Can Catholics teach Presbyterians how to live with tension?

As usual, Bill, a very thoughtful post. One which should be helpful to the RC church (although you are asking help from them).
Charles Kiker, pastor of First Baptist Church Kansas City Kansas, 1992-99
Really, the Second First Baptist Church of KCK--the First Baptist Church of KCK is the African American First Baptist--predates the while First Baptist by several years.

As a Catholic who is currently very aware of the ways in which we deal with the tensions in the church, or fail to deal with them, I'm afraid I can't give a ringing endorsement for "our way." Mostly we manage the tensions by letting them sit like an 800 pound gorilla in the corner that everybody is acutely aware of, but generally won't acknowledge. When we do talk about them, it's usually in small numbers, in a circle of people we're pretty sure are sympathetic to our views on the subject. Public dialogue on the subject is very difficult, in part because many conservative Catholics believe quite strongly that openly discussing such tensions promotes division, which is a big taboo for them. When one half of the church believes that it's morally wrong to have the discussion that the other half of the church believes that it's morally wrong not to have, mostly the tension simply persists ad infinitum.

How does the Catholic Church live with the fact that there is a substantial percentage of homosexual priests in spite of calling homosexuality "objectively disordered? Simple.....we keep them in the closet or deny that any such problem exists..

I am what you call a Catholic Revert. I left the Catholic church after the church's bishops failed to address the child abuse problems. (I was in my 20's and thought I knew everything) Eventually, after many years of looking into different churches, I came back. My theology is Catholic. I do not agree with everything the church teaches but I feel at home here. How come? I look as the Church as family. One never agrees on every issue with one's family, yet we are family. We stay together because of our love for each other. I also trust the Holy Spirit. I pray to God daily asking Him to lead my church in the direction He wills. I ask for obedience of the Church Leaders (as well as myself) concerning His will. I also feel free to voice concerns to my church leaders. I may respectfully disagree but I no longer think of leaving as an option. God's will shall prevail - I believe this totally. We must remember the Christian faith has been around for 2000 years - through many controversies. Christ left us the Church to help us in our relationship with him. How can we leave it?

I will keep your Church in my prayers. God Bless. Linda

Greetings from down here. I do not know about the Presbyterian church in Australia and gays, but some years ago the church voted to allow the ordination of women. I believe seven were ordained. The church has now reversed that approval, but not disentitled the ordained women from ministry. Only one of those original seven still holds office. She is Minister of St Andrew's Church Canberra, Australia.

Check with the Episcopalians, too.

Dear sir,

I always value your comments,because they are a source of sanity, sincere dialogue and questioning in a religious world so full of dangerous certitudes and growing dogmatic statements. You compare the situation to the "biblical" defense of slavery. But I must remind you of a similar and equally sinister debate: "Does women have a soul?" The question was never answered in practice. I think the "magisterium" firm opposition to the ordination of women goes back to these remote times.

As regarding homossexuality, I think the only answer you'll get from the Vatican will be: hipocrisy is the best policy. Catholic tradition alaways exalted the soul and forgot about the body, considered an unfurtonately necessary support. That's why the relation with sexuality was alaways so twisted, and will remain so. I like to ilustrate my words with telling examples: remember that the castrati were favoured in Rome, because they childish voices reflected better the exaltation of God's glory. So, what did matter if they had to loose, in childood, their genitals?

Just take a look at Wikipedia: "In 1589, by the bull Cum pro nostri temporali munere, Pope Sixtus V re-organised the choir of St Peter's, Rome specifically to include castrati. Thus the castrati came to supplant both boys (whose voices broke after only a few years) and falsettists (whose voices were weaker and less reliable) from the top line in such choirs. Women were banned by the Pauline dictum mulieres in ecclesiis taceant ("let women keep silent in church"; see I Corinthians, ch 14, v 34)." As you see, there is also a biblical justification for such a crime. The last castrato lived until the end of the XIX century, and left recordings of same of the best of sacred music composers. Do you think that they deserved not to lead a normal life?

Regarding homossexual priests, I recommend to search in the memoirs of Gore Vidal his description of gay Rome. I'll never forget a phrase, wich, for me tells all: "Lighted by the moon, the Colyseum was like an white scenary full of crows". An explanation: In his young days, the Colyseum was the place by excelence for gay cruising. And the craws were... the black cassocks of priests. Strangely, this happened long before the Vatican II, now blamed of all the perversions of the sexual revolution.

