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The Anthropology Of Orientation – David S. Crawford

May 10, 2013
The bulk of Sappho’s poetry, which was well-known and greatly admired through much of antiquity, has been lost, but her immense reputation has endured through surviving fragments. Sappho's poetry centers on passion and love for various people and both sexes. The narrators of many of her poems speak of infatuations and love (sometimes requited, sometimes not) for various females, but descriptions of physical acts between women are few and subject to debate. Whether these poems are meant to be autobiographical is not known, although elements of other parts of Sappho's life do make appearances in her work, and it would be compatible with her style to have these intimate encounters expressed poetically, as well. Her homoerotica should be placed in the context of the 7th century (BCE). The poems of Alcaeus and later Pindar record similar romantic bonds between the members of a given circle.

The bulk of Sappho’s poetry, which was well-known and greatly admired through much of antiquity, has been lost, but her immense reputation has endured through surviving fragments. Sappho’s poetry centers on passion and love for various people and both sexes. The narrators of many of her poems speak of infatuations and love (sometimes requited, sometimes not) for various females, but descriptions of physical acts between women are few and subject to debate. Whether these poems are meant to be autobiographical is not known, although elements of other parts of Sappho’s life do make appearances in her work, and it would be compatible with her style to have these intimate encounters expressed poetically, as well. Her homoerotica should be placed in the context of the 7th century (BCE). The poems of Alcaeus and later Pindar record similar romantic bonds between the members of a given circle.

Because Christianity has never claimed that revelation is or should be a direct source of civil law and has always “pointed to nature and reason as the true sources of law – and to the harmony between objective and subjective reason, which naturally presupposes that both spheres are rooted in the creative reason of God,” it has met its match in a modernist legal positivism which demands “an unbridgeable gulf” between “‘is’ and ‘ought.’” If nature “is viewed as ‘an aggregate of objective data linked together in terms of cause and effect,’ then indeed no ethical indication of any kind can be derived from it. So the new lesson for Catholics is: don’t look at the law and the courts to support your religious beliefs. 

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The point then is this: the entire modern conception of law and its meaning favors the mechanistic view of physicality and the separate, bodiless conception of the fully human. Indeed, this view generates the standards of rationality and argumentation employed on all sides in the debate over “gay marriage.”

Consider the claim that there is no legally cognizable difference between “same-sex couples” and  infertile “opposite-sex couples” or  fertile “opposite-sex couples” and  “same-sex couples” employing reproductive technologies. To borrow Benedict’s language, this is an entirely “functionalistic” view of the body’s sexual and procreative meaning.

It would appear that the body’s procreativity can be entirely replaced by the technical processes of the lab without any real loss of its essential humanity. Rather, its replacement would be an enhancement of the humanity of conception and birth. We also see these assumptions at work in the argument that man and woman are essentially interchangeable for all legally cognizable purposes.

That civil marriage would be by definition the union of a man and a woman, a union which normally and naturally results in children, means that a (perhaps, the) primary polarity underlying and shaping social and personal identity – and giving cultural form to social life – is that between man and woman. This is a question not just of “function” but of personal and social identity; it is a question of what we think the human being and society most fundamentally are and what we think the place of the child in that society is. More fundamentally, the social significance of this polarity allows for the integration of sexuality and love, the integration of the body’s inherent order and its implications for bodily acts as fully personal.

The sameness argument signals the rapidly approaching extinction of this polarity as personally and socially decisive. Indeed, it implies its replacement by another anthropology, that expressed by the concept of “orientation.” If this concept means nothing else, it means that the identity of the person is no longer grounded in either masculinity or femininity as naturally and personally ordained to each other and as expressed by the body. The shift therefore effectively demotes the meaning of sexual difference – the correspondence of the male and female bodies as such – to a sub-personal and purely material (“biological”) significance.

The body in its sexual ordination – and the implications extend beyond sexuality – is therefore no longer decisive for the person. Rather, a person’s sexual desire and freedom possess a fundamentally arbitrary and indifferent relationship to his or her body’s natural correlation to the opposite sex. The relationship between man and woman therefore becomes merely a variant, a particular “orientation,” grafted onto what is in fact an underlying androgynous anthropology.

That this new paradigm is actually displacing the former – so that the former is increasingly unavailable as a form of social and personal identity – is evident when we consider the fuller implications of the sameness argument. Of course, it is the very purpose of the concept to redefine the meaning of sexuality altogether. Were this not the case, the concept would fail to treat “gay” relationships as equivalent to traditional man-woman relations. Hence, it is part of the very logic of the concept that it characterizes both same-sex relationships and the man-woman relationship as merely alternative “orientations.”

But in doing so, the new category abstracts the essence of sexuality from the natural correspondence of man and woman. Thus, sexual attraction, according to the conceptual world of orientations, displaces this natural correspondence as the explanation for a given person’s sexuality. Hence, if a man and woman are attracted to each other it is not because of the natural correspondence of the sexes; it is because they happen to have a particular “orientation,” that of “heterosexuality,”  rather than another, that of “homosexuality.”

But this in turn suggests that whatever correspondence there may be between the male and female bodies is only an accident of the sub-personal mechanisms of physicality. Personal correspondence, on the other hand, is due to an individual’s “orientation,” which is conceived as fundamentally indifferent to the underlying natural correspondence of the bodies, since it can just as legitimately be directed toward the opposite (biological) sex or toward the same (biological) sex (or to both).

The problem with this developing anthropology, and its codification in law, is that it is impoverished as a human form. The identity of the person is no longer grounded in his masculinity or her femininity understood as a personal-somatic ordination of love; it is, rather, grounded in his or her “orientation” and thereby removed from the body as an expression of the person. Hence, the extinction of the sexual difference is also an extinction of the personal-somatic ordination of man and woman.

