Vatican Publishes Views on Gay Priests

[B_DoubleMeatWhopper]

I willing to place a large bet that the Catholic Church will have the highest rate of kiddy fiddlers. Or maybe second to the Scout movement.

I doubt it for a couple of reasons. The pedophile priest scandals were an American problem, not global. Even with the large population of the US, there is a shortage of priests, and only a small percentage were/are offenders. Granted, there are more pedophiles in the priesthood than there should be, but for every pedophile priest there are thousands who are sincere about their vocation and who find approaching a child in lust to be abhorrent. We hear about pedophile priests in the news because that's what news is about. Who wants to hear about the devout priests out there who care for their parishioners and who do the good works expected of priests? Priests doing what priests should do is not deemed newsworthy. If you want to find pedophiles, look in the professions that deal almost exclusively with children. Most of the workers in those professions would never dream of molesting the children in their charge, but for those who are so inclined, the proximity of the children and the opportunities to be alone with them could prove to be a powerful motivation to act upon unsavoury impulses.

 

[dlcs]

Who wants to hear about the devout priests out there who care for their parishioners and who do the good works expected of priests? Priests doing what priests should do is not deemed newsworthy.

And that is disturbing on SO many levels. What does that really say about American culture, that we're addicted to other people's agony, ill deeds, and such incredible negativity? And what does it say about our society that when someone does something right for the sake of simply doing the right thing (like priests doing what priests should do, as he says), we somehow disdain them for doing so? Suspicion is the best way I can describe it. What's that person trying to get?

Dr. Andrew Weil wrote that everyone in America should go on a news fast. Stop watching, reading, listening to any sort of news. Then after a week see how your perceptions change.

 

[Shelby]

seen on a bumper sticker -

Abstinence makes the church grow fondlers

 

[rawbone8]

here's a recent reaction

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/11/24/MNGR6FTHU91.DTL

"There is nothing in this document that would require a change in the current practice," said the Rev. James Bretzke, chairman of theology and religious studies at the University of San Francisco.

He said that it has long been true that some American bishops and superiors who lead religious orders will automatically disqualify candidates for the priesthood who claim a homosexual orientation, while other bishops will consider them.

"Unless you get a critical mass of bishops and religious superiors who say, now we can't admit any gay men, I don't think it's going to have any discernible effect," Bretzke said. "There are lots of excellent gay priests and seminarians, and we have a priest shortage. We're not exactly in a buyer's market here. If you're not going to ordain gay men, and not going to ordain married men, and not going to ordain women, well then who's left? It's not exactly a big pool."

Estimates of the percentage of priests who are gay have varied from as few as 10 percent to as many as 60 percent. The directive applies only to seminarians -- not to priests who have already been ordained.