Recently on the blogsite of America magazine, James Martin, S.J., listed all the things that gay people “are not to do according to the teaching of the [Roman Catholic] church.” They include: Enjoy romantic love, marry, adopt a child, enter a seminary, and work for the church and be open.
Martin also notes that gay people in the church are frequently reminded that they are “objectively disordered,” and that their sexuality is “a deviation.”
He concludes his piece with the following:
Taken together, [all of this] raises an important pastoral question for all of us: What kind of life remains for these brothers and sisters in Christ, those who wish to follow the teachings of the church? Officially at least, the gay Catholic seems set up to lead a lonely, loveless, secretive life. Is this what God desires for the gay person?
Although the points Martin raises are important, I’m nevertheless disappointed that he makes no attempt to offer answers to the critical questions he poses. There’s also no acknowledgment that the “teachings of the church” regarding homosexuality are discerned by many Catholics - both gay and straight - as being at odds with the gospel message. Indeed, after often long and difficult journeys of discernment, many in good conscience dissent from these teachings and trust instead their own experience of God mediated in and through their lives and relationships.
All of this reminds me of a commentary entitled “Untouchable” that Ned O’Gorman had published last December in Commonweal:
There is a place where even the liberal Catholic press fears to tread. The relative lack of serious discussion about homosexual desire casts into spiritual darkness a tribe of believing Catholic men and women who must fend for themselves in their quest for a serene emotional life, for companionship, and for the comfort of sexual love. For “the teaching church,” the subject is untouchable.
. . . as it largely appears also for Martin, who only questions the “teaching church,” but offers no direct critique, counter arguments, or alternatives.
O’Gorman continues:
There are few intellectuals, lay or clerical, who will take it on, for it is risky to bring into the public forum the notion that there are Catholics who practice their faith with diligence and who love those of their own sex and have known the joy of that love.
As O’Gorman notes, he is one such Catholic, one who has “discovered that such a love is easy to bear, complete, and holy.”
I contend that of those gay Catholics who remain within the Roman expression of Catholicism, most would resonate with – or at least concur with – O’Gorman’s experience. They consciously live their lives – their relational lives – in ways that continually reveal God’s loving and transforming presence. And this journey is undertaken and celebrated regardless of what the clerical leadership of the church insists should or shouldn’t be done.
The lives and stories of such gay Catholics are out there. They are lives and stories of Catholics who know exactly what needs to be done in the face of the prohibitions set forth by the church’s clerical caste. I wish James Martin had drawn from these lives and stories when writing his piece for America.
And I wish he would have drawn from his own experience as a Catholic Christian and responded to the question: Is a lonely, loveless, secretive life what God desires for the gay person?
My response to such a question is unequivocal: Of course it’s not.
Fullness of Life
Jesus came to embody and model a way of living and being in the world that leads to fullness of life. God does not will anyone to “lead a lonely, loveless, secretive life.” It’s a lie to tell a gay person that such a life is the special cross that God wills them to bear. Yet this is what many are told by some in the church. But it’s a lie. It is not God’s will.
God desires us to be full human beings, willing and able to give and receive love. Gay people, like their straight counterparts, can and do experience the giving and receiving of love through sexual relationships marked by justice, wholeness, and this life-transforming and, yes, life-giving sharing of love. The Church as the people of God has for centuries been growing in ever-greater awareness of this truth. Yet the vast majority of those males who comprise the clerical, celibate caste of the Roman Catholic Church have not. And the question has to be asked: Why?
The central problem
My own view is that many (perhaps even a majority) of bishops and priests are closeted (and psycho-sexually stunted) gay men who do not want healthy, well-adjusted gay people in their midst. Such people pose a highly uncomfortable challenge to all forms of unhealthy and dysfunctional expressions of sexuality. In a similar way, the vast majority of male clerics have a stunted and dysfunctional connection with women – so much so that they fear them gaining any kind of equality in ministry.
In short, most men in positions of power within Roman Catholicism fear relating with anyone who has grown beyond the dysfunction that, in large measure, justifies and sustains the entire clerical, celibate caste system within which men are prevented from growing, changing . . . and, yes, loving in a truly Christ-like way.