Rather, if “orientations” really are conceived as equivalent and parallel, if the difference of the sexes has been lost to an underlying androgynous sameness, then the unavoidable fact of the sexually differentiated body has been reduced in its significance to being merely the biological and material conditions and circumstances of sexual acts of whatever kind. The “different-sex” arrangement of marriage and family, while not rejected as a possibility of desire and choice, is nevertheless reduced to constituting the manifestation of simply one of the possible “orientations.” It is, again, simply grafted onto an underlying androgynous anthropology as one of its variants.

Note that the mechanistic assumptions about the human person are entirely consonant with the experience of same-sex attraction as “innate” or “natural.” Efforts to find the “gay gene” or other physiological causes of homosexuality express the desire to substantiate the source of this self-experience in precisely the world as so conceived. The “natural,” here, clearly means something like the non-free; it stands for the idea of this self-experience as rooted in empirical and therefore deterministic circumstances, to be discovered at either a physiological or psychological level.

Of course, it is universally recognized that human desire can be directed in ways that ultimately invert the true meaning of desire. Lost, then, is the deeper reality of the body’s expression of form and finality, which offer a firmer basis for understanding the authentically human. Indeed, the treatment of sexuality on the basis of “orientation” expresses the arbitrariness of the body’s natural ordination. What is not taken into account, then, is the personal order of love expressed by the body in its very visible form as male or female.

This suggests a basic paradox. The personal meaningfulness of the body’s specification as male or female is in fact inescapable – that is to say, it is affirmed even in its outward denial or rejection. We can see this truth when we consider that sexual acts must rely on the sexualized body, but that the body is only sexual insofar as it is male or female. Furthermore, the fact that a body is either male or female depends on the correlation of male and female to each other. After all, the structures of the male body would make little sense were it not for the concrete reality of the female body, and vice versa.

The odd result is that, under the shift to orientations, sexual acts rely for their very being on that from which fully human and personal meaning has been drained. This paradox is particularly clear with regard to homosexual acts, which both depend on the fact of the body’s sexual polarity for their very possibility and also tacitly deny any deep anthropological significance of that polarity. In effect, homosexual acts and desire are only parasitic on the bodily correspondence of the masculine and the feminine.

But this paradox also characterizes the concept of “heterosexuality.” As we have seen, the anthropology of orientation conceives of the man-woman couple not according to their natural correspondence but according to their orientation, which is labeled “heterosexual.” The idea of “heterosexuality” as a category alongside “homosexuality” therefore fully incorporates the logic of “orientation,” viz. the indifference of the self and desire to the natural ordination of the body.

Because it also rests on the abstraction of the person from this natural ordination, it also views the ordination of the male and female bodies to each other as only the external or material conditions necessary for sexual acts. This leads us to an odd result: even sexual acts between a man and a woman are conceived in a way that makes them also to be parasitic on the natural correspondence of the male and female bodies.

This fact is suggestive of a deeper point. The person as conceived by this anthropology lives an unnatural relation to his or her body. Sexuality clearly is an unavoidably natural attribute of the body. As we have seen, the anthropology of orientation pertains especially to personal and social identity. But the body presents a real problem for this identity. It is a problem precisely because, no matter how far we remove it to a subordinate realm of function and mechanism, it threatens to name us, to tell us who and what we are precisely on the basis of its visibility and the fact that – however much we may put it at a distance – it is undeniably and in a substantial way part of us. This is particularly true in the realm of sexuality. The anthropology of orientations is, therefore, in the awkward position of trying both to affirm and deny the meaningfulness of the body’s sexuality.

The result is a fragmentation in both personal identity and sexual love. The simultaneous dependency on the sexualized body and loss of that body’s deep meaning leave no place for the development of sexual love as an expression of the deepest reaches of the I. The implicit androgyny leaves us no way to integrate the body, desire, love, or personal acts. To the extent these are rooted in the sexualized body, they are reduced to a material impulse of the organism.

On the other hand, since according to the ideology of orientations sexual desire and love can run contrary to the sexual ordination of the body just as reasonably as they can run in accordance with it, we might believe that they are separate from the body, that they are purely spiritual realities that merely use the body.

But then it is difficult to see how sexual acts, which after all are bodily acts, can really be fully personal acts. Does the specifically sexual – as love and desire – arise from the body or from the disembodied self? If from the former, then it is hard to understand how to characterize them as properly human and personal; if from the latter, then it is difficult to understand how they can be expressed as specifically sexual.

Here then is the dilemma and the source of human impoverishment. The primacy of the category of “sexual orientation” implies a fundamentally extrinsic relationship between a functionally-mechanistically conceived body and a correspondingly spiritualized freedom. Ironically, once this starting point has been accepted, sexual desire and love are left without a real home. They must oscillate between the functionally sexual – an order that has been treated as one of mechanistic determinism – and the spiritually androgynous – an order of bodiless freedom and love. But they cannot fit comfortably in either.

Public Reason and the Child
This disintegration of bodily acts as personal enactments of love is carried over into the implications for love’s fruitfulness. To reduce the difference of the sexes to biological function, which in the end can be replaced and improved upon by the technical processes of the lab, is assumed to humanize physicality by making it an expression of human freedom. The increasingly clear connection between “gay marriage” and developing reproductive technologies is telling evidence of this. The logic of the anthropology of orientation and the logic of the technologization of human conception (which is, of course, a much broader practice than “gay marriage”) are in fact the same.

Indeed, the use of technology to enable gay partners to conceive has at times been viewed as superior because it is rooted in what is thought to be a mature choice rather than sub-personal natural processes.[20]  Again, to conceive the question this way is to have reduced those “natural processes” to the merely functional-mechanical. There have been predictions that in the near future the majority of children in medically developed societies will be produced by means of the lab, both to prevent the sorts of problems that occur in the less perfect mechanisms of nature and to allow for certain enhancements thought to be on the horizon. Where natural conception and reproductive technologies are equated, as the courts have done, the child (even in the case of natural conception) is treated as a product of mechanical function.