I knew,personally,two openly gay priests (in fact, one was my parish priest), that solved the problem repenting deeply after they reached 60. This parish priest - I can talk freely, because he died many years ago -, was a very good priest, but after seing the light became quite a prude. I was attending his church in the early eighties, when started the awful plague of AIDS. He had a dear brother, who was also a homossexual. Almost everybody knew that he had contracted the disease: after some years, he looked like a walking skeleton. Except his brother.

One night, I received a late call from him: "Can you come to the Church?". I went. It was then that he asked me: "Look, what is this thing called AIDS?". I explained it to him, and for the first time I saw him worried about his dear bother, who was very ill in the hospital. Some days later, I received another call. He told me: "Praise the Lord! He died, but before he repented from all his sins". I can assure you I felt a little bit disgusted. After some time, I decided not to return to his church.

As you can see, this is the Catholic way of solving problems: ignoring them.

You're a wise and good man Bill. The Church of Rome could do with a few people like you.

Bill, The notion that all Catholics march in lock step with the Pope and the Vatican is a total myth. We do have a body of doctrine to which we all generally agree. But let me take the one thing you mention here to show that
there are always interpretations at stake.
"Objectively disordered".
Now Aquinas is surely one whom the current pontiff would sanction as being a voice worth hearing. Aquinas tells us that all our knowing comes to us through a medium. In other words, we have no direct knowledge of anything.
We have our senses, and they are fallible as we all know. There are also
cultural factors involved. We say, for instance, seeing is believing. In
South Africa you could say that to many a native and be laughed out of the room. You see, they have to be able to rely on hearing much more than we
do to stay alive. Many big white hunters lost their lives because the never
heard what hit them not because they did not see it.
So from an epistemological stance and good Thomist philosophy the statement
Objectively disordered would be a fallacious statement per se since it violates the possibility of the observer. There may well be objective realities, that is not the question or the problem. The problem is that
its irrelevant to a subjective knowing species. We cannot honestly declare
anything as objectively disordered, this is merely a pretense by a human whose
knowing power is intrinsically subjective. We are knowing subjects. We will
never know the object of our knowing as object, only as knowing subject. The
best we can do is to deliver honestly and humbly our subjective opinion.
It would be nice to drop the term completely as it is dishonest and destructive. Living with tension is a delight compared to having to listen to nonsense in the guise of fact. My best thought to advance to all my
christian brethren is that there is One Christ, One Body and One Church. We
are all in the same Church. We can argue all we want about our particular
confessions. I would prefer to think we all want exactly the same thing,
happiness here and hereafter.
God Bless.
TomC

Independent supervision or an orgainizational model allowing for autonomous congregations might mollify those congregations upholding the biblical teachings on sexuality. Also, the fact that pastors are hired by local congregations and not appointed will also help.

I am a Roman Catholic convert and this is what I try to remember.

The Church has a long history of dissent, and sometimes, that dissent gets you labeled a saint. We are Catholic by virtue of our baptism and nothing else. Is understanding and following Church teaching important? YES! And I have NEVER been a big fan of dissenting because it "doesn't seem nice" to believe this or because "I don't personally care about this." Dissent needs to be done for the right reasons and it needs to have a basis in the Bible, Sacred Tradition, history, science, canon law, etc. Regardless of why or if you dissent, however, you are Catholic, full stop. You can be a Catholic in good standing or a Catholic in bad standing, devout or non-devout, knowledgeable or ignorant, but once the Sacrament of baptism has been performed on you, there is no going back. To suggest otherwise is to suggest that the sacraments are just a symbol, that neither God nor the Holy Spirit was really present, and that they exercised no power over you.

The best solution is to know, and stick to this knowledge, that a Christian is a Christian by virtue of baptism. Whether or not someone is truly Catholic or Christian is ultimately a decision that can be left to God alone, not by anyone else. Remember that every one of us has a slice of God in them, as it were, and treat them with charity. Remember that God loves Truth and that Truth will always out. This is the major virtue of dissent. Ideas can be tested by the arguments that support them and fruits they bear, and if something is Truth, it will always bear the best fruit and no heresy can ever hope to touch it. People that want to protect the church from dissenting ideas don't really believe in the power of Truth.

And when other Christians deny this, call them out on it vocally (but politely). Every time someone hurls the slander "You're a fake Christian" or "You are in a big to destroy the Church," they are making vicious claims they cannot support and slander is a very serious sin. Don't let it go.