Author James Baldwin says it best:
I think the inability to love is the central problem, because the inability masks a certain terror, and that terror is the terror of being touched. And, if you can’t be touched, you can’t be changed. And if you can’t be changed, you can’t be alive. The great difficulty is to say YES to life. The difficult quest is to be oneself, to be true, to say YES with courage – to accept one’s sexuality, one’s race, one’s bittersweet contradictions.*
Think about the church’s prohibition against any type of sexual connecting outside of procreative sex within heterosexual marriage sanctioned by the church – a prohibition that even includes masturbation. At it’s most basic level, it’s a prohibition against touch – human touch that can potentially lead to greater self-awareness, personal development, and fullness of life.
I think centuries ago, church leaders recognized and began to fear the power of sexual touch. Such touch is transforming; it has the potential, yes, for harm, but also for liberation and empowerment. I wouldn’t be surprised if many of the strict sexual prohibitions within the Christian church came about during what Harvey Cox has termed the “Age of Belief,” that time when Christianity “curdled into a top-heavy edifice defined by obligatory beliefs enforced by a hierarchy.”
Cox maintains that, in contrast, early Christians allowed for multiple understandings and expressions of the faith, so much so, I’d add, that even the “gay saints” Sergius and Bacchus were acknowledged and accepted. Yet once Christianity moved from being “a loose network of local congregations, with varied forms of leadership” into a “rigid class structure with a privileged clerical caste at the top ruling over an increasingly disenfranchised laity on the bottom,” all kinds of changes began to take place. And women, along with those whom we now understand as gay, where no doubt the first to be “pushed to the underside and the edges.”
We’ve inherited quite a problem, haven’t we?
Still, our God is a God of transformation. People – and institutions – can and do change. Life remains a precious gift – full, it’s true, of “bittersweet contradictions,” of joy and suffering, pleasure and pain. It’s both “tree of life” and “cross of death.” So when a gay person is unlucky in love, when he/she experiences, for instance, heartache over a failed relationship, it’s wrong to blame his/her sexual orientation. It’s erroneous to imply that the homosexual orientation guarantees such unhappiness and failure; that a homosexual orientation is the mark of a broken sexuality. Yet these types of things are exactly what the clerical leadership of the Church says. It says that as gay people we can never be fulfilled and happy; we can never experience God’s sanctifying love in our sexual relationships. These are all lies. If you take nothing else, dear reader, from this blog, take this: Those types of statements, that type of thinking . . . lies, all lies.
Why stay?
One reason I choose to remain in the Roman Catholic Church is to identify and refute such lies. For me, these untruths are such a grievous affront to the life and teachings of Jesus that I simply cannot remain silent.
Increasingly, the question for me is not “What should I do as a gay Catholic?,” but rather “How best can I do what I know I must do as a gay Catholic?”
And what exactly must I do?
Well, it’s really not that much different from what we are all called to do. I am to bear humble yet firm witness to God’s loving and transforming presence in my life and relationships as a human being – a human being who happens to be gay. I also feel called to bear witness to what I experience of God in the lives and relationships of other people – gay people included.
I believe that all of this means that our seeking of and attuning to God’s presence in real human lives must come before unquestioning adherence to traditions and doctrines uninformed by and unresponsive to this same sacred presence mediated in and through human experience. As I’ve noted previously, love trumps tradition; and conscience, informed by God’s presence in the depths of our being, trumps doctrine developed by others unmindful of our reality and of God’s presence in our lives.
I don’t do any of this simply for myself but for the ongoing development of both the church and humanity. I believe the honest sharing of who we are and of God’s presence in our lives and relationships is not only needed for the continued shaping of our theology – our collective way of talking about God – but for our healing from centuries of fear and ignorance, and the terrible things – the violent and debilitating things – that such fear and ignorance has inflicted upon all of us. Homophobia and sexism do not only harm gay people and women, but, in many ways, heterosexuals and men as well. We all need healing.
Perhaps the following excerpt from Part 5 of my semi-autobiographical series The Journal of James Curtis will clarify what I mean. In this particular excerpt James recounts a conversation with a Roman Catholic womanpriest named Cathie.
“But aren’t you all excommunicated?” I asked. “I mean, this system you want to be part of doesn’t accept you. Why be part of it?”
Cathie looked at me intently.
“James,” she said softly, “does this system accept you as a gay man? You know it doesn’t, and yet you stay; you want to be part of it. Why?
I was lost for words.
