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buzzcut
Guest
Those of you who live in Canada can see the Vision TV “Gay Priests” special rebroadcast tonight I think:
Vatican Document Forbidding Homosexuals to Priesthood Ready for Release
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JOHNYJ
Guest
The Bishops would like to blame the Scandal on Gays,but. They can’t the major offenders were pedophiles who went after young children.If you have the stomach you should read the trial reports. Also the FBI says the majority of child molesters in the USA are, HETROSEXUAL !
Was there some Gay stuff going on probably
.Not the majority though.
Now the $ 64 question what do you do with the celibate Gay priests we already have ?
You can’t throw them out of the priesthood.What bishop will take a priest that has done nothing wrong, and stick him in an office. When he is desperately short of priests .
Was there some Gay stuff going on probably
.Not the majority though.
Now the $ 64 question what do you do with the celibate Gay priests we already have ?
You can’t throw them out of the priesthood.What bishop will take a priest that has done nothing wrong, and stick him in an office. When he is desperately short of priests .
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fix
Guest
The majority of abuse cases involve pederasty. That is male homosexual priests and teenage boys. It is not about pedophiles which involve prepubescent children.
There are more homosexual abusers of underage children by percentage than there are heterosexual abusers and the links to these studies have been posted many times here.
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felra
Guest
I can’t believe that after all this time and subsequent studies/findings/analysis that some folks persist in promoting a myth. Duuhh!! Obviously this demostrates a selective screening of information (name removed by moderator)ut, or subscribing to or promoting an outright lie to support an already preconceived agenda/belief (whether on an individual or media conglomerate basis). Get the facts straight folks!
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fix
Guest
I know. I can’t believe it either. I have heard many blaming the media and I can agree the media are not pro Catholic, but that does not excuse all the other parties involved in the problem.
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contemplative
Guest
Did you watch the broadcast? What did you learn?
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Libero
Guest
I agree with many points, of course you cant just blame ‘the scandal’ on homosexual priests, this is just a myth. It can be briught back to any nuber of things, as said trying to promote an agenda, or find a way out of trouble, also what is to say a priest has not lied about their sexuality in a desperate attempt to lessen the trouble they are in? - If they can molest a young person, then surely they can lie.
Secondly, i cant find the whole scandal thing a real point in not ordaining homosexuals. The scandal happened quite a while ago now, and times have certainly changed, US bishops are using the one stirke method, or trying to if it weren’t for Romes intervention. Also this scandal affected mainly the US. The document in question will affect the global catholic church, not just america.
The real issue here is not the scandal.
Also i would agree with earlier statements where posters have said that the issue is about holiness and devotion to God. Who is to say that a homosexual can not practice chastity as well as a heterosexual, there is no real fact there. These i think are the main arguments. Other than a gay priest being extremely effeminate or camp how does sexuality effect ones ability as a priest. I really dont think the document and enforcement will make any difference.
Secondly, i cant find the whole scandal thing a real point in not ordaining homosexuals. The scandal happened quite a while ago now, and times have certainly changed, US bishops are using the one stirke method, or trying to if it weren’t for Romes intervention. Also this scandal affected mainly the US. The document in question will affect the global catholic church, not just america.
The real issue here is not the scandal.
Also i would agree with earlier statements where posters have said that the issue is about holiness and devotion to God. Who is to say that a homosexual can not practice chastity as well as a heterosexual, there is no real fact there. These i think are the main arguments. Other than a gay priest being extremely effeminate or camp how does sexuality effect ones ability as a priest. I really dont think the document and enforcement will make any difference.
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buzzcut
Guest
I did watch it. It was just unsubstantiated sensationalism, accompanied by a secularist commentary. Why am I not surprised.
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felra
Guest
Our sexuality pervasively affects all aspects of our personhood. God made us as sexual beings (male and female He made us). IMO, one’s ability as a priest is directly proportional to one’s ability to have healthy, life giving and receiving relationships–with God, with member’s of the flock, with fellow clergy–in the identity role of Father. The role of a priest is defined by Fatherhood, and assumes the same fatherhood identity and role as a married man’s fatherhood vocation, although different in scope, emphasis and expression.
I recall a vocation director’s statement that the best candidates for the priesthood are those men who are the best candidates for marriage. This resounds with common sense. I do not see how anyone can so easily discount, dismiss a man’s sexuality (sexual orientation, psychosexual development) as a primary consideration for priestly candidacy. I prefer a man with an ordered and well adjusted sexuality (heterosexual orientation/psychosexual identity) as a seminarian candidate/priest in order to be able to fully give and receive in the vocational capacity of Father.
