…The outspoken music star, Sinead O’Connor has composed a letter to Pope Benedict XVI in which she launched a scathing attack on the pontiff for his remarks that pedophilia was theorized in the 1970s as being "fully in conformity with man and even with children"...
The letter reads: An open letter to Pope Benedict from Sinead O'Connor:
...
The letter reads: An open letter to Pope Benedict from Sinead O'Connor:
...
‘In the 1970s pedophilia was theorized [by the church] as something fully in conformity with man and even with children.’ …
Exactly who held the theory that pedophilia was fully in conformity with man and with children? Please give us their names.
Exactly when did they hold this theory? Exactly when if ever did they cease holding the theory?...
Why was it never given to any commissions of enquiry or civil authorities?
Why in all the years since these scandals broke out was yesterday the first mention of this information? …
Read complete letter:
Pope’s child porn 'normal' claim sparks outrage among victims
December 21, 2010 - Belfast Telegraph
Victims of clerical sex abuse have reacted furiously to Pope Benedict's claim yesterday that paedophilia wasn't considered an “absolute evil” as recently as the 1970s…
“Catholics should be embarrassed to hear their Pope talk again and again about abuse while doing little or nothing to stop it and to mischaracterise this heinous crisis,” said Barbara Blaine, the head of SNAP, the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests,
“It is fundamentally disturbing to watch a brilliant man so conveniently misdiagnose a horrific scandal,” she added.
“The Pope insists on talking about a vague ‘broader context' he can't control, while ignoring the clear ‘broader context' he can influence — the long-standing and unhealthy culture of a rigid, secretive, all-male Church hierarchy fixated on self-preservation at all costs. This is the ‘context’ that matters.”
The latest controversy comes as the German magazine Der Spiegel continues to investigate the Pope's role in allowing a known paedophile priest to work with children in the early 1980s…
Read complete report:
Related Links:
Pope Blames 1970s Society for Pedophile Priests
December 21, 2010 – LiveScience
Pope Benedict used his annual speech to Rome's cardinals and bishops on Monday (Dec. 20) to ask them to reflect on the church's responsibility in the child sex abuse scandals.
Benedict qualified his mea culpa by stating that the scandal (in which priests who sexually abused children were often ignored or protected by the Catholic Church) was partly justified by the broader social context. Benedict said that while the church accepted some responsibility, he could not be silent about ''the context of these times.... There is a market in child pornography that seems in some way to be considered more and more normal by society." [History of Pornography No More Prudent Than Present]
Benedict claimed that as recently as the 1970s, "pedophilia was theorized as something fully in conformity with man and even with children." In this climate, the Catholic Church's actions were merely reflecting the moral relativism of the times: "It was maintained — even within the realm of Catholic theology — that there is no such thing as evil in itself or good in itself," Benedict said. That is, church leaders weren't sure if child sexual abuse was wrong, since secular society seemed to accept it.
The pope's statement is actually a logical fallacy with the Latin name of "tu quoque," roughly translated as "you, also," or "you're another." It's a version of a defense heard on schoolyards around the world when a child is caught doing something bad: "Well, he did it too!" This "everyone's doing it" fallacy is often invoked by tax evaders and speeders. One person's illegal or immoral act cannot be used to justify the same act by another person; it just doesn't work that way.
Pope Benedict is simply wrong when he claims that child sexual abuse and pornography were socially acceptable in the 1970s and 1980s, when the bulk of sexual abuse occurred. Even if it were true, there's little reason to think that pedophile priests would be especially susceptible to perceived secular moral decay. The Pope's acknowledgement, that Catholic priests do not have the wisdom nor the moral compass to realize that raping children is wrong or harmful, is a remarkable admission, and hardly comforting…
Read complete report:
The History of Pornography No More Prudish Than the Present
By Stephanie Pappas,
October 11, 2010 - LiveScience
Pornography is often portrayed as one of the ills of today's society, evidence of modern moral decay brought to you by video cameras and broadband access.
As it turns out, modern times have got nothing on the past. Pornography existed long before video or even photography, and many researchers think evolution predisposed humans for visual arousal (It's a lot easier to pass on your genes if the sight of other naked humans turns you on, after all). Whichever way you slice it, the diversity of pornographic materials throughout history suggests that human beings have always been interested in images of sex. Lots and lots of sex.
"Sex has always played a super-important role for human beings and their relationships," said Seth Prosterman, a clinical sexologist and licensed therapist in San Francisco. "What people do sexually has always been a curiosity, and of interest." [RELATED: New Technologies Let Pornography Producers Stay On Top]…
Read complete report:
Benedict XVI - Maintains Ignorance of Human Sexuality
COVERT OPERATIONS | Pornography
Long After Kinsey, Only the Brave Study Sex
By Benedict Carey,
November 9, 2004 - Science Forum
In a scene from the movie "Kinsey," opening in theaters on Friday, government agents seize a box of study materials being shipped by Dr. Alfred C. Kinsey, the pioneering sex researcher, and impound the contents as obscene.