I appreciated reading your comments on the question of homosexual acceptance in the Presbyterian communion, Bill. The fact that you recognize that exactly the same problem exists in the Catholic Church and yet does not seem to lead to visible contention in quite the same way is owed to the radically different ecclesiology in Catholicism (and Easter Orthodoxy, for that matter) The Catholic Church possesses the concept of institutional apostolicity. The visible Church itself, despite its evolution over the centuries with inevitable changes and adjustments, was founded by Christ. Coupled with this is the notion of magisterial authority whereby the faith in its articulated form has been passed down maintained and developped by the sensus fidelium (through the ages, not just presently)and is guarded and defined by papal and episcopal authority. Hence, what is in scripture is not open to personal interpretation but can be known and understood only in the light of this living tradition. A fundamental sign that a doctrine is true is its unamimous and reiterated acceptance throughout the Christian ages. Few doctrines are as solid on this point as the teaching that marriage is the union of one man with one woman and that sexual relations are legitimate only within its precincts. This precludes with absolute certainty the acceptance of homosexual activity. No one has ever defined this truth. In any case dogmas are defined essentiallty because they have the quality of permanence and contiuity that this one does. The psychological ramifications of such solidity are easy to see. Even those active homosexuals within the Church who cry out for acceptance of their way of life know at least instinctively that this acceptance can never be given and yet the Church wishes for them to reamin and eventually accept the truth of its teaching so that they may receive forgiveness and absolution from Christ. Why should they be rejected? They belong to Him. It is his Church's absolute duty to love them and continue to preach the truth to them. 9

Excellent column Bill. We Catholics have lived with the tension in the context of hope: hope of change, hope of understanding. We also come from a tradition that has at times welcomed diversity of positions, with example of embracing both the Dominican (Thomistic) and Franciscan theological viewpoints. However, at the present moment there is a call from some members of the hierarchy for a one way mentality with no differing of opinions or you hear a call to get out. One just needs to read the blogs here to see the intolerance.
Through our elevation of various people following Jesus in different ways to sainthood, through our encouragement of different charisms for different religious orders, through our tolerance for different approaches to theology and spirituality, we have embraced diversity of opinions and embraced the gray areas for centuries. Our understanding of the eucharist is what keeps us united. Let's just hope it stays that way.

What percentage of priests are homosexual?

The term "objectively disordered" should not be applied to a person or even to the condition of homosexuality. The term should be applied to the inclination towards homosexual activity, most especially sodomy. The Church can only address the moral question of homosexuality, not the psychological question of homosexuality. No one knows for sure how the condition of homosexuality comes about, so the Church can't make any authoritative statements about the condition per se.

Bill,

The old claim of "Outside the Church there is no salvation." took a hard fall by the middle of the last century. But consider its effect on the pre Vatican Church. Disagreement and even division may be challenging, infuriating.

I think that Cushing's basis for excommunication of Fr. Leonard Feeney was for "gross sin against the virtue of charity". He sidestepped the dispute. Something else trumped dogma. Something we forget, but must be paramount.

The basic 'correctness' of Feeney's position provides for tension, and thus resiliency among Catholics to this day. It focuses on our need to reflect on what do we mean by terms such as "People of God", "Church" and "Mystical Body". Even notions of "invincible ignorance" (referring to salvation for no-believers); and "intentional ignorance" (Thomas Aquinas, not an excuse). Plausible deniability doesn't seem to have a place.

Slavery was a similar issue to all Christians in this country 200 years ago. Garry Wills made an excellent point in "Head and Heart" when he praised Quakers, primarily, for their contributions in this country to overcome the notion that because the Bible recorded instances of slavery, it therefore was a good. After the 19th century no Christian country believes it is just.

I don't know where the issue of homosexuality will go. I try to follow St. Paul, yet keep in mind that medical science increasingly indicates that some are simply 'hard wired' that way. All truth comes from the Holy Spirit.

It comes down to a matter of remembering charity.

I probably have not offered anything fresh to you, but it's been worth it to me to consider my response.

Not sure we can help!!

I think the fundamental difference regarding Celebacy makes it difficult to apply Catholic experience to Presbyterian clergy. We have been taught that our clergy are celebate, overtly inthe context of not being married but more importantly and somewhat inferentially in the context of being committed to chastity.

So I think the rank and file pew sitter is likely to consider each and every clergy as being asexual, based on an activity standpoint. Sure we encounter some who you'd pick to be gay..but I imagine the bias is still towards asexuality.