At a deep level, however, the inescapability of the experience of the body in its maleness and femaleness reminds us that we are not self-originating. To already be something before an act of freedom suggests to the modern mind a loss of freedom rather than its ordination. But the importance of what we do not simply choose, but only choose as an expression of a more deeply possessed gift, is especially evident in the difference and correspondence of the male and female bodies. This becomes all the more obvious with respect to the procreative implications of sexuality and, by extension, the natural relations of the family, despite their suppression by the anthropology of orientation. The sexually “other” represented in the masculinity or femininity of the body serves as an invitation to love, precisely in its difference. It is an invitation that is by its very nature “open-ended,” both in its origins and in its destiny.

This open-endedness already implicit in the vocation inscribed in sexual difference finds its complete expression in the fruitfulness proper to the love of man and woman precisely as such – viz. the child. Clearly the fact of birth – both being born and giving birth – does not fit comfortably with the notion of personal identity as rooted most primitively in the individual’s act of choice.

The visible expression of the parents in their bodies – their knowledge of each other and their self-knowledge in relation to each other – already bespeaks the fruitfulness proper to their love. It bespeaks the fact that this fruitfulness both requires and precedes their freedom. The body in its sexual ordination indicates our being something before any possible act of our freedom. It indicates being part of a lineage, of being a child of this mother and this father.

Similarly, the child’s knowledge of him- or herself – his or her personal and social “identity” – is simultaneously a knowledge that his or her origin is embedded more deeply in reality than any act of his parents’ wills. The parents did not give themselves their own bodies. Their bodies represent what stands behind them and shapes their freedom. The parents’ act of freedom is in fact an act of consent to this deeper origin in a fabric of relations that precedes them, gives meaning to their love, and stretches out from the past into the future.

According to the logic of “reproductive technologies,” the ideas of conception and birth are viewed in terms of choice and instrumentalism, technique presiding over a set of biological processes. The implication is that “natural relations” are only part of the functionality of the material universe, except of course to the extent that they too are viewed entirely in terms of choice – that is to say, a choice to utilize these processes for a human good.

But such a line of reasoning misconceives both the meaning of birth and of love. In principle, the act that causes conception by technical means could occur without there ever having been any sort of bodily communion of the spouses or even without the spouses’ gametic contribution. Hence, the relation between love and the act of choice to have a child is motivational and moral, rather than ontological. But the child needs more than to know that the intentions of his parents were good. He needs to know that his ontological origin is good, and this means that he needs to know that he is more than the functionalistic product of another man’s freedom.

Where reproductive techniques are used, the bodily relations of the parents are abstracted from – are merely accidental to – the conception of the child. This last point is crucial. The child born in this fashion cannot understand him- or herself as having been already implicit in the parents’ bodily composition and the love proper to it prior to any particular choice or act of the parents. In this way, the child’s coming to be is abstracted from the “open-endedness” of the love proper to the “sexual difference” of the parents.

Rather, the parents and the child must see the child’s origin as the act of choice initiating technical means, rather than in the consent to the fruitfulness already implicit in their bodily acts of love. The conception of the child, then, is radically the result of an act of choice rather than the always-already implicit fruit of love. Hence, the act is restructured on the model of “making” (poiesis) as opposed to the “acting” (praxis) of fruitful love.[ Robert Spaemann, “Genetic Manipulation of Human Nature in the Context of Human Personality,” in Human Genome, Human Person, and the Society of the Future, Proceedings of the Fourth Assembly of the Pontifical Academy for Life, ed. Juan de Dios Vial Correa and Elio Sgreccia (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1999): pp. 340-350, at 342.]  The very logic expressed by the courts is that of Baconian and Hobbsian knowledge-as-production rather than knowledge as reception or discovery of what is.

The symbolic meaning of such a “making” then is that the child does not have a deeper origin than the parents’ freedom, or that, to the extent it is acknowledged that there is such a deeper origin, it amounts to a denial that that deeper origin stands in relation to the child in any way differently from any other sort of production that begins with materials given in the physical order. That procreative fruitfulness is at a radical level something the parents give themselves in an act of choice insinuates that the child is subordinated to that choice. This is why Donum Vitae tells us that artificial means of reproduction treat the child as property. Such means are a violence on the child’s dignity and self-knowledge as both “earlier” and “greater” than the parents’ freedom.

Conclusion
The foregoing suggests ways in which political and legal liberalism, while seeming to protect and produce pluralism, in fact at the deepest level produces and enforces an absolute monism of beliefs about such absolutes as the meaning of person, freedom, and the world. Radical differences in various beliefs all drift toward mere stylistic expressions of an underlying liberal conception of what is.

This is why political liberalism tends to remake pre-political and inherently non-liberal relations (e.g. marriage and family) and institutions (e.g. churches) in its own image and likeness. It tends to view these only as various types of voluntary association. There is little doubt that the question of “gay marriage” has been caught up in this process.

This is why the underlying anthropology and the type of rationality to which it gives shape offer little basis for cognizable objections to the inevitable if gradual assimilation of the anthropology of orientation into educational systems, professional organizations, public ethical standards, tax policies, anti-discrimination laws, and so forth, enforced by the technocratic-bureaucratic leviathan that constitutes the environment in which the modern individual moves and breathes. It is this underlying anthropology and its implications for the person that must be challenged, if arguments against “gay marriage” are to be sustained.

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The Public Reason of Orientation – David S. Crawford

May 9, 2013
The image Humanum chose for its issue on Same-Sex Unions (Crawford’s article was a key contribution to the issue) is the supposed portrait of the Greek lyric poet Sappho, who was born around 620 BC on the island of Lesbos. The fresco was found in Pompeii. The Alexandrians included her in the list of nine lyric poets. Her birth was sometime between 630 and 612 BCE, and it is said that she died around 570 BCE, but little is known for certain about her life.