**2332 ***Sexuality *affects all aspects of the human person in the unity of his body and soul. It especially concerns affectivity, the capacity to love and to procreate, and in a more general way the aptitude for forming bonds of communion with others. (CCC)
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Libero
Guest
Okay, I have aknowledged what you have written, but really it does not clear anything up for me, how does sexuality change ones ability to spread God’s teachings and the beliefs of the church? Is it really a determined fact that a man who is attractes to the same sex cannot make just as good a father as a heterosexual man. Also does the ability as a father really play that greater role, when thinking of the two priests at my parish i struggle to accept them as father like figures - namely because i dont think they are, whenever i have had to talk to them they have had great difficulty communicating with me, i think that it is the same with most of the youths at the church
I am having a few problems accepting that sexual orienatation effects ones ability as a priest just because the catechism says it does.
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felra
Guest
No one is perfect, we all suffer from the effects of original sin and a fallen world. With that said, I believe that why not have the most qualified candidates for the priesthood. Sexual identity/orientation is but one aspect of qualification, but, no denying, a most significant aspect if not properly ordered and maturely integrated into a seminarian’s psychosexual (personhood) identity. There are other spheres of assessment that a seminarian is evaluated to assist in the vocational discernment process. I hope that temperament, basic personality traits are likewise taken into consideration.
A priest does spread God’s teachings and beliefs, but also assumes the very priesthood of Jesus Christ, whereby Jesus continues to minister to His flock through the person of the priest. A priest’s imperfections do not nullify the validity of Christ ministry through the priest. However, Christ does have to work within the constitutional character and capacities of the priest. With this said, I believe that to the extent that a man posses a predominant, unresolved SSA, this poses a limitation to the extent that He can minister to the flock, simply because Christ (the perfect man) cannot occupy our flaws (imperfection). It is my understanding that Christ respects and most normally works within the limitations of the vessels that we currently are, and I believe that SSA is a needed criterion of qualification/fitness for the priestly ministry.
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Libero
Guest
Alright that really hasn’t made it any clearer to me i am afraid. I understand perhaps how a homosexual priests pesonal feelings about church teachings may differ from a heterosexual priests, and thus the priest may give more liberal sermons, less harsh on homosexuality etc. But that is all, as far as i am aware there is no definete fact that says that a homosexuals orientation can change the way that he thinks and his ability to make decisions etc, you said yourself that no one is perfect.
Okay, but like you said once again, there are far more important characteristics, which one would you prefer a priest with SSA or a priest who likes the thought of murder? It’s not really as if the priests sexual ability is being tested during his time as a clegy member, however his ability to be friendly, informative, educate and show people the true nature of God are being tested. Perhaps you could give me some examples of a situation where a homosexual priest would not be a good priest due to his sexual orientation.
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felra
Guest
A person’s sexuality (orientation, desire, psychosexual development) does not affect/influence their thoughts or perceptions or subjective decision making? I believe that you have not given this topic adequate thought.
Please do not misquote me–"**but like you said once again, there are far more important characteristics"-- **I never said or expressed this contention. Each priestly candidate needs to be individually assessed based on objective and qualitative criteria. From your logic of least common denominator, the Church has to choose between a murderer and a man afflicted with SSA for priestly candidacy? This all but supports my contention: Why should the Church have to settle for less, and for nothing but the best, in it’s screening of viable and qualified priestly candidates who feel called to the priesthood?
"It’s not really as if the priests sexual ability is being tested during his time as a clegy member, …" …Hello? …again, you seem to have not thoroughly considered the reality of the priestly vocation. A man upon ordination to the priesthood does not suddenly check out his sexuality (orientation, desire, psychosexual maturity) and become asexual, or non-sexual. Priests, like the rest of us, in their vocation have to devleop the virtue of chastity and manage the challenges of living a celibate life. You, like too many others, are guilty of naiively trying to segregate a man’s sexuality from the ministry and vocation of priesthood, as if it does not exist, or is a non-significant aspect of their personage.
"Perhaps you could give me some examples of a situation where a homosexual priest would not be a good priest due to his sexual orientation."…this is what the vocation directors responsible for screening seminarian candidates should have been asking themselves rather than overlooking/ignoring SSA as an intergral area/aspect of assessment for qualification/fitness for priesthood.
My question to you: Do you consider SSA to be a disordered desire and a symptom of an underlying psychological disorder?
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Libero
Guest
So in that case do you think that sexual orientation is the most important factor in choosing ordination candidates, if so what are you on? I used the example of the murderer etc, as an example, slightly off the point.
But its not really like we have perfect candidates begging to join the priesthood, is it?
I thought you said once that we all have flaws, the church accepts this, they do not ask for nothing but the best, and i would hope that they dont start to.