The tension about LGBT folks happens because of misinformation and fear

Encourage folks to contact reputable sources of information on LGBT folks

I suggest IN THE LIFE MEDIA... also contact PFLAG parents and Friends of Lesbian and Gays

Please do not neglect the gay people who throughout history have added to the music and literature and art of the world

Please remember that the operative word in the phrase Gay people is PEOPLE ...
and ALL People are Children of the God of Love who made us and loves us Just as We Are

Blessings to you for this needed article

Great article. Now we Catholics have something to learn from the Presbyterians.

An old Irish parish priest once told me, when I was mad at some people and some policies in our Catholic Church, just to always remember to stay close to God (who IS the Church)and remember the sacraments were there. I did, and I'm happy he advised me. People will always find a reason to leave...like, "Someone took my pew, and I'd been sitting in it for 56 years!"
This can be alleviated, but prejudice is not that easy. Just try to remember what my old parish priest said. Peter crossed the water because he stayed focused on Jesus, wasn't sidetracked. We should do the same.

Blessings,
Florence in Mobile

Dear Bill,    

Thank you for these comments and those of your linked blog 'Faith Matters'.     You are both wise and knowledgeable.
.
As for learning something from Catholics — good luck with that!   :))     Catholics are 'traditionally' a diverse and scrappy bunch,   and as a group tend to be rather stubborn,   regardless of which side of an issue they take.     Perhaps it is that stubbornness that keeps them from "vaporizing" and abandoning ship — they simply refuse to be 'run off' by another group within the RCC.     In any event,   the "big tent" of Catholicism is not homogenized and pasteurized no matter what this or that bishop or pope or neo-traditionalist layperson might say.     Those of us who are cradle Catholics and have been around for a few decades have paid our dues and just roll with the punches.     There will always be some sort of 'tension' within the spiritual life and within the Christian community because flawed human beings are involved.
.

Dear Sir,

My comment on the old debate about women’s soul has to do, obviously, with Graeco Roman Philosophy and its great influence in the Christian Theology of the Middle Ages. Let’s quote just the two more inflluential philosophers, Plato and Aristotle:

- (Plato) ascribed the inferior status of women clearly to a degeneration from perfect human nature. “It is only males who are created directly by the gods and are given souls. Those who live rightly return to the stars, but those who are ‘cowards or [lead unrighteous lives] may with reason be supposed to have changed into the nature of women in the second generation’. This downward progress may continue through successive reincarnations unless reversed. In this situation, obviously it is only men who are complete human beings and can hope for ultimate fulfilment; the best a woman can hope for is to become a man” (Plato, Timaeus 90e).

(Anne Dickason, ‘Anatomy and Destiny: The Role of Biology in Plato’s Views of Women’, in Carold C. Gould and Marx W. Wartofsky (eds.), Women and Philosophy. Toward a Theory of Liberation, New York 1976; Julia Annas, ‘Plato’s Republic and Feminism’, in Osborne (ed.), Woman in Western Thought pp. 24-33.)

- (For Aristotle), the reason for women's inferiority lies in a defect. “Women are defective by nature” because they cannot reproduce semen which contains a full human being. When a man and a woman have intercourse, the man supplies the substance of a human being (the soul, i.e. the form), the woman only the nourishment (the matter).

Since it was a fundamental principle for him that, of the two factors or components in every being, ‘form’ is superior to ‘matter’, sexual reproduction was considered beneficial, because it demanded that the one who gives the ‘form’ (the male) be separate from the one who supplies the ‘matter’ (the female). Thus the ‘lower’ is not mingled with the ‘higher’ in the same individual. Aristotle subscribed to what Caroline Whitbeck has called the ‘flower pot theory’ of human generation. The female, since she is deficient in natural heat, is unable to ‘cook’ her menstrual fluid to the point of refinement, at which it would become semen (i.e. ‘seed’). Therefore her only contribution to the embryo is its matter, and a ‘field’ in which it can grow. Her inability to produce semen is her deficiency: ‘a woman,’ Aristotle concludes, ‘is as it were an infertile male’ (Generation of Animals, I, 728a).‘A male is male in virtue of a particular ability, and a female in virtue of a particular inability’ (Generation of Animals, I, 82f).

(Caroline Whitbeck, ‘Theories of Sex Difference’, in Gould and Wartofsky (eds.), Women and Philosophy , New York 1976, pp. 54-80; M.Maloney, ‘The Arguments for Women's Difference in Classical Philosophy and Early Christianity’, pp. 41-49.)

I think both conceptions are still present in today’s positions towards genders, body and sex. Excuse me if my ideas were not exposed clearly enough.

