I find it hard to carve a single passage from Colm Toibin's quite astounding essay in the London Review of Books on the Catholic church and the homosexuality question. It's beautifully crafted and honest and true and inescapably Catholic. It covers a lot of ground that this blog has covered, but its description of the crisis of moral authority in the hierarchy is particularly nuanced and fine. What Toibin conveys is the special love many homosexuals have had - for two millennia - for this institution and its mission; and the choice the hierarchy has had for several decades to move forward in hope with these Catholics or to move back in fear against them…
…It seems pretty obvious to me - as it does to Angelo Quattrochi, whose book is reviewed by Toibin - that the current Pope is a gay man (just as it was blindingly clear that John Paul II was straight). I am not claiming that Benedict is someone who has explored his sexuality, or has violated his own strictures on the matter. There is absolutely no evidence of that, or of hypocrisy of any sort. But that does not mean that he isn't gay. In fact, Ratzinger's command that gay priests should actively lie about their orientation makes any public statement about this on its face lacking in credibility. But when you look at the Pope's mental architecture (I've read a great deal of his writing over the last two decades) you do see that strong internal repression does make sense of his life and beliefs. At times, it seems to me, his gayness is almost wince-inducing. The prissy fastidiousness, the effeminate voice, the fixation on liturgy and ritual, and the over-the-top clothing accessories are one thing. But what resonates with me the most is a theology that seems crafted from solitary introspection into a perfect, abstract unity of belief. It is so perfect it reflects a life of withdrawal from the world of human relationship, rather than an interaction with it. Of course, this kind of work is not inherently homosexual; but I have known so many repressed gay men who can only live without severe pain in the world if they create a perfect abstraction of what it is, and what their role is in it. Toibin brilliantly explains this syndrome, why the church of old was so often such a siren call for gay men who could not handle their own nature. In Benedict, one sees a near-apotheosis of this type, what Quattrocchi describes as "simply the most repressed, imploded gay in the world." Read complete article:
Among the Flutterers - Colm Tóibín
The Pope Is Not Gay by Angelo Quattrocchi
translated by Romy Clark Giuliani
London Review of Books
Auschwitz - Christmas 2008
A flashback far more severe than in
Brokeback Mountain
…The question I asked myself was: what would it have been like for someone growing up gay during the Nazi Persecution of Homosexuals 1933 -1945?
What would be the severity of the psychological effects on a boy who grew up to be gay in Germany during the time of Hitler’s NAZI PERSECUTION OF HOMOSEXUALS 1933 -1945? During the Nazi regime, homosexuals were publicly defamed and falsely accused for the major social problems of that time, which was done to incite massive public hatred and hostility directed against homosexuals. Homosexuals were used for medical experiments, physically mutilated, brutally tortured and exterminated.
Would this child, as an adult, in a severe dissociated state of mind from his own homosexual feelings (Harry Stack Sullivan MD, Dissociative Processes, Clinical Studies on Psychiatry (1956)), unconsciously perpetuate the terrifying horror of the insensitivity he had experienced growing up? If he found himself in a position of authority would he recreate the same social and political environment of violence and terror for homosexuals that he experienced, as a child who grew up to be gay, during the NAZI PERSECUTION OF HOMOSEXUALS? Read more:
Benedict XVI - INTERNALIZED HOMOPHOBIA
"It [homosexuality] remains something that is against the Nature that God originally willed.” - UNSUBSTANTIATED ANTIGAY STATEMENT – Selective Attention – Dissociation – Process of Projection - permits EXTERNALIZATION of unconscious conflicts - rejecting own unacceptable urges by rejecting lesbians and gay men (who symbolize those urges) without consciously recognizing the urges as own. - PLANK & SPECK - Luke 6:40-42 & GALILEO
400,000 Anti-gay marriage DVDs - $1 million Nienstedt - Minnesota October 29, 2010 - RELIGION & ETHICS PBS – video (NP)
HOMOPHOBIC ORGANIZATION
Part 2: 'I Hope that the Church Will at Last Confront the Issue of Homophobia' | Dream Turns Into Nightmare | Senior Theologian In The Catholic Church
November 22, 2010
Spiegel International
David Berger, 42, was Professor of the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas. The theologian published and edited Theologisches (Theological Issues), a conservative Catholic monthly magazine in Germany from 2003 until this year, and had contacts with various arch-conservative groups within the Catholic Church. He resigned from all his offices after outing himself as a gay man in April 2010. He is now a high school teacher and has written a book about his experiences in the Catholic Church in Germany. "Der heilige Schein. Als schwuler Theologe in der katholischen Kirche" (The Holy Illusion: A Gay Theologian in the Catholic Church), was recently published by Germany's Ullstein Verlag. It has not been published in English.