The scene portrays a time in American history, the 1940's and 1950's, when marital relations were rarely discussed and frank reporting about sex was greeted with a collective anxiety verging on horror. In 1948, when Dr. Kinsey published "Sexual Behavior in the Human Male," he was called a pervert, a menace and even a Communist.
Much has changed in the years since then. But scientists say one thing has remained constant: Americans' ambivalence about the scientific study of sexuality.
Decades after the sexual revolution, sex researchers in the United States still operate in a kind of scientific underground, fearing suppression or public censure. In a culture awash in sex talk and advice in magazines and movies and on daytime TV, the researchers present their findings in coded language, knowing that at any time they, like Dr. Kinsey, could be held up as a public threat.
Social scientists say that for all its diverse tastes and freedoms, the nation that invented Viagra and "Sex and the City" is still queasy about exploring sexual desire and arousal, even when this knowledge is central to protecting the public's health.
In July 2003, for instance, Congress threatened to shut down several highly regarded sex studies, including one of emotion and arousal, and another of massage parlor workers. And last summer health officials refused to finance a widely anticipated proposal backed by three large universities to support and train students interested in studying sexuality…
…
That is why almost any discussion of sexuality in minors has been politically radioactive, experts say. In a public condemnation that stunned many sex researchers, Congress in 1999 voted unanimously to denounce a research article in an arcane journal that concluded that some victims of childhood sexual abuse suffered little long-term emotional damage.
The article was not an original experiment but reviewed previous surveys.
The American Psychological Association, which had published the paper, decided to have an independent panel "re-review" it - a decision that outraged some of the group's own members and led some scientists to resign from the organization. Although many experts say the paper was scientifically sound, few have dared even propose a study of sexuality involving minors since then, scientists said.
Pedophilia in particular is off-limits. Psychiatrists and psychologists have studied and tried to treat people imprisoned for sexual crimes, with limited success. But it is not clear whether these convicted felons are representative of all people who have sexual fantasies involving children.
People do not choose to become pedophiles, experts say, but usually discover as adults that they are afflicted with unusual desires, and many long resist the urge to act on them. Researchers know that boys who are sexually abused themselves may be at increased risk of developing pedophilia later on, but they still know little about how these urges develop, or in whom.
"The intensity of the emotion on this issue is so high that it is heresy to express any concern about a person with pedophilia," much less study treatment, said Dr. Fred Berlin, founder of the Johns Hopkins University sexual disorders clinic. He added, "Since the Catholic Church scandal, I don't know anyone who has even had the nerve to suggest that some in the church are ill and need help."…
Read complete report:
Related links:
Benedict XVI PORNOGRAPHY
Why conservatives spend more on pornography
Nigel Barber, Ph.D.,
March 9, 2009 – Psychology Today
As far as online adult entertainment is concerned, the Red states are also the red light states. Eight of the top ten pornography consuming states went for McCain in the presidential election (the two exceptions, Florida and Hawaii went democratic).
The biggest consumer of Internet pornography was Utah with 5.47 subscriptions per thousand home broadband users compared to Montana the lowest state with 1.92 subscribers per thousand (1). Study author, Benjamin Edelman of Harvard Business School focused on broadband users because pornography is a bandwidth hog. Edelman was also careful to rule out the age distribution of the population, income, education, population density, marriage rates and other characteristics that might make state comparisons unfair. Utah still wound up at the top of the heap.
Utah's top ranking surprises many. One can think of many adjectives to describe the state: religious, conservative, family-oriented, outdoorsy, clean-living, but few would have guessed top-pornography-consuming. Many would find it easier to attribute such interests to western neighbor Nevada, a center for gambling and prostitution. Ironically, Nevada doesn't even make it to the top ten.
States that banned gay marriage had 11 percent more porn subscribers. The level of agreement in a state with the statement that "Even today miracles are performed by the power of God" predicted higher pornography consumption. States claiming to have old-fashioned values about family and marriage purchased substantially more adult-content subscriptions…
Really cracking down on sexual nonconformity is remarkably tough. The early Christian monks who were constantly on their guard against sexual thoughts ended up being obsessed with it.
Read complete report:
Related links:
Homosexuality in Sodom and Gomorrah
by The Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson
December 8, 2010
The Washington Post
SEXUAL ORIENTATION is less about sex and more about LOVE, being one with another human being - ATTACHMENT THEORY | “Auschwitz – Benedict XVI - Christmas 2008 - Brokeback Mountain” (NP)
30 years of Ratzinger/Benedict XVI’s - Directives To Hierarchy – To make - THREATS, SILENCE, HARM AND DISPOSAL of Catholic Personnel Supportive of LGBT Adults and Children
Vatican Bank mired in laundering scandal
By Nicole Winfield and Victor L. Simpson
Dec 11, 2010 The Associated Press –
Bloomberg
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.