The image Humanum chose for its issue on Same-Sex Unions (Crawford’s article was a key contribution to the issue) is the supposed portrait of the Greek lyric poet Sappho, who was born around 620 BC on the island of Lesbos. The fresco was found in Pompeii. The Alexandrians included her in the list of nine lyric poets. Her birth was sometime between 630 and 612 BCE, and it is said that she died around 570 BCE, but little is known for certain about her life.

To understand why abortion and gay marriage may trump or may eventually trump in the courtroom, read the following carefully. It presents the “new” public reason of Homosexualism and why it is tragically wrong.

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Reason and Nature
In the minor Platonic dialogue, the Minos, Socrates characterizes law as “wishing” to be “the discovery of what is.” The sense of the statement is not simply that law should – if it is to live up to its calling, if it is to be good law or laws – embody the true or the just. That would be only a positivistic and finally moralistic interpretation. Rather, Socrates suggests a deeper point, viz. that even contradictory notions of the just express something of the truth – all tacitly wish to be the discovery of what is, even if all fall short by varying degrees in this discovery.

There is another side of Socrates’ formulation, however. Theories of law, legal systems, and particular laws, precisely in falling short of the fullness of the true or the just, nevertheless always express or mediate what a given culture or society thinks is true, even when the legal order outwardly rejects any such pretentions. In other words, law always implies (indeed, cannot avoid implying) a truth claim about the human person.

Classical notions of law tend to be clear about this point. They begin with the basic human elements of inclination or desire and a primitive knowledge of the good. In part, this desire and primitive knowledge of the good is rooted in our embodiedness. Our desire for fully human life and love can only be for life and love as expressed and experienced by living, embodied beings.

As such, this beginning point for law presupposes a robust anthropology. Not only is the body in part the source of desires that make reason practical, and on that basis a source of law, it also serves in its very visibility as a sign of human origins and destiny. It therefore serves as support and guidance to help us to be human in the fullest sense, however infinitely varied the instantiation of our lives might be. According to this classical approach, then, the truth claims about ultimates – such as the natures of the person, the body and physicality generally, freedom, and society – are fairly manifest. Law so conceived clearly and explicitly mediates an idea about “what is.”

The legal developments we have been discussing over the past post and this also mediate a claim about what is, although the two courts would seem to believe they are doing no such thing. It is these tacit truth claims about the human person that nevertheless dictate the sort of rationality thought to be coherent for legal authority. Of course, these implicit truth claims do not come out of a void. Rather, they represent the general outlook of deep currents in modern thought and therefore tendencies whose roots are centuries old. Consider the following passage describing this outlook, as it is represented in Hobbes, from Leo Strauss’ Natural Right and History:

“We understand only what we make. Since we do not make the natural beings, they are, strictly speaking, unintelligible. According to Hobbes, this fact is perfectly compatible with the possibility of natural science. But it leads to the consequence that natural science is and will always remain fundamentally hypothetical. Yet this is all we need in order to make ourselves masters and owners of nature. Still, however much man may succeed in his conquest of nature, he will never be able to understand nature. . . . There is no natural harmony between the human mind and the universe.

Man can guarantee the actualization of wisdom, since wisdom is identical with free construction. But wisdom cannot be free construction if the universe is intelligible. Man can guarantee the actualization of wisdom, not in spite of, but because of, the fact that the universe is unintelligible. Man can be sovereign only because there is no cosmic support for his humanity. He can be sovereign only because he is absolutely a stranger in the universe. He can be sovereign only because he is forced to be sovereign. Since the universe is unintelligible and since control of nature does not require understanding of nature, there are no knowable limits to his conquest of nature.“
Leo Strauss, Natural Right and History (University of Chicago Press, 1950), pp. 174-75

This striking passage captures an important ambiguity at the heart of the modern project. The new form of knowing and reasoning Strauss describes tends by its very logic toward a constructive and technical approach to the world. The knowable is the makeable, according to the formula verum quia faciendum.[Ratzinger, Introduction to Christianity, trans. J.R. Foster (Ignatius Press, 1990), pp. 31-35.]

To know the world, in other words, is freely to construct it. But to be entirely free in this regard, the world must be drained of its inherent meaningfulness. Hence the “unintelligibility” of things in themselves. Here we find the fundamental nihilating character of modernity’s main currents of thought at their sources.

Knowledge and reason concern not things in themselves but their mechanical properties, their external relations, extension, mass, force, etc. At the same time, this concept of knowing and reasoning gives birth to the modern narrative of inevitable and perpetual technical progress and development, the ever-greater conquest of nature (“no knowable limits”).

The implication for freedom and intellect, then, is that they are  something set apart from the physicality even of the body. But where freedom is set aside from reality as given, it becomes indifferent freedom, freedom without interior ordination, freedom without a given end; where intellect is set aside from material reality, it views the world as only an object with its mechanical functionality and exterior and purely efficient causality.

The more exhaustively meaningful and value-laden the world, the less room there is for absolutely “free construction” not only of our world but of ourselves. This exaltation of freedom is matched, however, by an angst concerning its possibility in a world thought of in mechanistic terms. Hence, we find an oscillation between absolute freedom as the radical source of human dignity and a despairing doubtfulness of the concrete possibility of that freedom in the real world. This oscillation is well represented in a passage from Canadian philosopher George Grant:

“[W]here the political liturgy is full of appeals to the individual in his freedom to make society, the scientific analysis of society and individuals is centered around the principle of a complete determinism…. We assert ‘scientifically’ that human conduct can be absolutely predicted and therefore controlled; as individuals we believe ourselves to be free in the most absolute sense, as the makers of our own selves and our own values.”
Value and Technology,” Collected Works of George Grant, vol. 3, 1960-1969, eds Arthur Davis and Henry Roper (University of Toronto Press, 2005), pp. 227-244, at 234

Now, of course, the question of “gay marriage” especially raises the question of the body in relation not only to the person, intellect and freedom but in relation to society and law. The body is unavoidably part of the cosmos and participates in its mechanical properties. Insofar as physicality is seen as a threat to freedom, no part of it could threaten more than the body itself, which not only operates beyond and outside our free acts but also – in its very visibility and personal recognizability – situates and determines personal identity.