Who is to say that a homosexual is not equally as capable of acheiving this voyage of leading a chaste life. That a heterosexual could find it far easier is complete rubbish. I would put it to you, that you ike so many others have a flase stereotypical view of homosexuals being incapable of rejecting sexual desire, and of the homosexual person in general.
That is not answering what i asked for, can you not back up your point of view with any real examples?
Yes i would consider SSA to be a disordered desire, but i think that homosexuals are capable of rejecting it. I also think that heterosexuals have disordered desires, they will have desires for women, lustful feelings just as homosexuals do, but they are feelings in both cases, people can reject their feelings woith determination and devotion to God. I would also say that I think SSA can be influenced by a number of factors such as uprbringing and experiences throughout childhood. I would not consider SSA to be a symptom of an underlying psychological desire.
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felra
Guest
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felra
Guest
First you try with misquoting me, now you expect me to seriously respond when you attempt to draw erroneous conclusions/assumptions as to that I am thinking? Your poor example is not the only thing “slightly off the point”.
God does not call “perfect” candidates to the priesthood. But each and every candidate must subject themselves to the Church to discern fitness for the priesthood as part of their vocational discernment process. The priesthood is not a right of individuals.
Again, you (and too many other folks) want to settle for less that the best and adequately qualified men for seminarian candidates. Why is this?
The reason that the Church scandals are such an issue is because priests with a homosexual orientation have been unfaithful to their vows and have preyed upon adolescent boys. There are plenty of other CA threads that document the sexual behaviors that SSA males are more prone to than men with a heterosexual orientation. Consider this: Which causes more scandal and overall damage to the Church—a priest with a heterosexual or homosexual orientation who violates his vows of celibacy? Be honest now.
In all due respect, but are you in denial? If the formation directors had been asking the right questions and screening out seminarian candidates with predominately SSA, there would be no sex scandal in the Church. Need I remind you of the untold emotional, psychological, spiritual and financial anguish and costs to the Church as result of this?
Lust is not a disordered desire, it is s sinful desire, i.e., giving one’s mind over to a sinful extension of an* ordered* heterosexual desire or a disordered homosexual desire. Note the distinction that you fail to make. I would refer to the excellent web site www.narth.com to become better informed on the etiology, causal factors, and reparative treatment approaches for those afflicted with SSA.
Question: What compassion do you have to offer someone (priest or otherwise) who must carry the cross of a disordered desire, other than to just “reject” it. This sounds utterly insensitive to me. Do you not realize that this person with a SSA at some level of awareness is struggling with an internal conflict? You would do yourself (and the Church) a favor to instead invest your energies on educating yourself on the complexities and struggles of SSA, rather than making the case for ushering into the priesthood those afflicted with SSA.
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Libero
Guest
Okay, firsty i think you’re getting a little too personal, don’t take it to far, i probably have, but i apologise for that.
Secondly, i actually do not consider a priest to be second best because they have SSA, i am sure that many priests with SSA are far more inspiring than some other heterosexual priests. You talk of qualification, then ask yourself this, does the church turn down an extremely clever theologian with many qualifications, because they have SSA. When we very well know that this person is capable of leading a celibate life? I would not consider a persons sexuality to be a good qualifying factor. Everyone is unique, we must assess people individually, by their personal qualities, not just by their sexual orientation.
Question: What compassion do you have to offer someone (priest or otherwise) who must carry the cross of a disordered desire? Would you say the same as I have written, or would you emphasise more on other parts of the SSA condition?
Secondly, i actually do not consider a priest to be second best because they have SSA, i am sure that many priests with SSA are far more inspiring than some other heterosexual priests. You talk of qualification, then ask yourself this, does the church turn down an extremely clever theologian with many qualifications, because they have SSA. When we very well know that this person is capable of leading a celibate life? I would not consider a persons sexuality to be a good qualifying factor. Everyone is unique, we must assess people individually, by their personal qualities, not just by their sexual orientation.
That is not true, this was mentioned earlier in the post, there a plenty of heterosexual priests who have done terrible things as well, including child molestation, also there are plenty of homosexual prisets who have done nothing but perform well as a priest, and now they are being branded people who caused the scandal. That is a scapegoat and completely unfair. It is not homosexual priests who caused the scandal, it is unfaithful priests, there is not much more to it.
That depends, the heterosexual could be breaking vows to a young girl, the homosexual could be breaking vows to a person his age, in that case the heterosexual. I think that just a priest who breaks vows causes damage anyway, how much depends on the society we live in, what is accepted in that society etc.
Of course i realise the anguish that people with SSA go through, I know people who have gone through that struggle. I tell them that God feels the same amount of love for them as he does for everyone else, that he forgives all sins and that the reward shall be great for living their life by Gods laws.
That is not what I am trying to do, I am merely trying to show that i feel that people with SSA are just as suitable for the priesthood as heterosexual people.