Gay Marriage - WITCH HUNTS ->The Crucible (1996) -> McCarthyism 1940’s -1950’s, -> Benedict XVI 2005
Ignorance, Arrogance, Indifference - Propaganda - BENEDICT XVI & BISHOPS - Child Sexual Abuse COVER-UPS – November 27, 2010
BENEDICT XVI & BISHOPS - Child Sexual Abuse COVER-UPS
COVERT OPERATIONS
Watergate
“…The cover-up had little to do with the Watergate, but was mainly to protect the covert operations.”
The operation [Watergate] was described…as "professional" and "clandestine."
“What the Pope Knew”
Gary Tuchman,
September 25, 2010,
CNN & CNN International
(Investigative documentary)
video
Read more/related links:
Priest says he was pressurised into taking blame for pope
– by PADDY AGNEW, DEREK SCALLY and PATSY McGARRY
4/19/10
Priest says he was bullied into taking fall for Pope in abuse scandal
- The Local – 4/18/10
Germany’s News In English – read more
Ratzinger & Vatican
“They did as much as they had at each point in time given the public outcry, and no more.”
Katrin Bennhold – 4/27/10
The New York Times – read more
“…the church must … end its campaign to block the weak and the vulnerable from receiving help to deal with the consequences of criminal sexual abuse.”
By Lawrence Lessig – 4/26/10
The New York Times – read more
Hurricane Katrina - Nancy Pelosi - Washington, DC – 2005
& Accountability
Benedict XVI Child Sexual Abuse
Who Can Mock This Church?
By Nicholas D. Kristof
May 1, 2010
The New York Times
Pope Blasts U.K. Anti-Discrimination Laws
CBS NEWS
Pope hits out at 'unjust and offensive' accusations over Boffo resignation
Richard Owen
Times Online – February 9, 2010
Italian Catholic scandal draws in Pope Benedict
By NICOLE WINFIELD – AP
abc NEWS/International – February 9, 2010
“This is about the reckless endangerment of children in a calculated, purposeful strategy to protect the institutional Church”
December 2, 2009
Ireland released a report into 30 years of Catholic priest abuse of children in Dublin that found the police frequently looked the other way to protect accused clerics.
Dublin, Ireland
That the Catholic church covered up sexual abuse by priests for years is hardly news anymore. But the highest-profile investigation into abuse allegations yet in Ireland found another breach of public trust: The Garda Síochána, the police force for the republic, failed to investigate reports of priest abusing children and conspired to protect Catholic officials in Dublin for 30 years. Photo
The commission on child abuse by Catholic priests in Dublin led by Judge Yvonne Murphy released its long-awaited report on the matter last week. Justice Murphy's commission investigated how allegations of child sex abuse by priests in the Catholic archdiocese of Dublin were dealt with by both state and church authorities from 1975 to 2004. The report slammed the Catholic hierarchy in Ireland and, for the first time, reprimanded state agencies, particularly the Garda. Photo
Unlike the Catholic sex abuse scandal uncovered by The Boston Globe in the archdiocese of Boston in 2002 where, instead of reporting the incidents to police, the dioceses directed the offenders to seek psychiatric treatment, in Ireland children, parents, and others reported suspicions of abuse to police but investigations did not follow. Many cases were simply referred back to church authorities instead. Photo Boston
Garda Commissioner Fachtna Murphy said that the report exposed "misguided or undue deference" shown by the police to religious institutions and said, "That has no place in criminal investigations, it certainly has no place in 2009 under my watch." "This is not about failings or learning curves. This about the reckless endangerment of children in a calculated, purposeful strategy to protect the institutional Church," said the abuse charity One in Four in a press release.
Read complete article:
Pope 'led cover-up of child abuse by priests'
2006 - London Evening Standard
standard.co.uk
Church in worst credibility crisis since Reformation,
theologian tells bishops
by HANS KÜNG,
April 16, 2010 – The Irish Times
Catholic Church sex abuse documents made public
By Gillian Flaccus,
Associated Press, October 25, 2010 - Salon
“If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!” Mt 6:23 | Benedict XVI – “Light of the World” | Hitler – “Mein Kampf” | NARCISSISTIC BULLY | WORLD REMAINS SILENT
New Rules Affirm Pope Benedict's Stance Against Gays
By Daniel Williams,
October 8, 2005 – The Washington Post
Professor's view:
Witch hunt for gay priests off base
when target
should be child abusers
By: Iver Bogen,
University of Minnesota Duluth - Duluth News Tribune
Pope Benedict XVI in August 2005 ordered an investigation of America’s 229 Catholic seminaries in order to eliminate gay seminarians. The week of Sept. 27, Vatican investigators began the “witch-hunt” at the Aquinas Institute of Theology in St. Louis. The question posed to the students: “Are you, or have you ever been, a homosexual?”