The body is both part of the heteronomous world of mechanism, and is also the expression of personal identity to the human community as a whole. Progress would ultimately need both to liberate the body by technical means from its limitations and defects (i.e. to make the body a better mechanism and a product of human freedom) and also to liberate the “self” from the body insofar as it represents the mechanical properties of physicality so conceived.

Legal Reasoning
These developments of course have had profound implications for the deep structure of public and legal reason. Statements of Benedict XVI in an address to the German Bundestag are helpful in pinpointing some of these implications. He begins by noting that unlike most great religions Christianity has never claimed that revelation is or should be a direct source of civil law. Rather, Christianity has always “pointed to nature and reason as the true sources of law – and to the harmony between objective and subjective reason, which naturally presupposes that both spheres are rooted in the creative reason of God.”

He goes on to speak of “the two fundamental concepts of nature and conscience, where… reason is open to the language of being.” Modernity’s tendency toward legal positivism, on the other hand, demands “an unbridgeable gulf” between “‘is’ and ‘ought.’” If nature “is viewed as ‘an aggregate of objective data linked together in terms of cause and effect,’ then indeed no ethical indication of any kind can be derived from it. A positivist conception of nature as purely functional, as the natural sciences consider it to be, is incapable of producing any bridge to ethics and law, but once again yields only functional answers.”[The Listening Heart, quoting Hans Kelsen, http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/speeches/2011/september/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20110922_reichstag-berlin_en.html%5D

The basic assumptions about nature (creation) and its reducibility to “an aggregate of objective data linked together by cause and effect” and to its purely functional aspect is not only characteristic of the jurisprudential thought form known as legal positivism, but is the pervasive presupposition of modern legal theory tout court. In assuming the “functionalistic,” mechanistic meaning of nature, law must also, if it is to be human, be a pure construction of freedom. Where it looks to what is, it will only be able to consider the human person in terms of the logic of functionality and mechanism.

It is significant that the only evidence and arguments deemed legally valid, as shown by the Perry court’s reliance on expert testimony by academics in the human sciences of sociology, psychology, economics, history, and so forth, modeled on the natural sciences, are those that view “what is” according to the model of functionality and mechanism. Arguments of a more explicitly philosophical-anthropological nature are not legitimate forms of legal argument.

We see in the sameness argument precisely this presupposition about functionality or mechanism as the source of knowledge about what is. At the same time, as we have seen, this functionalistic-mechanistic view of nature and being has implications for what we think freedom is. If human dignity lies chiefly in the fact of personal freedom, then the primary goal of law will be to liberate the subject as far as possible for self-invention.

Everything that has been said thus far leads to the peculiarly modern difficulty in integrating human freedom and material reality. We see this tendency nowhere more powerfully than in modernity’s liberation of human ends and freedom from the natural, particularly as these might be expressed by the body. Consider H.L.A. Hart’s famous rejection of natural law, in which he nevertheless grants a “minimum content” of law, viz. security against violent death at the hands of others and at least some minimal property rights. Even this minimum content, however,

“depends on the fact that in asking what content a legal system must have we take this question to be worth asking only if we who consider it cherish the humble aim of survival in close proximity to our fellows. Natural-law theory, however, in all its protean guises, attempts to push the argument much further and to assert that human beings are equally devoted to and united in their conception of aims… other than that of survival, and these dictate a further content to a legal system (over and above my humble minimum) without which it would be pointless. Of course we must be careful not to exaggerate the differences among human beings, but it seems to me that above this minimum the purposes men have for living in society are too conflicting and varying to make possible much extension of the argument that some fuller overlap of legal rules and moral standards is ‘necessary’ in this sense.”
[H.L.A. Hart, “Positivism and the Separation of Law and Morals,” in The Philosophy of Law, ed. R.M. Dworkin (Oxford University Press, 1977), pp. 17-37, at 36.]

For Hart, law is a human construction in view of vulnerability in the contingently factual world, from which natural teleological and formal causality have been subtracted. This fact is born out in Hart’s discussion of the aims of man in society, which are judged to be too diverse to be given an account if we abstract from the most basic passion – the one to which both Hobbes and Locke tied the source of society – the fear of death.

Similarly, John Rawls tells us that “Human good is heterogeneous because the aims of the self are heterogeneous. Although to subordinate all our aims to one end does not strictly speaking violate the principles of rational choice… it still strikes us as irrational or more likely as mad. The self is disfigured….”[ John Rawls, A Theory of Justice (Cambridge Mass., Harvard University Press, 1971), p. 554, cited in Alasdair MacIntyre, Whose Justice? Which Rationality (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1988), p. 337.]

If the contractual foundation of society is founded on the fear of death, it makes sense that in order to maximize self-realization we must minimize natural order. Indeed, “ends” are reduced to personal goals or aims. The law’s primary purpose then, above and beyond securing person and property, is to maximize the freedom for self-expression and determination. What is most important remains unstated but nevertheless obvious: to root law in nature would be to submit human freedom to what has now been reduced to the purely functional and mechanical. In such a world, law must be pure construction if it is to be rational and human.

