Church. The Church has never opposes individuals homosexuals just their action.

It is no different than heterosexual inidviduals who engages in the sin of fornication, which is a common practiced by today’s society. These acts are never morally correct or acceptible by the Church.

It is very possible for a monk who have sex attraction to join a religious order. So as long as they do not engage in sexual immortality. If they have can’t live up to that, they need to get out of the religious order and be a lay Catholic.

I encourages those with such attraction contact groups like “Courage.” Courage is founded by a former homosexual man and it’s recommended by many Catholic organization, who held orthodox views of the Magisterium.
 
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