Question: What compassion do you have to offer someone (priest or otherwise) who must carry the cross of a disordered desire? Would you say the same as I have written, or would you emphasise more on other parts of the SSA condition?
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felra
Guest
Note: First attempt by this poster to lure me into a defensive posture by claiming that I have been “getting a little too personal”. This usually indicates that someone is beginning to lose the factual basis for his or her argumentation. Let me guess, next comes accusations/labels of being angry, aggressive, hyper-conservative, intolerant, …
You are mixing apples and oranges. Candidacy for *religious *vocation, versus qualifications for lay vocation.
You overtly contradict yourself here. You can’t have it both ways. Either you acknowledge that human beings are created as sexual beings or not. You come across as wanting to have you cake and eat it too, i.e., arguing from the premise that men are created as sexual beings and then not as sexual beings, whatever suits your argument.
Of course the sex scandal is about priests who have been unfaithful to living chaste lives in their vows to celibacy. However, the vast majority of abuse has been homosexual predation by priests against adolescent males. It is very curious and alarming that someone claiming to be a faithful Catholic (correct me if I am assuming too much here) would seek to obfuscate the facts by subsuming the priest sex scandal into a matter of “unfaithfulness” and all together claim foul when it is pointed out that the sex scandal is predominately a phenomenon and issue of homosexual predation. The veneer cover of your homosexual apologist is wearing very thin on this thread. I can only feel very bad for the victims, families and parishioners of this sex scandal when they hear pronouncements like yours that seek to sweep under the carpet the cause of so much suffering and scandal in the Church. Shame on you. :tsktsk:
This is a scary response. Simply what type of relativistic based social engineering are you referring to?
You have certainly made the case what you feel, but your factual and argumentative basis appears full of holes to me (as I have attempted to point out).
The only compassion that I have to offer someone in carrying their personal cross is the compassion of Jesus Christ as found in the fullness of the Gospels.
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Libero
Guest
Okay, i think it is a shame that you think i am beginnig to back out, and fail to accept my apology. I am merely saying that this is not some war where one person should come out victorious with their point of view, but rather what is supposed to be a civilised conversation realying ones opinions without having to prove them with fact. I fully acknowledge your point of view, and would rather that I did not have to pick holes in your argument as has been done to me, but it seems like I am left with no choice. I have no intention of getting aggressive, and hurling accusations of being hyper-conservative, intolerant. If the conversation were to come to that i would simply leave the thread. I think there is perhaps some slight misconception of who i am, I hope you do not have me branded as that type of person, but i am slightly doubtful.
If you feel that I have not adequately provided fact, then you are probably right, I did not think fact would be that essential, however i am slightly unsure of what parts of your argument are defienetly fact. Just highlight them if you want, you dont need to take a defensive stance and argue against me.
Sorry dont really understand what you mean here. My aim in this thread was to show that i consider homosexuals to be equally as capable of being a priest as heterosexuals, I point out here that personally i do not think that a persons sexuality plays that bigger part. - there is no need to try and prove me wrong here, i know your opinion.
I am just disapointed at your response here. I think you have completely misunderstood me (feel free to correct me if you think i am wrong). Of course I feel bad for those poor people involved in the scandal, however we cannot permenantly dwell on the past, we must try and move forward (please note that I am not trying to sweep anything under the carpet). I am upset that you choose to point out that I may not be a faithful catholic you did not assume too much, I cerrtainly did not expect another catholic to be arguing against my belief. My aim here was to try and make sure that the scandal was not blaimed on homosexual people, I do not aim to insult or upset others. If you intended to bring shame and bad feelings upon me, then congratulations you have suceeded, parts of this this forum was far different to what I naiveely expected a christian chat room to be like.
If you wish me to answer this then please rephrase I am only just fifteen and have a bit of trouble getting the meaning of your message here.
If you feel that I have not adequately provided fact, then you are probably right, I did not think fact would be that essential, however i am slightly unsure of what parts of your argument are defienetly fact. Just highlight them if you want, you dont need to take a defensive stance and argue against me.
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felra
Guest
This entire post sounds like an emotional plea to disengage from a substantial discussion on a most important Church topic. I would hope that participants on this Catholic discussion forum would engage the issues, be able to defend their opinions put forth, especially when they touch on issues central to the faith (age aside). Otherwise, we each become our own authority, which is why their are so many problems in the Church over those laity and religious who express their “opinions” as if they are authoritative.
A question for you regarding your stated position on another thread of similiar topic:
Re: Why so many “gay marriage” posts?
What change in the Papal view towards homosexuality would you like to see put forward?
As a point of reference, this is what the official teaching of the Church has stated regarding homosexuality:
“Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.” They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.” (CCC 2357)
“The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God’s will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.” (CCC 2358)
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