On the other hand, Hart’s most important detractor, Ronald Dworkin, introduces legal principles of justice, which he argues underlie law in its very meaning. But Dworkin’s response to legal positivism introduces only a liberal notion of “natural law,” one that is rooted in rights and indifferent self-determination. Here again we find the tacit presupposition that to envision a connection between law and nature would be to submit the legal subject either to the mechanical properties of reality or to the arbitrary acts of will of another (such as a legislative majority). The underlying principle is that of the “equality,” or more specifically, the right to “equal concern and respect.” [Ronald Dworkin, Taking Rights Seriously (Harvard University Press, 1977), 272-73]

Characteristically, this most basic right correlates with a fairly standard notion of the meaning of the liberal political and juridical order: politics, laws, institutions, and actions in the public order must be “independent of any particular conception of the good.”[Ronald Dworkin, “Liberalism,” in Public and Private Morality, ed. S. Hampshire (Cambridge: 1978), p. 127]  In a political and juridical world so defined, an underlying emphasis on autonomy and self-determination controls.

And so, Dworkin is only what we might call the flipside of Hart. If Hart can only envision law as a human construction abstracted from natural principles, Dworkin seeks to found law on preexisting principles of justice, but principles that are rooted only in individual self-interest and indifferent freedom. Dworkin’s principles also presuppose the dichotomy between freedom and nature on which the liberal order is founded.

These basic jurisprudential assumptions can be seen in the way decisions are made in courts such as those we have been discussing. Consider on the one hand, the famous and influential passage from the Supreme Court’s Casey decision, a passage that has been both celebrated and reviled. There, the Court famously declared that

“At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life. Beliefs about these matters could not define the attributes of personhood were they formed under compulsion of the State.”
[Planned Parenthood v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833 (1992)]

Implied is a particular role and limitation of government and law. It is to generate a political and legal order without predetermining the pattern of individual self-definition in relation to the basic meaning of reality as a whole. Just below the surface of the Court’s argument is the fear of determination, of the loss of freedom, here expressed in terms of the state.

For the Court, the meaning of things cannot be known or presupposed in a juridical context, but can only be a matter of individual belief, given to the self by the self. Were the state to impose meaning, it could only be the imposition of the legislative majority’s arbitrary view of things. The majority’s “moral disapproval” could have no basis in rationality, because the connection of that rationality to what is can only be understood in mechanistic-functionalistic terms, rather than in natural terms.

Of course, conservative jurists, who have heaped scorn on the passage, differ only by the fact that they do, in effect, seek to place the arbitrary imposition of meaning in the democratic majority, rather than in the individual. In others words, the conservative position has essentially the same jurisprudential positivism, but it is more willing to give weight to a majority’s “moral disapproval,” based only on democratic principles.

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Why We Are Losing the Gay Marriage Debate – David S. Crawford

May 8, 2013
Not these guys again...

If acts that fulfill the behavioral conditions of procreation are, in fact, capable of uniting spouses inter-personally — thus providing the biological matrix of the multilevel union and sharing of life that marriage is, according to the traditional understanding long embodied in Western law, philosophy, and culture — then truly marital acts differ fundamentally in meaning, value, and significance from intrinsically non-marital sex acts (such as acts of sodomy and mutual masturbation). The Illusions of Married Personalism, Robert P. George

How the debate over “gay marriage” has been shaped by some ubiquitous but unexamined presuppositions…

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 Introduction
It should be clear by now that those who oppose the civil recognition of “same-sex marriage” are gradually (or perhaps not so gradually) losing the public debate. The problem is not that they have no arguments. It is that judges, legislators, journalists, and regular citizens have increasingly found those arguments not only weak but in fact incoherent from the standpoint of public reason.

That they are incoherent then leads to the further conclusion that they must be based on bigotry and hateful intolerance. This development naturally puts defenders of the traditional idea of marriage on the defensive. It is especially unsettling for Catholics, who feel they have a long tradition of reasoned public discourse based on natural law principles. Typically they respond with increasing frustration, often by means of a simple repetition of the usual arguments, but with greater stridency.

The whole situation may seem a bit surreal. Granted, if the state establishes an institution, with benefits and burdens, it must determine the requirements for access on a rational basis from the standpoint of valid or legitimate state interests. And of course the bar is raised where the institution involves fundamental rights, such as access to civil marriage.

Nevertheless, few would have doubted until recently at least the general cogency of the traditional arguments. Those arguments at first blush appear sound enough: the man-woman couple is the basis of the continuation of society over time; it generates the familial environment in which the child can best flourish; the child should optimally have both a mother and a father to develop a healthy and balanced relationship to both sexes, and so forth.

For these reasons, these arguments conclude, the state has a strong interest in regulating and preserving marriage’s traditional meaning. Indeed, some argue, the state would have no interest in regulating marriage were it not for its connection with the child. It is striking, then, that these are precisely the arguments that have been found – repeatedly at this point – to fail at the basic level of public and legal rationality, despite the fact that they seemed so irrefutable just a short while ago.

How have we come to this impasse? How could such reasoning fail the most basic test – its legal cogency? What are the controlling principles and assumptions of the reasoning that cannot see this? Complete answers to these questions are no doubt complex. My discussion will be limited to some anthropological implications of the “gay marriage” debate for the meaning of sexuality, desire and love for personal and social identity.

The Sameness Argument
Clues for approaching our dilemma may be garnered from a brief examination of two important court decisions, the 2010 Perry decision of a Federal District Court in California[1]  and the 2003 Goodridge decision of the Massachusetts Supreme Court.[2]

In rejecting the traditional arguments mentioned above, both courts begin by observing that it has never been a requirement of marriage that couples actually have or plan to have children, or even that they are capable of doing so. At the same time, they note, some households headed by “same-sex partners” do have children, whether from previous relationships, legal adoptions, or various sorts of “reproductive technologies,” such as surrogacy or artificial insemination.