The investigation was reminiscent of the house arrest of Galileo in his home near Florence from 1633 until his death in 1642 for espousing the Copernican heliocentric view of the universe. The church does not suffer “heretical” thinking well and is extremely slow in altering its doctrines to be consistent with scientific progress as well as changes in cultural mores regarding acceptable human behaviors… photo
… It is my belief the Catholic Church’s focus on gay priests is merely a strategy for affixing blame and is consistent with its historical antipathy toward homosexuality and same-sex behaviors. However, research in the area of child sexual abuse suggests that pedophilic intrusions occur preponderantly with heterosexual males rather than gay men. It is not one’s orientation that is predictive of pedophilia. According to Dr. Nathaniel McConaghy, “The man who offends against prepubertal or immediately postpubertal boys is typically not sexually interested in older men or women.”
Being immature psycho-sexually, these men find themselves responding sexually to other males who also are immature. One’s orientation is not predictive of pedophilia. Read complete article - By: Iver Bogen, University of Minnesota Duluth - Duluth News Tribune
Critical Study Finds Direct Link - Between School Victimization Of Gender-Nonconforming Lgbt Youth With - Depression And Quality Of Life In Adulthood
by Dr. Caitlin Ryan
October 4, 2010 - Family Acceptance Project™
San Francisco State University
OCTOBER 4, 2010 - New research has found that lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) youth who do not conform to societal gender norms have compromised mental health that is clearly linked to the bullying and harassment they receive in school. The study, to be published in the November 2010 edition of Developmental Psychology, is the first to thoroughly analyze the relationship between the victimization suffered by gender non-conforming LGBT students and their psychosocial adjustment as young adults.
Analyzing data from the Family Acceptance Project’s young adult survey, the authors examined the school-related experiences of 245 LGBT young adults, ages 21 to 25. They found that LGBT young adults who did not socially conform to gender roles as adolescents reported higher levels of anti-LGBT victimization, with significantly higher levels of depression and decreased life satisfaction in young adulthood. This research shows that the negative impact of anti-LGBT school victimization affects both quality of life and the LGBT young adult’s capacity to enjoy life. Most crucially, the findings show that anti-LGBT bullying in school largely accounts for this psychological harm.
The study calls for schools to take action to address the bullying, violence, and social isolation that gender-nonconforming LGBT youth face, including the implementation of education programs for students and faculty, offering support programs including Gay-Straight Alliances (GSAs), and protecting students through robust nondiscrimination policies.
Co-author Stephen T. Russell said: “There is increasing attention on anti-LGBT bullying in schools. Our research makes it crystal clear that anti-LGBT bullying is a major reason that youth who don’t conform to gender rules or expectations have poorer mental health later in life.” Added co-author Russell Toomey: “Clearly, gender nonconforming and LGBT students need protections in schools that are specific to their sexual orientation and gender identities to interrupt the strong link between bias-victimization and poorer mental health.”
By proactively supporting gender-nonconforming and LGBT youth, the authors conclude that schools can change the hostile and harmful environments these adolescents face each day, and prevent future tragedies such as the suicides of Asher Brown in Texas and Seth Walsh in California and the 2008 murder of fifteen-year-old Lawrence King.
Concluded co-author, Caitlin Ryan, Director of the Family Acceptance Project: “Each day we see tragedies directly related to anti-LGBT school victimization. This study provides clear evidence of the lasting effects of school bullying related to gender expression and LGBT identity. Schools can no longer turn a blind eye to these problems without being held accountable for the mental health problems these children suffer.”
The Family Acceptance Project is a community research, intervention, education and policy initiative that studies the impact of family acceptance and rejection on the health, mental health and well being of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) youth. Results are being used to help families provide support for LGBT youth; to improve their health and mental health outcomes; to strengthen families and help maintain LGBT youth in their homes; to develop appropriate programs and policies; and train providers to improve the quality of services and care these youth receive in a wide range of settings. The Family Acceptance Project is based at San Francisco State University.
For more information, please visit
"Impending rules on gay priests create Catholic divide"
by Charles Honey – October 8, 2005
The Grand Rapids Press
When the Rev. Martin Kurylowicz came out to his Sparta parish eight years ago, he said he had struggled for years with his homosexuality.
The Catholic priest says the struggle would be made harder for many others if the Vatican issues new rules that reportedly would ban gays from becoming priests…
…"I sizzled when I read it," said Kurylowicz, 55. "It's very hurtful, is what it is. In this day and age, there's no reason for it. It sends a message that there's something wrong with gays."
Kurylowicz said he spoke out then to raise awareness of violence against gays and teach others homosexuality is not a choice but an inborn trait. Church leaders still don't understand that and contribute to gays' poor self-esteem, he said…
…"Kids as young as 4 or 5 know they're different," said Kurylowicz, a psychotherapist… "They grow up with this pervasive guilt, which sabotages their growth and motivation." The result is thousands of dollars in therapy to accept their natural orientation, he said, adding, "Does the Vatican want to take that on, like the tobacco industry had to take on for the damage it caused consumers? "…
Read complete article:
by Charles Honey
Religion Editor
The Grand Rapids Press – Archives
Watergate 1973
Ripping Open An Incredible Scandal
(TIME, April 30, 1973) -- The denials, the evasions, the secretiveness, and, yes, the lies, all had failed. The Watergate case was breaking wide open. A 10-month campaign by some of the highest past and present officials of the Nixon Administration to cover up their involvement was crumbling. Read more - CNN TIME Photo Nixon
Roman Catholic - hierarchy child sexual abuse
“cover-ups”
ordered by Benedict XVI
to avoid public outrage & criminal charges
- falsely accused gay priests - WATERGATE?