In the same sense, the defense of slavery has also roots in Graeco-Roman culture. A strange thing: homosexuality, which was also so common and praised, it was afterwards rejected and persecuted. The aversion towards any kind of homosexual practices is now specially present in Africa, where homosexual face sistematic persecution, prison and even death. Talking with a missionary who has a deep knowledge of African cultures, he told me that is not at all tipically African, but was the effect of the contact along the centuries with Christian missionaries.

The early 20th century philosopher / psychologist William James advocated that in order to understand and study religious experiences, one needs to look to the extremes, even the pathological.

I believe that this principle applies to the discussion of human sexuality. We need to move beyond a discussion of homosexuality / heterosexuality and consider the fact that "at the fringes" there are people who are anatomically "in between genders". There are also people whose psychologically is different from their anatomical make up---i.e. transgender people. The latter experience themselves, generally from early childhood, as male in a female body, or vice-versa and often undergo surgery to adapt their anatomy to their "spirit". I have met, for example, a "male" who, even as a little boy, aspired to be a nun, and who later had various hormone and surgical procedures to become a "woman".

Are such people, then, also to be barred from the ministry? Are they to be deemed inadequate just because of how they are made. We would not bar someone who was otherwise physically "different". For example, there have been some wonderful blind and deaf priests. How would one determine whether a hermaphrodite is sufficiently "male" to be admitted into the priesthood?

I believe that once theologians start to grapple with these very real issues, they will see that there is no alternative in justice than to admit everyone who feels called by God to the ministry. The issue becomes one of discernment of God's calling, and not of gender or sexual preference.

I'm sorry Bill I cannot agree with you that Catholicism, even American Catholicism can show anyone the way to anything but Reaganism/Republicanism, Greed and death.

There is still no admission of any guilt or the taking of any responsibility over pedophile priests. And not a hint of talk about the very large numbers(30-70%) of gay clergy in the Catholic church. The Roman Catholic church can show no one the way. In fact the exact opposite is true. The Roman Catholic church has been a hate generator for at least a millenia.

Other faith traditions have done a far better job of integrating others into their folds, including gays, women and minorities. Among Right Wing Fundie cult Catholics supremacism IS still their guiding light, NOT the teachings of Christ or the love of God but this BLINDING certitude that only the pope and they know the mind of God(sin of Pride)and are the sole arbiters of absolutely EVERYTHING about EVERYTHING!!!

True some few Protestants sects are the very same way, especially the Mormons(but not all, not Harry Reid or the Udall family, etc) and the evangelical fundamentalists(but not all, Not Jimmy or Rosalynn Carter, not Rev. Jim Wallis, not Arbp. Desmond Tutu,et.al).

Also let us recall that in Nov. '05 and again in Nov. '07 the Methodists governing body clearly separated themselves from the Bush government and it's use of religion as a political weapon and God as THEIR political TOOL, in support of greed, war, hatred and political dominance.

And so I say again, as I have said probably dozens of times before: May God bless the Methodists for their adherence to the laws of God and the teachings of Christ, including: "Render unto Caesar...

Ray McGovern(Fordham, CIA, VIPS) has reported that the Presbyterians also are not part of the Bush/GOP/Papacy/bishop/Right Wing hate everyone war/death/kill (for oil, theology and profit) machine.

Mr Timmaeus you would do well to NOT look to the pope or his hierarchs, most priests or the Right Wing fundie Catholics who follow them for an ounce of guidance on how to handle any kinds of differences or problems of any kind for they are not followers of Christ love but purveyors of Satanic hatred and death. True, they have Karl Rove and Frank Luntz to sanitize it and make their evil and greed look like sanity but it's still evil just below the surface. Killing and greed are their way, no matter how much Rove or the pope sanitizes or blesses it. Evil is still just evil. NOTHING good ever comes from evil.

One of these days Rove will try to sanitize that, BUT underneath it will still be evil. They have the amazing ability to excuse everything they do, or to make it all look like something else. But it all just stinks from the rotting.

Bill, only the liberal people of the Catholic church can share anything of value with others. (And we may be getting a bullet in the head,yet.) Why do we have something ti give? Because we believe that we are all children of God and equally important. NO ONE is superior to any one else, no matter his position in life and especially not his wealth or power. When we get, some day finally but not likely, a pope that teachers AND that LIVES that in his daily life than maybe the papacy will have some shred of value or insight to offer the world. Until then...NOTHING.

Bill, look to God, Jesus Christ the Holy Spirit and to yourselves and maybe you can show the way to the world the way of Christ.