SPIEGEL: Did you feel this pressure yourself?
Berger: I published the magazine Theological Issues and was summoned by the sponsors every time a faintly liberal view was espoused. Opus Dei people were always there to observe. They said I wasn't allowed to write "life partner;" it should instead be referred to as "fornication partner." "Homosexuality" was too neutral, they said. One had to refer to it as "unnatural fornication."
SPIEGEL: What finally triggered your departure?
Berger: The appearance of the bishop of Essen, Franz-Josef Overbeck, on Anne Will (a prominent Sunday night political talk show broadcast on German public television station ARD), when he described homosexuality as unnatural and a sin during a debate about sexual abuse.
SPIEGEL: Did that make clear to you that you'd been part of the church too long?
Berger: Instead of standing up for my rights and those of my partner I supported anti-democratic and anti-liberal groups that fight against these rights and in which some people dream of a fundamentalist Catholic religious state or seriously call for a Catholic jihad. I joined in this playing with fire and was then naively appalled when the whole house was ablaze. I regret that.
SPIEGEL: It sounds as if your book is a confession. But your former colleagues are not prepared to grant you absolution.
Berger: A reputable theologian loyal to the pope put it clearly: He said I was given the opportunity to discreetly distance myself from the "scene." I was offered the chance to continue this hypocrisy and go on climbing up the career ladder. Because I didn't want to take part in this ecclesiastic "crisis management," I was accused of "shamelessly seeking the public spotlight."
SPIEGEL: What impact do you hope your book will have?
Berger: I hope that the church will at last confront the issue of homophobia. It must recognize that a large proportion of the Catholic clerics and trainee priests in Europe and the United States are homosexual.
Read complete interview:
Part 1: 'A Large Proportion of Catholic Clerics and Trainee Priests Are Homosexual'
Related links:
WIDESPREAD HOMOPHOBIA
in the Catholic Church
Theologian says much of clergy is gay
by Derek Scally,
November 22, 2010 – The Irish Times
WIDESPREAD HOMOPHOBIA in the Catholic Church stems from its large number of closeted priests, a German theologian has said.
David Berger, an expert on St Thomas Aquinas and former publisher of a Catholic magazine, has called for Rome to own up to the gay priests in its midst and alter its attitudes and teaching on homosexuality.
“It must be acknowledged that a large number of Catholic clerics and trainee priests in Europe and the United States are homosexually-inclined,” Mr Berger told Der Spiegel magazine.
“The worst homophobia in the Catholic Church comes from homophile priests, who are desperately fighting their own sexuality,” he said. “Obviously, those who follow their urges are repudiated more fiercely when one is so painfully repressing that disposition oneself.”
…Mr Berger “came out” in April after the Bishop of Essen, Franz-Josef Overbeck, described homosexuality as perverse and a sin during an appearance on a television chat show.
As a gay man in a long-term relationship, he said he had suffered for years under the homophobic atmosphere in the church.
Read complete article:
Vatican Asking For Male Prostitutes
“Naturam expellas furca, tamen usque recurret.”