Further, some “opposite-sex” couples do not have children, either by choice or from infertility. Hence, drawing a legal demarcation for purposes of marriage around “opposite-sex couples” because of their potential ability or decision to have children generates a simultaneously under-inclusive and over-inclusive legal classification. Consider the Perry case’s way of addressing this question:

“The court asked the parties to identify a difference between heterosexuals and homosexuals that the government might fairly need to take into account when crafting legislation…. Proponents pointed only to a difference between same-sex couples (who are incapable through sexual intercourse of producing offspring biologically related to both parties) and opposite-sex couples (some of whom are capable through sexual intercourse of producing such offspring)…. Proponents did not, however, advance any reason why the government may use sexual orientation as a proxy for fertility or why the government may need to take into account fertility when legislating…. No evidence at trial illuminating distinctions among lesbians, gay men and heterosexuals amounting to ‘real and undeniable differences’ that the government might need to take into account in legislating.”
Perry v. Schwarzenegger, 721 F. Supp. 2d 921 (2010), 997

The conclusion then seems inevitable: while the state has a valid interest in stabilizing familial relations for the sake of children, this concern would be better met by opening marriage to all couples heading households with children, regardless of the parents’ “orientation.”

However, this question of the relationship between marriage and children is filtered though a more basic part of the courts’ arguments, viz. that in fact marriage can no longer be considered ordered to the child. Rather, marriage is ordered to the enduring relationship of the spouses and their life together, which may or may not include children, as the spouses choose.

The Perry trial court records extensive expert testimony concerning the evolution of marriage’s meaning over time, while no acceptable or believable expert testimony could be produced to show procreation’s continuing essential link to marriage. Professor Nancy Cott, a Harvard historian and expert on marriage in America, testified that if marriage was previously considered a way of linking parents and children or to assure paternity, it now centers on the formation of a household and the common life of a couple.

Why would the state have an interest in licensing, regulating, and promoting marriage if it no longer possesses a necessary or intrinsic link to the child? Because it stabilizes households and the intimate relations on which they are founded, and this in turn promotes economic prosperity, personal and social wellbeing, and security in times of vulnerability, whether or not children are part of the picture. Indeed, the Goodridge court tells us that the “‘marriage is procreation’ argument singles out the one unbridgeable difference between same-sex and opposite-sex couples, and transforms that difference into the essence of legal marriage.” [4]

As the foregoing suggests, once procreativity is no longer essential to the idea of marriage, a crucial element of the argument is made available. This is the apparent sameness of “opposite-” and “same-sex” couples. Because “same-sex couples” are essentially like “opposite-sex” couples, they are also similarly situated for civil and legal purposes. Evidence of this sameness runs throughout the courts’ opinions. The Perry court cites extensive expert testimony, from a parade of sociologists, psychologists, and others to support the idea. Both courts note that the gay or lesbian plaintiffs before them have remained in long-term, “committed” relationships.

Both courts emphasize a commonality of the hopes and desires between “same-sex” and “opposite-sex” couples. Both courts regard love and enduring companionship as the basis of the relationship. The Goodridge court, at least, emphasizes the common middle-class standing of the two types of couples. The argument concludes that the question of “gay marriage” can be understood primarily in terms of the assimilation of so-called same-sex couples into existing social structures and institutions. Indeed, it implies that the assimilation can occur without substantially changing the authentic meaning or significantly disrupting those structures and institutions. As the Goodridge court put it, “the plaintiffs seek only to be married, not to undermine the institution of marriage.”

This idea of sameness then mediates further consideration of the meaning and place of procreativity. While “same-sex couples” cannot produce offspring genetically related to both of them through their sex acts, this fact in no way distinguishes them from sterile “opposite-sex couples.” Or alternatively, “same-sex couples” who do employ reproductive technologies are in no pertinent way essentially different from fertile “opposite-sex couples.” Once, this essential sameness is accepted, it becomes clear that the two types of couples really are just that: two parallel types. They are therefore essentially equivalent and similarly situated with respect to their social meaning and the status of their interests.

But what about the argument that the optimal conditions for raising children requires the presence of both a mother and a father? Importantly, the argument from sameness feeds back into this question, as well. For the concept of sameness is not only brought to bear on the differing but equivalent types of couples, but more fundamentally on the sexes themselves.

This point is part of the deeper logic of the entire debate: the relationship between two men or two women is equivalent (anthropologically) to a relationship between a man and woman precisely because the sexes are essentially the same (anthropologically). The sexes differ only in outward, biological aspects. Hence, to the claim that children need both a mother and a father for ideal development, the Goodridge court responded that such an argument smacks of “gender stereotyping,” of the false prejudice that men and women have different roles in the family, which the state long ago rejected as a matter of policy. As Perry concludes,

“Children do not need to be raised by a male parent and a female parent to be well-adjusted, and having both a male and a female parent does not increase the likelihood that a child will be well-adjusted.”
Perry v. Schwarzenegger, 721 F. Supp. 2d 921 (2010), 981

Again, extensive expert testimony was offered to support this proposition, while hardly any expert testimony was offered for the opposite viewpoint. According to Perry, the argument that having both a mother and father is optimal implies also a return to the legal differentiation between the roles of husband and wife under the universally rejected common law doctrine of coverture.[ Perry v. Schwarzenegger, 721 F. Supp. 2d 921 (2010), 992-993]  In short, to say that men and women are different in some unspecified way (to specify opens one to the charge of “stereotyping”) implies a return to institutionalized sexism.

Once these arguments have been eliminated, the opposition to civil recognition of “same-sex marriage” can only be based on moral disapproval of homosexuality. But the courts have rejected the idea that simple moral disapproval of the majority can suffice as a legitimate basis for state laws limiting fundamental rights. Rather, state laws must be rationally related to a legitimate state purpose, and mere moral disapproval cannot serve as such a purpose.