No “Checks and Balances”
A major problem with the hierarchical structure of the Roman Catholic Church is that there are no “checks and balances.” When the necessary “checks and balances” are not in place to protect any organization, it leaves “not making waves” the rule that governs the hierarchy and opens the way to many devastating mistakes harmful to everyone and allows corruption to grow.
The following statements are harsh statements, but unfortunately they are heavily documented. (1) Benedict XVI and his hierarchy failed to protect children from child sexual abuse for decades. (2) They mistreated and intimidated the victims and their families who came to report the child sexual abuse, in order to cover up publicity of any child sexual abuse. (3) They failed to protect children by repeatedly reassigning the child sexual abusers to assignments where children would be present. (4) When the hierarchy’s criminal negligence failing to protect children became public, globally, in 2002 they shifted the blame wrongfully onto gay priests. Photo
Read complete report:
Child Protection Service of the Archdiocese of Dublin http://www.justice.ie/en/JELR/Pages/PB09000504
(5) By falsely, against known research to the contrary, blaming gay priests they implicated the entire LGBT community and how they are fighting against Marriage Equality. When the scientific facts known for decades about human sexuality have been discounted with no substantiated facts given to explain why, it causes many questions whether Benedict XVI and the hierarchy’s fight against Marriage Equality is more a fight to maintained the cover-up of the hierarchy’s criminal negligence failing to protect children? Benedict XVI and his hierarchy need to clearly offer substantiated reasons why they are against Marriage Equality. This statement needs to be spelled out in great detail and follow Pope John Paul II’s test of truth of not separating science and religion. Photo Nixon
(6) Benedict XVI and the hierarchy’s continuous public propaganda against homosexuality encourages public intolerance towards LGBTQ&I adults and children. They continue to do this even though this summer 2 major Christian denominations approved LGBT singled and partnered people for all forms of ordained ministries. (7) Benedict XVI and the hierarchy’s continuous promulgation of the Vatican’s unsubstantiated antigay teachings that are harmful to children in their early childhood psychological developmental years, harm that is crippling throughout their lives. They have continued this even after the beginning of the year, 2009, the Family Acceptance Project research studies had shown the negative effects caused to youths, when their sexual orientation is not accepted, having health problems, suicidal ideation, etc. They ignore all the major medical, psychiatric, psychological and social workers national and international professional associations regarding their findings regarding human sexuality and sexual orientation. WHEN DO WE START PROTECTING CHILDREN?!?!
Written by Fr. Marty Kurylowicz
December 17, 2009 – Revised January 15, 2010
Facts About Homosexuality and Child Molestation
Dr. Gregory Herek,
University of California at Davis &
Yale University &
City University of New York
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:
July 2010
President of the United States
United States Congress
United States Supreme Court
50 United States Governors
Dear -- --------,
My name is Fr. Marty Kurylowicz, a Roman Catholic priest from the Diocese of Grand Rapids Michigan ordained June 16, 1979.
In March 1997, after attending a National Symposium of the New Ways Ministry that was held in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, I learned that children as young as 4 and 5 years of age know that they are different. This feeling "different" is only identified in their adult years as being gay. However, the harmful influence of antigay social and religious norms -- in particular, for Catholics, the Vatican’s unsubstantiated antigay teachings -- are severe and last throughout a child’s lifetime. The harmful effects are not isolated only to these children who grow up to be gay, but also affect their families, siblings, friends and anyone whom they might consider special in their lives. They are a prescribed societal sentence of implicit isolation, which place at risk of suicide so many innocent adolescents and young adults. They stifle an enormous amount of human potential in the world that otherwise could be put to use for finding cures for diseases, offering better ways of maintaining peace among people and improving the quality of life for everyone in the world.
Gay Marriage - “SEPARATION BETWEEN CHURCH AND STATE” Does Not Give Churches Or Benedict XVI - The Freedom To Abuse Children or Adults. July 2010 - By Fr. Marty Kurylowicz
Ratzinger, Hurley, Maida & Accomplices
Kids Are Being Hurt!!!
(Sequential Order of Reactions)” November 28, 2010
“If you shut up truth and bury it under the ground, it will but grow, and gather to itself such explosive power that the day it bursts through it will blow up everything in its way.”
Emile Zola
What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight, and what you have whispered in the ear in the inner rooms will be proclaimed from the roofs.
Luke 12:3
"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."