Though you drive Nature out with a pitchfork, she will still find her way back.
The Vatican was today rocked by a sex scandal reaching into Pope Benedict's household after a chorister was sacked for allegedly procuring male prostitutes for a papal gentleman-in-waiting.
Angelo Balducci, a Gentleman of His Holiness, was caught by police on a wiretap allegedly negotiating with Thomas Chinedu Ehiem, a 29-year-old Vatican chorister, over the specific physical details of men he wanted brought to him. Transcripts in the possession of the Guardian suggest that numerous men may have been procured for Balducci, at least one of whom was studying for the priesthood.
The explosive claims about Balducci's private life have caused grave embarrassment to the Vatican, which has yet to publicly comment on the affair.
While Catholicism does not condemn homosexuality outright, its teaching is that homosexual acts "are intrinsically disordered". The Catechism of the Catholic church states unequivocally: "Under no circumstances can they be approved."
Balducci was arrested on 10 February, suspected of involvement in widespread corruption. A senior Italian government official, he is alleged to have to steered public works contracts towards favoured bidders. He has not been charged.
Read complete article - by John Hooper – quardian.co.uk
Related links:
Gay Prostitution Probe Rocks Vatican - 2 Officials At Center Of Investigation In What Officials Call An 'Organized' Male Prostitution Ring – CBS NEWS
Vatican chorister hired escorts for papal attendant: Report - Montreal Gazette
Pope embarrassed by Vatican gay sex scandal - By GayNZ.com
The Church and Gays: Can't Decide Whether to ""Love" 'Em" or Leave 'Em?" - By Jodi Jacobson, Editor, RH Reality Check
“Naturam expellas furca, tamen usque recurret.”
Though you drive Nature out with a pitchfork, she will still find her way back. MW
White-Hot 'Outrage'
Over The Capitol Hill Closet
May 9, 2009
National Public Radio (NPR)
The Psychology of the Closeted
Individual and Coming Out
In contemporary gay culture, to hide one sexual identity is referred to as either “closeted” or “in the closet.” Revealing oneself as lesbian, gay or bisexual (LGB) is called “coming out.” 16 Paradigm • Fall 2007
by Jack Drescher, M.D.
Many LGB individuals report developmental histories with difficulty acknowledging their homosexuality, either to themselves or to others. This is because, starting in childhood, LGB individuals are often subjected to antihomosexual attitudes, not only from strangers, but also from their own families and communities (Drescher, Stein and Byne, 2005). The childhood need to hide may persist into adulthood, leading many LGB individuals to conceal important aspects of themselves.
There are a range of homosexual identities that describe an individual’s awareness and acceptance of same-sex attractions. Closeted individuals cannot acknowledge homoerotic feelings, attractions and fantasies to themselves. They cannot or will not integrate homosexuality into their public personae and these feelings must be dissociated out of conscious awareness.
If and when same-sex feelings and attractions are no longer completely dissociated, an individual becomes homosexually self-aware. Such individuals may acknowledge some aspect of their homosexuality to themselves. However, accepting the feelings is not a pre-determined outcome. A religious, homosexually self-aware woman may choose to remain celibate rather than integrate her religious and sexual identities…
Sullivan’s (1956) theories of dissociation elaborate how a sexual identity can be separated from the rest of one’s persona. For example, selective inattention is a common, nonpathological process, akin to tuning out the background noise on a busy street. In more intense dissociative mechanisms, double lives are lived yet not acknowledged. One sees clinical presentations of closeted gay people lying somewhere between selective inattention, most commonly seen in the case of homosexually self-aware patients thinking about “the possibility” that they might be gay, to more severe dissociation –in which any hint of same-sex feelings resides out of conscious awareness. More severe forms of dissociation are commonly observed in homosexually selfaware married men who cannot permit themselves the thought of coming out (Drescher, 2006).