The Catholic church is now deep inn the process of renting itself asunder and destroying itself. When only the people remain, then and only then MAY it arise from the ashes. That is, IF there is any living people still alive in America and on the face of the earth. Why do I say that. Because when the pope says to push the BIG RED BUTTON, there are those who, without thinking, will do exactly that. The GOP, the hierarchy and the Scalia SCOTUS are full of those people.

While I realize that my comment was not politically correct I think it needs to be heard. I assume NCR would never censor debate?

When you heretics are ready to talk, we are ready to listen. We don't need to be enlightened or lectured by a "religion" that accepts every form of deviant, unnatural behavior under the sun.

Get your own church in order, then maybe we can talk.

Bill, I can offer three reasons I remain in the Catholic Church, despite areas of strong disagreement and disillusionment. First and foremost, I do believe in the Real Presence of the Eucharist and find no other denomination which can fill that role. Secondly, I have profound respect for theologians like Rahner (who lived through silencing only to gain prominence at VII) and lastly because I shopped and found a parish which meets my criteria and where I work with the staff for the people. Largely, as much a possible, I ignore the hierarchy, as unfortunately many Catholics do as well.

I don't know what label can be given us with our track record to date, worldwide.
Carmelo Abbate investigative journalist would be a good voice of the inconsistancies if not hypocracy.

Check with the Methodists. They follow the Jesus way best. See the above comment.

Bill, I tried twice before to post this. You may not want to hear it, but consider it prophetic. As a former Presbyterian I can say there is nothing to hold the PCUSA together. Scripture, confessions, traditions? None of those have any value anymore. Those who do think they have value are excluded. There is nothing left for them but to leave. You have drawn a line in the sand that does have meaning. You want them to stay, but only on your terms. They cannot go with you as you leap into the abyss that leads only to darkness.

Consider that the PCUSA has been declining by over 50,000 members a year for decades. The median age is about 60. There are only about 2 million members left. Now many of the most vibrant congregations will pull out. The PCUSA has everything a liberal could want: women clergy, no authority figures, a malleable theology, gay clergy and soon gay marriage, no pesky orthodoxy to spoil the fun. Yet it is dying. No one is beating down the doors to get in. This is not because they took an unpopular stand against the culture, but because they have given in to the culture. You must liberate yourself from the false idols you have embraced.

Catholicism has tension because we are not going in that direction. We cannot. As we speak those who agree with the PCUSA within Catholicism are also dying out. The only growth comes where the Church has been faithful and resisted fatal compromise with the spirit of the age. As it is said, "those who wed the spirit of the age soon become widowers." It is those who dissent who leave Catholicism. Also those who tired of dissent and fled to evangelical churches. The common denominator is dissent, often outright heresy, that has caused the problems.

You asked for help and I will give it. The first thing you must do is STOP and REVERSE COURSE. If you don't do that then you are already lost. You will hit the iceberg and sink with great loss of souls. The second thing is to rethink that 16th century disagreement. Perhaps it laid the foundation for the wreck. You might consider that the barque of Peter still swims because she holds fast to the ancient faith of the apostles and refuses to give in to those who would put her on the wrong course. We will not commit spiritual suicide no matter how many among us choose to do so. Liberalism as you see it in the NCR represents not the future of Catholicism, but a brief moment in her history when we were rocked by dissent. That time is passing. We have weathered the storm. I suggest that you practice metanoia, turn back and find the right path which is the path of orthodoxy. If you do not then your future is only a footnote.

I believe that many of the Catholic Church's celibate priests in the USA are gay, but the Church has never taught, despite what is often written (including in this article) that being gay is sinful. It has taught that engaging in homosexual acts is sinful, as it heterosexual sex outside of marriage. I think regardless of a priest's orientation, being celibate is a great challenge and I give them credit for meeting that challenge. That's not to say that celibacy must be with us forever, as we see more married Protestant clergy being ordained into the RC Church and more recognition of the married clergy of the Eastern Catholic Churches. The fail for so many (inside and outside the Catholic Church) is measuring Christian doctrine by their own (philosophically voluntarist) yardstick. One attaches to Truth because it is true, not because one believes it to be true.

In answer to your lead question, my answer is "No".

(on the other hand, we own the inquisition...)

Seems like it all hinges on celibacy. Gay priests are called to be celibate just the same as heterosexual priests. If a priest is truly celibate, their homosexuality is much more tolerable. But if gay priests are less celibate than heterosexual priests, because there is more temptation and more opportunity, and the church tolerates it, there is a problem. It seems unfair.