Overview
FAP Family Video Series
Helping diverse families understand how to support their LGBT children takes resources that touch the heart – view video
Youth Development Current Trends
Dr. Caitlin Ryan and The Family Acceptance Projects’ Study of LGBT Youth
December 13, 2010
National Association of Social Workers
Related links:
Homosexuality in Sodom and Gomorrah
by The Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson
December 8, 2010 – The Washington Post
Gender-Nonconforming Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Youth:
School Victimization and Young Adult Psychosocial Adjustment
- Developmental Psychology © 2010 American Psychological Association
2010, Vol. 46, No. 6, 1580–1589
The Protective Effect of Family Acceptance for Gay Teens
Prayers for Bobby (2009) (TV)
…Prayers for Bobby is the amazing true story of a mother torn between her loyalties, challenged by her faith, and moved by a tragedy that would change her life, and the lives of others, forever.
Bobby Griffith (Ryan Kelly, Smallville) was his mother's favorite son, the perfect all-American boy growing up under deeply religious influences in Walnut Creek, California. Bobby was also gay. Struggling with a conflict no one knew of much less understood Bobby finally came out to his family. Despite the tentative support of his father, two sisters, and older brother, Bobby's mother, Mary (three time Academy Award nominee and Golden Globe winner Sigourney Weaver, Avatar, Working Girl), turned to the fundamentalist teachings of her church to rescue her son from what she felt was an irredeemable sin. As Mary came closer to the realization that Bobby could not be "healed," she rejected him, denying him a mother's unconditional love, and driving her favorite son to suicide.
Anguished over Bobby's death, Mary finds little solace in her son's poignant diaries, revelations of a troubled boy fighting for the love of his mother and God. Finding it difficult to reconcile her feelings of guilt, her conflicted emotions over religious teachings, and her struggles with understanding her son's orientation, Mary finally, and unexpectedly, reaches out to the gay community as a source of inspiration and consolation. For Mary Griffith, it's the beginning of a long and emotional journey that extended beyond acceptance to her viable role a vocal advocate for gay and lesbian youth. In 1996, twelve years after Bobby's death, she was invited to address the Congress of the United States, establishing her as a major force in the fight for human rights.'
Read more:
Watch video clip:
Difference Between Life & Death
Being “In” And Living “Out” Of The Closet
"Why, It Is A 'Gift' From God!!!" - Monastic Wisdom - Absolute Fright For Benedict XVI
March 1997 “Coming Out”
"$126,000.00 as reported by Bishop Walter Hurley, May 27, 2006 – The Grand Rapids Press"
By Fr. Marty Kurylowicz
“KNOW YOURSELF”
JOHN PAUL II
ENCYCLICAL LETTER
FIDES ET RATIO
OF THE SUPREME PONTIFF
JOHN PAUL II
TO THE BISHOPS
OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
ON THE RELATIONSHIP
BETWEEN FAITH AND REASON – September 15, 1998
Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth; and God has placed in the human heart a desire to know the truth—in a word, to know himself—so that, by knowing and loving God, men and women may also come to the fullness of truth about themselves (cf. Ex 33:18; Ps 27:8-9; 63:2-3; Jn 14:8; 1 Jn 3:2).
INTRODUCTION
“KNOW YOURSELF”
1. In both East and West, we may trace a journey which has led humanity down the centuries to meet and engage truth more and more deeply. It is a journey which has unfolded—as it must—within the horizon of personal self-consciousness: the more human beings know reality and the world, the more they know themselves in their uniqueness, with the question of the meaning of things and of their very existence becoming ever more pressing. This is why all that is the object of our knowledge becomes a part of our life. The admonition Know yourself was carved on the temple portal at Delphi, as testimony to a basic truth to be adopted as a minimal norm by those who seek to set themselves apart from the rest of creation as “human beings”, that is as those who “know themselves”.
…
(29) “[Galileo] declared explicitly that the two truths, of faith and of science, can never contradict each other, 'Sacred Scripture and the natural world proceeding equally from the divine Word, the first as dictated by the Holy Spirit, the second as a very faithful executor of the commands of God', as he wrote in his letter to Father Benedetto Castelli on 21 December 1613. The Second Vatican Council says the same thing, even adopting similar language in its teaching: 'Methodical research, in all realms of knowledge, if it respects... moral norms, will never be genuinely opposed to faith: the reality of the world and of faith have their origin in the same God' (Gaudium et Spes, 36). Galileo sensed in his scientific research the presence of the Creator who, stirring in the depths of his spirit, stimulated him, anticipating and assisting his intuitions”: John Paul II, Address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences (10 November 1979): Insegnamenti, II, 2 (1979), 1111-1112.
Read complete Encyclical Letter:
Fides Et Ratio
Of The Supreme Pontiff
John Paul II http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_15101998_fides-et-ratio_en.html
“Science can purify religion from error and superstition; religion can purify science from idolatry and false absolutes.
Each can draw the other into a wider world, a world in which both can flourish.”
Faith can never conflict with reason
The 'Galileo case' teaches us that different branches of knowledge call for different methods, each of which brings out various aspects of reality. http://www.its.caltech.edu/~nmcenter/sci-cp/sci-9211.html
“There are no irreconcilable differences
between science and faith”
PopeJohn Paul II
This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man. - William Shakespeare
Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, 'Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,' when you yourself fail to see the plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye. - Luke 6:40-42
Ricky Martin on Coming out and Coming Into His Own
- By Nekesa Mumbi Moody AP,
November 3, 2010 – ABC News
"What, am I gonna teach them how to lie?”