To hide significant aspects of the self, or vigilantly separate from each other, can be painful. Constant hiding creates difficulties in accurately assessing other people’s perceptions of oneself as well as recognizing one’s own strengths. Dissociation’s impact on self-esteem can also make it difficult to feel one’s actual accomplishments as reflections of one’s own abilities. Transparency, invisibility, losing one’s voice, being an outsider, etc. are some of the terms used to describe the subjective experience of dissociative detachment (Drescher, 1998).
Read complete research:
Jack Drescher, MD, is a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst in private practice in New York City.
Dr. Drescher is a leader in his profession. He is a Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, and served as a Consultant to APA’s Committee on Public Affairs. He is a member of the DSM-5 Workgroup on Sexual and Gender Identity Disorders. He is a past Chair (2000-2006) of APA’s Committee on GLB Issues and a Past President of APA’s New York County Branch. He is currently the Co-Editor of AppleSource, the newsletter of the NYC DB of the APA. He is President-Elect of the Group for Advancement of Psychiatry, and a Past Trustee of both the Accreditation Council for Psychoanalytic Education and the American Academy of Psychoanalysis and Dynamic Psychiatry. He is a member of numerous distinguished psychiatric, medical and scientific organizations, including The American College of Psychiatrists and the New York Academy of Medicine.
Read more:
"ANGELS IN AMERICA" - Benedict XVI & Hierarchy – “No Angels In The Vatican” - Ignorance about human sexuality is extremely harmful to children.
"ANGELS IN AMERICA"
(2003)
Playwright Tony Kushner adapts his political epic about the AIDS crisis during the mid-eighties, around a group of separate but connected individuals.
Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on National Themes is a play in two parts by American playwright Tony Kushner. It has been made into both a television miniseries and an opera by Peter Eötvös…
As the seven-hour play progresses, Prior is visited by ghosts and an angel who proclaim him to be a prophet; Joe finds himself struggling to reconcile his religion with his sexuality; Louis struggles with his guilt about leaving Prior and begins a relationship with Joe; Harper's mental health deteriorates as she realizes that Joe is gay; Joe's mother, Hannah, moves to New York to attempt to look after Harper and meets Prior after a failed attempt by Prior to confront Hannah's son; Harper begins to separate from Joe whom she has depended upon and find strength she was unaware of; and Roy finds himself in the hospital, reduced to the companionship of the ghost of Ethel Rosenberg and his nurse, Belize, a former drag queen and Prior's best friend, who meanwhile has to deal with Louis's constant demands for updates on Prior's health.
Read more:
I'm His Child
Zella Jackson Price
Memorable quotes “Angels in America”
Joe Pitt: Stop it! Stop it! I'm warning you! Does it make any difference that I might be one thing deep within? No matter how wrong or ugly that thing is so long as I have fought with everything I have to kill it? What do you want from me? What do you want from me Harper, more than that? For God's sake, there's nothing left. I'm a shell. There's nothing left to kill. As long as my behaviour is what I know it has to be, decent, correct that alone in the eyes of God.
Joe Pitt: All I will say is that I'm a very good man who has worked very hard to become good and you wanna destroy that. You wanna destroy me but I am not gonna let you do that.
Hate Crime Bill vs Attacks
But
No Facts -> Fear And Ignorance
Of The Blind Leading The Blind
October 27, 2009 – Fr. Marty Kurylowicz
The bible in fact does not condemn Galileo or homosexuality, which science reveals that are normal elements of nature and human sexuality.