“We stay, James, you and I, because we believe we have something to give to the Church. The Church would be incomplete with out us. One of my mentors is an old Native American woman, and in her culture they have the idea of ‘medicine’ – of healing insight and be-ing that brings wholeness to individuals and the community. I believe with all my heart that our dear Church, our spiritual community, is terribly sick, profoundly unhealthy, and that it’s people like us, people whom those in positions of power dismiss and ‘excommunicate,’ who carry within them the medicine that’s needed to make the Church well, to make it whole. That’s why I stay, James. Not to be part of a sick and dysfunctional system, but because I’m a medicine bearer, as are you. And we’re called to be part of the healing, part of this wonderful movement of the Spirit that is happening all around us. But we have to be within the system to facilitate the healing.”
Of course, I’m well aware that the clerical leadership of the Roman Catholic Church has a near-obsessive compulsion to dismiss, malign, and deny the lives and relationships of gay people, and accordingly the transforming and healing presence of God that they contain for all of us. If there is anything that could be understood as the “cross” that gay Catholics must bear, it’s this willful degradation by the clerical leadership of our lives and our relationship with self, others, and God.
Recently there was a news story about the Vatican’s views on the possibility of life on other planets. In contemplating the idea of God creating alien life forms, Jose Gabriel Funes, a Jesuit priest, astronomer, and the director of the Vatican Observatory said: “We cannot put limits on God’s creative freedom.”
Yet this is exactly what the clerical leadership of the Church does when it comes to human sexuality; when it declares as infallible its current (and limited) understanding of the meaning and purpose of sexuality and its expression. Indeed, it would seem that those who comprise the clerical leadership would be more comfortable with alien life forms than with their gay neighbors here on earth!
Reform and Renewal
I’m fortunate to be part of a number of local groups that are working to make a difference in the lives of Catholics – gay and straight – who are deeply troubled by the disconnects between the hierarchical church’s views, policies, and practices concerning homosexuality and the gospel message of love. Together, we’re working to identify these disconnects and to articulate alternative policies and practices that embody a church that radiates Jesus’ core teaching of radical equality, unabashed inclusivity, and transforming love. We will not be silent; we are not leaving.
I’m well aware, however, that not all gay people are able to remain in the abusive environment that the church has become as a result of the attitudes and actions of its clerical leadership. Part of me recognizes that for many people – especially women and gay people – the healthiest thing to do, both emotionally and spiritually, is to cease participating in the Roman expression of Catholicism. Indeed, I know many gay people who have found a loving and accepting spiritual home elsewhere, for example in the Episcopal Church or in the Old Catholic Church.
I can’t say for sure that one day I may not join the mass exodus of people from the Roman Catholic Church, but for now I’m committed to staying and continuing working with others to bring about reform and renewal. This blog is part of that effort, as is my work with the Catholic Pastoral Committee on Sexual Minorities (CPCSM), the Progressive Catholic Voice, and the Catholic Coalition for Church Reform.
The King’s Outlaw
I’ve often thought that if ever I was to write an autobiography of my life as a gay Catholic I’d entitle it “The King’s Outlaw.” It’s a title that reflects certain medieval and courtly concepts so beloved by “traditionalists.” But that’s not why I’m drawn to it.No, “The King’s Outlaw” was the English title given to a French television series (Thierry La Fronde) that I remember watching as a child in Australia. And yes, Jean-Claude Drouot who played the outlaw in this Robin Hood-type tale was a very handsome guy indeed in my little gay boy eyes!
I choose this title because it sums up well my relationship with the church – and with God. You see, I believe that although I’m definitely outside the “laws” as promulgated by the church’s clerical leadership, I remain nevertheless in the “king’s”, i.e., God’s loving embrace as I strive to live a life of consciousness, compassion, integrity and, yes, chastity, i.e., purity of heart.
The current pope and the majority of bishops may mean well, but I believe that when it comes to matters of human sexuality they’ve betrayed the gospel message. As James Martin and others have clearly shown, there is no good news for gay people in the discriminatory ideology that the Vatican attempts to pass off as sexual theology. Indeed, there’s not much good news for any of us. And so, given where the hierarchical church is at in terms of its sexual theology, I’m well aware that I stay as an outlaw, a dissenter. And that’s okay.
Of course, I’ve been accused of trying to “destroy the church” - by which I believe is really meant a certain (limited) way of understanding the church. I’m not interested in destruction, but rather transformation – my own, the church’s, and the world’s. That’s ultimately what I live for. And that’s why I remain a gay Catholic in a far from perfect church.