Ricky Martin
Ricky Martin reveals he ‘cried like a baby’ after coming out
– November 2, 2010 – PinkNews.co.uk
Ricky Martin has told Oprah Winfrey about the moment he decided to announce he was gay.
The Puerto Rican star posted a message on his website declaring himself to be a “fortunate gay man” but says he broke down in tears afterwards.
He said: “When I realised, okay, I just pressed send, whoo… I was alone.
“I was in my studio alone for a minute. My assistant walked in and I just started crying like a little baby. I started crying.”
The 38-year-old said he decided to be open about his sexuality to set a good example to his twin sons, Valentine and Matteo, two.
He said: “I couldn’t take it anymore, it was too painful.
“But I guess the most important thing is my children… When I was holding them in my arms I was like, ‘What, am I gonna teach them how to lie?’ Whoa, that is my blessing right there. Then, when I was holding my children I said, ‘Okay, it’s time to tell the world’.”
Read more:
Ricky Martin cried 'like a baby' after revealing his sexuality
– November 2, 2010
CNN.com
Pope Benedict to Beatify a
Gay Saint?
A Conservative Icon? Maybe Both
by David Gibson – September 18, 2010
Politics Daily
…"It is not good for a Pope to live 20 years," Newman once wrote of the long-lived Pius IX. "It is an anomaly and bears no good fruit; he becomes a god, has no one to contradict him, does not know facts, and does cruel things without meaning it."
Such frank talk about the failings of the hierarchy tended to make Newman a champion of liberal Catholics -- a courageous man who wrote about the "development of doctrine" in the church at a time when the Vatican was projecting an image of unceasing continuity. He also disagreed strongly with the church's adoption of the doctrine of papal infallibility, and famously wrote that if pressed, he would drink "to Conscience first and the Pope afterwards." Photo
…Complicating all the interpretations is the fact that Newman had an extraordinarily close relationship with another English Catholic, Father Ambrose St. John, who had died in 1875, leaving Newman bereft -- and giving today's gay Christians an icon of their own.
"I have ever thought no bereavement was equal to that of a husband's or a wife's, but I feel it difficult to believe that any can be greater, or any one's sorrow greater, than mine," Newman wrote at the time of his friend's death. "From the first he loved me with an intensity of love which was unaccountable." And elsewhere: "As far as this world was concerned I was his first and last."
Sexual orientation - Internalized Homophobia
“Auschwitz – Benedict XVI - Christmas 2008 -A flashback far more severe than in Brokeback Mountain”
GAY TEENAGE SUICIDE - Fr. Marty Kurylowicz
Nothing in life is more precious than the intimate relationships we have with love ones. Healthy love relationships delight us give us confidence to take on challenges and support us in difficult times. Photo
Gay marriage -> Restoring
"Hope of Love"
To Children In Early Childhood -> Marriage Equality
March 23, 2010 – by Fr. Marty Kurylowicz
Marriage Equality, like Galileo, is the truth about the facts of growing up gay. Marriage Equality will not become a reality until people learn that its most vital purpose is that it restores the “hope of love” to children in early childhood – essential to their development and well-being for life. Without Marriage Equality we teach children how to hate love and how to be mean and indifferent to people as adults. With all due respect, without Marriage Equality we would teach them in much the same way as has been shown by Benedict XVI and the hierarchy, especially in their lack of care and protection of children for decades.
Galileo
Biblical quotes used to Condemn Galileo
Ecclesiastes 1:5 (New International Version)
5 The sun rises and the sun sets, and hurries back to where it rises.
Ecclesiastes 1:5 (New American Standard Bible)
5 Also, the sun rises and the sun sets; And hastening to its place it rises there again.
1 Chronicles 16:30 (New International Version)
30 Tremble before him, all the earth!
The world is firmly established; it cannot be moved.
1 Chronicles 16:30 (New American Standard Bible)
30 Tremble before Him, all the earth; Indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not be moved.
Psalm 93:1 (New International Version)
1 The LORD reigns, he is robed in majesty;
the LORD is robed in majesty
and is armed with strength. The world is firmly established; it cannot be moved.
Psalm 93:1 (New American Standard Bible)
1 The LORD reigns, He is clothed with majesty; The LORD has clothed and girded Himself with strength; Indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not be moved.
Psalm 96:10 (New International Version)
10 Say among the nations, "The LORD reigns."
The world is firmly established, it cannot be moved;
he will judge the peoples with equity.
Psalm 96:10 (New American Standard Bible)
10 Say among the nations, "The LORD reigns; Indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not be moved; He will judge the peoples with equity."
Psalm 104:5 (New International Version)
5 He set the earth on its foundations; it can never be moved.
Psalm 104:5 (New American Standard Bible)
5 He established the earth upon its foundations, So that it will not totter forever and ever.
Read more:
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.