People for whatever reason seem to be using the bible to hide from their own personal sexual issues. This is a sacrilege! It is a total disrespect for the bible to be used to hide and harm innocent people, most especially children. These people do not check out the facts about the bible and science on homosexuality, because in truth they do not want to know the truth. Even in discourse with people who believe that homosexuality is evil because they say the bible states it to be, as with Galileo, they are not interested in a discussion, they do not want to hear the truth. They only want to discredit the truth, in every conceivable way, by whatever means available to them. They are likely doing what they have been doing all their lives regarding their personal fears about the truth of their sexuality. There is nothing to be gain to be in discourse with such people. In fact, they should be avoided, because they are harmful. Because no matter what they say or how violently they say it, it will not cause the sun to revolve around the earth or for homosexuality to be evil. Photo
ATTACKS and absolutely NO FACTS
from the
BIBLE or SCIENCE
It is a waste of time for you and for them, besides being seriously harmed by their "unchecked meanness" towards others. If and when they do their homework and truly study both the bible and the science regarding homosexuality and human sexuality then there could be a productive discourse. Otherwise, there are no discussions with them; only continuous personal attacks on the person who opposes them that are fierce, cruel and hurtful. Likely, in the way they treat themselves, which may have started when they were treated in such fashion, in their past.
Even Jesus advised leaving them because, as he said, "they are the blind leading the blind" Matthew 15:14. And it is these people who are worried that their freedom of speech will be curtailed, by the new additions to the Hate-Crime Bill. It is only their ability to remain in darkness that is being curtailed, which is greatly more fearful to them, than their concerns about their freedom of speech. They have attacks but absolutely no facts, all motivated by fear and a self-imposed ignorance of the facts. This is the same for Benedict XVI and his hierarchy you never hear any stated facts regarding human sexuality. None!!! They offer absolutely "no" discussion or classes on the topic of human sexuality. None!!! They offer no detailed documentation regarding human sexuality from the bible or science. None!!! Because they know only too well that it would not be approved by scripture scholars or by any scientific studies. Where is the truth, not to mention the LOVE?
Their attacks are likely meant to be distractions to stay off the issue, because any attempts to keep them on the issue are met with fiercer and even more vicious attacks, but no facts, like an obsession. They seem to be like a child throwing a hysterical tantrum, however, unlike a child, they are able to cause serious harm to innocent people. It is this violence that the Hate-Crime Bill is designed to protect people from.
It is the intensity of their forcefulness to attack others without any substantiated facts to support their position that draws public attention to question their sexuality. It is like so many public figures who so forcefully have spoken out against homosexuality and then are found in "public restrooms" engaging in homosexual acts. Today, not only are more people "coming out" of the "closet" but there is an enormous ever growing number of Allies supporting LGBT people and their civil rights. It is the continuous education on human sexuality that keeps this number growing strong. However, it is also becoming more noticeable when someone protest too much against homosexuals with the absence of factual data to support the protesting that catches peoples attention and causes people to wonder, why? What causes this person to protest so strongly, because no valid facts are given?
What should be top priority is the life harm that is caused to children, who grow up LGBT and sadly it is not even considered of any importance. The Bible is about Love the purest form of Love known. The Bible is not about permission to hate, to remain blind or to harm people, especially very young children.
Posted: October 27, 2009
Related links:
GAY YOUTH SUICIDE | BENEDICT XVI & BISHOPS Child Sexual Abuse Cover-ups – Negligence Protecting (1) Children & (2) LGBT Children | Family of Rutgers suicide victim lends name to bill – November 19, 2010 – CNN
NO EVIDENCE SUPPORTS THESE [homosexual] STEREOTYPES
Judge Vaughn Walker Ruling
California Prop 8. August 4, 2010
Related Links:
[Unsubstantiated] --- RELIGIOUS BELIEFS that gay and lesbian relationships are
SINFUL or INFERIOR to heterosexual relationships
HARM gays and lesbians.