* James Baldwin, from an interview first published in The Advocate and excerpted in the Utne Reader, July/August 2002, p. 100.
See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
Getting It Right
The Many Manifestations of God’s Loving Embrace
Gay People and the Spiritual Life
The Gifts of Homosexuality
The Many Forms of Courage (Part 1)
The Many Forms of Courage (Part 2)
The Many Forms of Courage (Part 3)
Be Not Afraid, You Can Be Happy and Gay
Trusting God’s Generous Invitation
Hypocrisy, Ignorance, Promiscuity, and the Love that is the Center of Catholic Christianity
Compassion, Christian Community, and Homosexuality
Celebrating Our Sanctifying Truth
A Catholic Presence at Gay Pride
A Catholic Voice for Marriage Equality at the State Capitol
What Is It That Ails You?
The “Ratzinger Letter” of 1986 as “Theological Pornography”
Staying on Board
Choosing to Stay
The Challenge to Become Ourselves
No Matter What
Recommended Off-site Links:
The Catholic Church’s Judas Kiss - Terence Weldon (Queering the Church, November 14, 2009).
More on the Judas Kiss: What is a Gay Catholic to Do? - Terence Weldon (Queering the Church, November 15, 2009).
The Conversation Centrist Catholics Do Not Intend to Have: What Are the Gays to Do? - William D. Lindsey (Bilgrimage, November 14, 2009).
The Conversation Centrist Catholics Do Not Intend To Have, Continued - William D. Lindsey (Bilgrimage, November 16, 2009).
What Should Gay Catholics Do May Not Mean Just Chaste Suffering in the Closet - Colleen Kochivar-Baker (Enlightened Catholicism, November 15, 2009).
Opening image: Michael J. Bayly.
Michael, thank you for a thoughtful and helpful discourse on your own response to the questions posed by Fr Martin. I too was disappointed that he did not attempt to answer his won question, but perhaps there was no need. I have been astonished and impressed by the extent and depth the discussion in the ensuing comments, and on how freely this has been picked up and repeated elsewhere. Much of the comments of course, simply repeated the tired old platitudes, but some showed real compassion and sensitivity. It may well be that, taken together with other pieces elsewhere, Fr Martin is at least beginning the process you note has up to now been missing - an open discussion of the problem.
ReplyDeleteJames Alison recently predicted that it would have to come, and quite soon. The discussion as you know has been ongoing for years in progressive circles, on gay blogs, and by professional theologians. It had to reach the mainstream sooner or later: perhaps we can now encourage that migration.
(Thank you for recommending my two posts - even though they were nowhere as thoughtful and informative as your own)
I concur completely with all of the sentiments that you expressed so beautifully and sincerely, Michael! :)
ReplyDeleteAs the bishops begin their annual meeting here in Baltimore, and prepare once again to draw up a not so surprisingly expected list of condemnations against current expressions of human sexuality (particularly homosexuality) it is useful to reflect and remind ourselves what our true purpose is within the Church when we are constantly denied our integrity, dignity, and equality as human beings.
As you noted, it is simply to be gentle agents of transformation. However long and arduous the process might take is not the matter at hand, we must simply continue to be witness of the Lord Jesus' all-encompassing, unconditional life for all individuals and His disdain for doctrines that were written not for humankind's benefit but to increase and ease the egos and consciences of those who wrote them, those who were in power. His words to these self-righteous, uncompassionate individuals are clear, "Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written, 'This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me; in vain do they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men.' You leave the commandment of God, and hold fast the tradition of men!" - Mark 7:6-8
It would be nice if the bishops could come to terms with these words of the Lord this year at their summit, but alas, that is probably hoping for too much... =/
Yesterday for us here in Baltimore was a joyous day as it was the 50th Anniversary of the dedication of the Cathedral of Mary our Queen, which is also the parish my mother and I have chosen as our spiritual home and in which were confirmed and welcomed into communion with the Roman Catholic Church in 2007 by Cardinal William Keeler. Archbishop O'Brien celebrated a beautifully, splendid Eucharistic Liturgy and delivered quite a good homily. However, he did manage to get the "marriage" issue in there at one point....
PART 2
ReplyDeleteI had considered writing a letter to the Archbishop detailing to him my life and experiences as a gay, Catholic to better provide him with a perspective of this sector of "disordered" individuals that he and other prelates see as destroying "the family," the central unity of human society.