Fr. Marty Kurylowicz
“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!!!
ANGELS IN AMERICA
[Official HBO Trailer]
I'M HIS CHILD
Zella Jackson Price
The President Signs Repeal of "Don't Ask Don't Tell":
"Out of Many, We Are One"
December 22, 2010 – The White House
With his signature today, the President put in motion the end of a policy that has hurt our military as a whole, that has forced thousands of those who serve to do so under a cloud of anxiety and isolation, and that has stood as a symbol of the barriers to unity and equality in our country. As the President put it, "For we are not a nation that says, 'don't ask, don’t tell.' We are a nation that says, 'Out of many, we are one.'"
View video:
Admiral Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff – one of many to receive a standing ovation during the signing ceremony – has made the case consistently on the effect this policy has had on thousands of our troops, and the President quoted him saying “Our people sacrifice a lot for their country, including their lives. None of them should have to sacrifice their integrity as well.” The President added:
I want to express my gratitude to the men and women in this room who have worn the uniform of the United States Armed Services. (Applause.) I want to thank all the patriots who are here today, all of them who were forced to hang up their uniforms as a result of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” -- but who never stopped fighting for this country, and who rallied and who marched and fought for change. I want to thank everyone here who stood with them in that fight.
The entire event was profound, and the President's remarks are well worth reading in full, but perhaps the most moving part of the President’s remarks was a story he opened with:
You know, I am just overwhelmed. This is a very good day. (Applause.) And I want to thank all of you, especially the people on this stage, but each and every one of you who have been working so hard on this, members of my staff who worked so hard on this. I couldn’t be prouder.
Sixty-six years ago, in the dense, snow-covered forests of Western Europe, Allied Forces were beating back a massive assault in what would become known as the Battle of the Bulge. And in the final days of fighting, a regiment in the 80th Division of Patton’s Third Army came under fire. The men were traveling along a narrow trail. They were exposed and they were vulnerable. Hundreds of soldiers were cut down by the enemy.
And during the firefight, a private named Lloyd Corwin tumbled 40 feet down the deep side of a ravine. And dazed and trapped, he was as good as dead. But one soldier, a friend, turned back. And with shells landing around him, amid smoke and chaos and the screams of wounded men, this soldier, this friend, scaled down the icy slope, risking his own life to bring Private Corwin to safer ground.
For the rest of his years, Lloyd credited this soldier, this friend, named Andy Lee, with saving his life, knowing he would never have made it out alone. It was a full four decades after the war, when the two friends reunited in their golden years, that Lloyd learned that the man who saved his life, his friend Andy, was gay. He had no idea. And he didn’t much care. Lloyd knew what mattered. He knew what had kept him alive; what made it possible for him to come home and start a family and live the rest of his life. It was his friend.
And Lloyd’s son is with us today. And he knew that valor and sacrifice are no more limited by sexual orientation than they are by race or by gender or by religion or by creed; that what made it possible for him to survive the battlefields of Europe is the reason that we are here today. (Applause.) That's the reason we are here today. (Applause.)
Read complete report & relaed links:
Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), chairman of the Armed Services Committee - unyielding force supporting - DON'T ASK, DON'T TELL Repeal Act of 2010 – ENDS discriminatory policy that “forces young men and women to lie,” – to lie – “about who they are in order to defend their fellow citizens.”
July 2010
President of the United States
United States Congress
United States Supreme Court
50 United States Governors
Dear -- --------,
My name is Fr. Marty Kurylowicz, a Roman Catholic priest from the Diocese of Grand Rapids Michigan ordained June 16, 1979.
In March 1997, after attending a National Symposium of the New Ways Ministry that was held in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, I learned that children as young as 4 and 5 years of age know that they are different. This feeling "different" is only identified in their adult years as being gay. However, the harmful influence of antigay social and religious norms -- in particular, for Catholics, the Vatican’s unsubstantiated antigay teachings -- are severe and last throughout a child’s lifetime. The harmful effects are not isolated only to these children who grow up to be gay, but also affect their families, siblings, friends and anyone whom they might consider special in their lives. They are a prescribed societal sentence of implicit isolation, which place at risk of suicide so many innocent adolescents and young adults. They stifle an enormous amount of human potential in the world that otherwise could be put to use for finding cures for diseases, offering better ways of maintaining peace among people and improving the quality of life for everyone in the world.
Gay Marriage - “SEPARATION BETWEEN CHURCH AND STATE” Does Not Give Churches Or Benedict XVI - The Freedom To Abuse Children or Adults. July 2010 - By Fr. Marty Kurylowicz http://fathermartykurylowicz.blogspot.com/2010/09/gay-marriage-separation-between-church.html
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
Critical Study Finds Direct Link - Between School Victimization Of Gender-Nonconforming Lgbt Youth With - Depression And Quality Of Life In Adulthood
by Dr. Caitlin Ryan
October 4, 2010 - Family Acceptance Project™
San Francisco State University
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