Judge Vaughn Walker Ruling
California Prop 8. August 4, 2010
On Prop 8, it's the evidence, stupid
By Lisa Bloom
CNN.com
and related links:
Facts About Homosexuality and Child Molestation
Dr. Gregory Herek,
University of California at Davis &
Yale University &
City University of New York
Report: Homosexuality No Factor in Abusive Priests
by RACHEL ZOLL
ABC News – 2009
New Catholic Sex Abuse Findings:
Gay Priests Are Not the Problem
by DAVID GIBSON
Politics Daily - November 18, 2009
NO EVIDENCE SUPPORTS THESE [homosexual] STEREOTYPES
Judge Vaughn Walker Ruling
California Prop 8. August 4, 2010
Related Links:
American Academy of Pediatrics
The Effects of Marriage, Civil Union, and Domestic Partnership Laws on
the Health and Well-being of Children 2006
American Medical Association
Policy Regarding Sexual Orientation
GLBT Advisory Committee
Children with Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Parents
American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry 2006
National Association of Social Workers (NASW)
Calls Proposition 8 Decision
“A Great Day in the Struggle for Human Rights”
August 11, 2010
Association of Gay and Lesbian Psychiatrists
Support of Legal Recognition of Same-Sex Civil Marriage
2005
Resolution on Sexual Orientation and Marriage - Research Summary
American Psychological Association
2004
New Rules Affirm Pope Benedict's Stance Against Gays
By Daniel Williams,
October 8, 2005 – The Washington Post
ROME, Oct. 8 -- In the first five months of Pope Benedict XVI's reign, stern opposition to homosexuality in and outside the Roman Catholic Church has quickly become a prime public message for the Vatican.
The new pontiff plans to issue guidelines that attempt to inhibit homosexuals from entering seminaries to train for the priesthood. Church inspectors have embarked on a tour of U.S. seminaries and, according to their working papers, are tasked to ask: "Is there evidence of homosexuality in the seminary? (This question must be answered.)"
Benedict also has energetically fought legal recognition of homosexual couples.
For the church and for Benedict, taking a public stance on homosexuality is not unusual. Church observers have noted that for the quarter-century before becoming pope, Benedict, then known as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, served as the Vatican's chief enforcer of orthodoxy, drafting official positions regarding homosexuality.
"No doctrinal chief has ever written and spoken about homosexuality as extensively as Ratzinger has, because homosexuals have never had the freedom to organize and demand recognition they enjoy today," wrote author John L. Allen Jr. in a biography of Benedict, published before he became pope.
His papacy's early focus on homosexuality is a reaction to outside events, some analysts have said: the spread of so-called civil unions or marriage rights to same-sex couples, and the disclosure of sexual abuse by priests. Vatican officials have largely blamed the abuse on homosexuality…
Some bishops note that the church already has prohibitions on homosexuals from entering the priesthood and suggest that a restatement will only make the church look intolerant, Vatican officials say…
Read complete report:
Protecting Children by education about Human Sexuality.
There is a scene in an old TV series called “All in the Family” where Edith Bunker is experiencing menopause and she does not know what is happening to her. Edith’s daughter Gloria is explaining to her the symptoms of menopause. Edith feels bad that her daughter has to tell her about menopause. Photo
Edith expresses her frustration and sadness about her lifetime lack of knowledge about human sexuality.
“When I was a young girl, I didn’t’ know what every young girl should know. Now, I‘m going to be an old lady, and I don’t know what every old lady should know.” Edith Bunker – video clip
“All in the Family - Edith’s problem (TV episode 1972 #2.15)”
Edith is not alone even today. Much of the opposition to same sex marriage is likely to a great degree related to feelings and confusion about many aspects of human sexuality exactly like Edith, on the part of millions of people, for women as well as for men, everyone. However, Ignorance about human sexuality is extremely harmful to children.
“Someday,
maybe, there will exist a well-informed, well considered and yet fervent public conviction that the most deadly of
all possible sins is the mutilation of a child’s spirit.”
…whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a heavy millstone hung around his neck, and to be drowned in the depth of the sea. Photo
Matthew 18:6
Protect children and the entire world will be safe.
Important note: No disrespect meant to Pope Benedict XVI or the hierarchy, the one and only concern is the safety and well-being of children.
Kids Are Being Hurt!!!
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