However, in light of the especially tepid climate within the Church, my mother cautioned me against this. Noting that how I'm just preparing to be a Eucharistic Minister, this probably would not be a good move. Even though it's absurd to imagine the Archbishop going through a witch-hunt just to remove a single person who wasn't afraid to embrace their sexuality, in spite of the Church's teaching, and was simply trying to follow the Lord as sincerely as they could, I knew, as I thought about it more and more, that the notion is contrary to several realities which have transpired within the Church. Look at the investigation of women religious here in the U.S. and the firing of any church ministers who support marriage equality. All of this, regrettably, as serving the Church should never put one in a position of fear, has made me consider how, or even if I should reveal to others my sexuality and what effect it would have on my attendance at the parish. I already know few people there as it is. On the one hand, I've thought that this could be my small way of opening the eyes of countless individuals to a way of acceptance and tolerance. On the other hand, I've thought that if I expressed my sexuality to anyone it could lead to my downfall, and ultimate condemnation and forced dismissal from the parish which I love so much with all my heart! Still, I wish I could express my sentiments to the Archbishop of what it's really like to be a gay Catholic, because I really don't think he, or many of the other prelates have any idea of what every day experience really entails, because they haven't been given an opportunity to grasp the perspective. I've even considered writing anonymously, but even then, it's probably not a good idea... :( It pains me to see that things within the Church have deteriorated to such a state!
PART 3
ReplyDeleteI really hadn't intended to say this much but I just want to express one more thing about what you said. A phobia of embracing the phenomenon of touch was indeed something that became prevalent and even embedded throughout the Church's theology. So much so that Holy Communion was restricted from the hands of the faithful and only allowed to be administered to individuals on the tongue, by the priest, the esteemed liaison between God and men. But luckily, at the Second Vatican Council, the Church analyzed this practice, and understood that if the Word Incarnate would come to dwell bodily in the womb of the Blessed Virgin and assume our flesh, and go forth to heal and cure all those who were incapacitated or disenfranchised, how much greater would it be for the faithful to receive the living God, present in the most Blessed Sacrament, in the loving immediacy of their own palms?
Being celibate men, the sense of touch, is something that so many priests and prelates of the Church have unfortunately missed out on. The sense of touch is something that confirms our very humanity. And the romantic expression of intimacy, of love, is especially meaningful and even evocative of the Divine. I'll never forget the first time I cuddled with a guy. As I rested my head upon his chest it felt like the most primordial feeling in the world, as if we were the only two people on the planet. Yet, at the same time, I got the feeling that God was looking upon us with approval, evoking in my mind the passage from Genesis when it speaks of the Spirit of God hovering over the uncreated waters of the devoid mass that would become the earth.
Hearing another's heartbeat next to mine, as Madonna would proclaim so simply for all time in "Like a Virgin", resting in the peaceful security and warmth of another's arms, being immersed in the beautiful fragrance of another man, all of these things confirmed in my mind that there was nothing "disordered" about my condition. Although my relationship with this particular man, regrettably, didn't really move anywhere, they were the most intimate moments I've ever spent with another guy and they've opened my eyes to what a loving, passionate, fulfilling romantic relationship between two guys can look like.
Perhaps if the bishops somehow caught a glimpse of this perspective maybe they would not see homosexuality as a deviated, disordered, condition from the original heterosexuality that they think God has intended for all, but an alternate, beautiful expression of God's creativity and diversity?
I too have continued to "identify" as RC because I feel called to minister to those who otherwise might not receive what I'm fortunate to bring to their hospital bedside - as a volunteer Communion Minister. I will continue to do that. In that sense I am engaged in a healing ministry. In my quiet way I break the rules. Just as Jesus did. In the service of this healing ministry.
ReplyDeleteAt the same time, more and more I am in anguish. For I am torn between "leaving" in solidarity with gay persons and others, who are excluded in so many ways. This morning I wrote about that in an email to a gay Catholic:
"For me, this recent need on the part of Australia to apologize for horrific abuse of children (immigrant waifs from Britain) has sent me over the edge. I am hanging on with my fingernails to the good people and the good spiritual traditions within the church. That is with one hand. The other hand is nearly withered from bearing all the pain and suffering done to people like you - and others - in the name of those of us, who nevertheless repudiate such behavior. I truly feel like Jesus on the cross here - holding onto two totally opposite "realities" - sin of the worst type and LOVE/HOPE/REPENTANCE." [I would now add HEALING.]
I have to say - I feel impaled on this cross. I would not "leave" unless from deep inside I feel a clear calling elsewhere. But, damn, I'm tired of this cross!
In some ways, and this may surprise you, it's almost harder "not being gay" and remaining in the church at this moment. It's like when you have a relative with a grave illness. Being a bystander is almost worse than being the patient. Watching someone's suffering - it's like watching torture. That's how it feels to me. I can hardly bear it.
Beautiful, Michael, and very much needed- thank you.
ReplyDeleteThat was excellent, Michael, but also in a way, painful to read. It just filled me with such sadness to read some of what you had to say. I was surely touched by what you said about touch. And I was moved by you saying of how you strive to live a life of consciousness, compassion, integrity, chastity and purity of heart. In a way I am tring to live such a life also. I was in another conversation and the man said that he considered gay people (he used the term sodomites) to be children of the devil. He said that we needed a new Inquisition in the Church. It makes me think of when I was a teen. I was a chaste virgin. I didn't even think about having sex with anyone. In truth, I never was picked on as I never had a bad word to say about anyone. I was treated with respect. I actually had no peer pressure when I was a teen. I knew nothing about the Church's teachings on homosexuality but since I didn't really have a strong awareness of my orientation perhaps it didn't matter. But when I think of the inner goodness and purity of heart that I had as a teen I am filled with anger when I hear lies about people being disordered, intrinsically evil, etc. How could I have been evil in my innocence? What is our Church doing to its gay teens today? They tell them that same sex marriage is evil but when many teens were sexually used by priests, this was accepted and covered up. They were good enough for that but not for marriage? What hypocrisy! The Church has a lot of explaining to do. I hope that what I have said here makes some kind of sense.
ReplyDeleteThank you, Michael, for your heartfelt words. I am a gay person who is no longer Roman Catholic -- not because of any choice on my part to leave, but because Rome rejected (and continues to reject) gay persons in general. Rome left me I did not leave Rome.
ReplyDeleteIt is commendable what you and others are doing, but the real question that needs to be reflected on is how to express one's Catholicity apart from Rome's indoctrinated mantra that they are the "one true church"? This is pure ridiculousness, but it continues to sway many from expanding their consciences beyond Rome.
I found my expression of Catholicism in the Old Catholic Churches of the Union of Utrecht because they share in our Catholic heritage as Roman Catholics and understand Rome's oppressive ways first hand. This expression here in the states is offered through the life and ministry of the Episcopal Church, where homosexuals are welcome to the full participation of the life of the church, and a more authentic expression of Vatican. Its ecumenical spirit exists more within Old Catholicism than in Rome.
I for one will not hang on the cross anymore for a church that seemingly no longer worships God but itself -- I will not hang on the cross for an institution that is systemically oppressive and exclusive towards others. This is antithetical to Christ's gospel. I want to experience the resurrection and the kingdom of God -- where my "gayness" is just another part of my baptismal being. I am tired of being unique, I am tired of fighting an institution that arrogantly depends on its "false-self" and not the grace of our Triune God, and I am tired of trying to be part of an institution that does not want me.
I have broken out of the Roman Catholic closet. I for one am tired of being a martyr for this local Church. What are we giving witness too?
I commend you, Michael, for your comments. I just see things differently.
Peace, ~Bob
When I occasionally wander over here, I find myself just shaking my head. So much energy expended in being angry at the Roman Catholic Church for being... Roman Catholic!
ReplyDeleteIt's not Old Catholic or Episcopalian or UCC or some other adaptable offshoot. It's the Church of Rome.
I left a long time ago over the homosexual issue. I'm not mad at it anymore for being what it was meant to be. Now I am what I was meant to be.
Some relationships can't be fixed.
You, apparently, are meant to be a leftist gay man. Leave the Church (in a lot of ways you seem to have already). In peace. And find some of your own.
Unless being the angry unloved son is what you really want.
"What kind of life remains for these brothers and sisters in Christ, those who wish to follow the teachings of the church? Officially at least, the gay Catholic seems set up to lead a lonely, loveless, secretive life. Is this what God desires for the gay person?"
ReplyDeletePrecisely how I know the Church's teaching is just wrong.