An Illusion
This last point concerning the legal value of moral disapproval of a majority suggests another theme in the courts’ reasoning – the sharp distinction between public reason and private morality. The claim of the traditional arguments’ irrationality is of course made in a civil and legal context. The courts emphasize repeatedly that they are only addressing “civil marriage,” that is to say, marriage insofar as it is a juridical creature of state legislation.

This limitation allows them to say that they are not mandating a moral position, but only making a judgment about what the law requires. “Our obligation is to define the liberty of all, not to mandate our own moral code”[Goodridge, at 312, and concurring opinion of Justice Greaney, at 349 (both citing Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 [2003]).]  is a claim piously repeated by the courts. The Goodridge court appears at least to acknowledge the legitimacy of citizens’ deeply held convictions on both sides of the “gay marriage” issue.

The implication would seem to be, then, that the issue of “gay marriage” transects two distinct domains – the public and the private – and that, if the traditional arguments are not civilly or legally rational, they may be rational – and therefore morally sustainable – in contexts other than the civil or legal one, where broader religious and moral starting points are relevant and may be decisive.

The courts seem, therefore, to offer a kind of settlement of the issue, by means of the distinction between the public and the private. But this “settlement” trades on an ambiguity in the idea of “tolerance.” The ostensibly non-moral notion of tolerance proffered by the courts would treat the concept as a merely legal one. It would have us suppose that tolerance means governmental neutrality to two positions, a neutrality that would leave in place a kind of modus vivendi between irreconcilable worldviews.

The question then is whether tolerance really can be thought of in this way, or whether it does not slide into another sense of tolerance, one which is thoroughly moral. This latter would see tolerance not as an agreement to disagree for practical and political reasons, but as signifying an imperative for the acceptance of diverse views and ways as equally valid.

This second version of tolerance, then, offers a standard for judgment concerning the proper disposition one has toward all others within society. Anyone who does not accept this moral standard sets himself beyond the pale of legitimate public discourse. Where this happens, a given private position might be politically and legally “tolerated” on a conditional basis due to prudential considerations, such as preserving countervailing principles of autonomy (e.g. “religious freedom”) or the undesirability of intruding too overtly in domestic or ecclesial matters.

This second version would nevertheless seek gradually to instill tolerance as a personal and public virtue, one that would dictate a moral and finally anthropological position regarding questions such as that of “gay marriage.” It would seek to inculcate not only a begrudging acceptance of the de facto presence of an opposing worldview, but the actual embrace of the new idea of marriage – that “same-sex” and “opposite-sex” marriage are essentially and morally equivalent and should be accepted as such.

If the courts at times speak as though they have the “merely” legal notion of tolerance in mind, in reality of course they have the second, and necessarily so. This is because tolerance in the first sense can only be an illusion in issues that involve beliefs about vital human matters. These are matters that necessarily involve our deepest convictions about what humanity is. Disagreement on such points cannot help but touch on the foundations of culture and society.

In a moment we will see that an anthropological shift is underway. But, for now, if the arguments against “gay marriage” are publicly irrational, that must necessarily mean that they are also publicly bigoted. But bigoted public arguments are in fact immoral public arguments, and this means that the private position will always be at least publicly immoral.

But can there be a position that is publicly immoral and yet privately moral? If issues such as “gay marriage” necessarily imply a certain conception of society, then rejection of the conception will appear to be antisocial, uncivil. And so it turns out that the concept of “tolerance” is in fact a demand of conformity in moral and anthropological belief.

In short, the tolerance that really is proffered is provisional and contingent, tailored to accommodate what is conceived as a significant but shrinking segment of society that holds a publicly unacceptable private bigotry. Where over time it emerges that this bigotry has not in fact disappeared, more aggressive measures will be needed, which will include more explicit legal and educational components, as well as simple ostracism.

Posted in David S. Crawford, Homosexualism | Tagged , | 2 Comments »

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Restoring the Broken Image: Healing Homosexuality 2 — Andrew J. Sodergren

April 9, 2013
While there is little published research to support Nicolosi’s views or therapeutic strategies – a fact which, in the eyes of the psychological establishment, justifies their marginalization – Nicolosi has done a laudable job of developing the academic and clinical foundations of reparative therapy. They deserve study by any psychologist or other academic or professional motivated to understand how family experiences may contribute to the development of homosexuality, and how psychotherapy may help to resolve it for those who wish to be healed.

While there is little published research to support Nicolosi’s views or therapeutic strategies – a fact which, in the eyes of the psychological establishment, justifies their marginalization – Nicolosi has done a laudable job of developing the academic and clinical foundations of reparative therapy. They deserve study by any psychologist or other academic or professional motivated to understand how family experiences may contribute to the development of homosexuality, and how psychotherapy may help to resolve it for those who wish to be healed.

The second part of a reblogging of a recent article in Humanum, the following essay reviews these books that Homosexualists fear:

Stanton L. Jones and Mark A. Yarhouse, Ex-Gays? A Longitudinal Study of Religiously Mediated Change in Sexual Orientation (InterVarsity Press, 2007), 414 pages

Mark A. Yarhouse, Homosexuality and the Christian: A Guide for Parents, Pastors, and Friends (Bethany House Press, 2010), 239 pages

Joseph J. Nicolosi, Shame and Attachment Loss: The Practical Work of Reparative Therapy (InterVarsity Press, 2009), 474 pages

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Perhaps Yarhouse’s most helpful contribution is his “three-tier distinction.” Yarhouse distinguishes between three levels of homosexual phenomena:

  1. Same-sex attraction,
  2. Homosexual orientation, and
  3. Gay identity.

Same-sex attraction (SSA) is the most basic descriptive level of experience. 

Many people experience SSA some of the time. When a person consistently experiences SSA as the prominent way of being with others, then we can speak of it as an “orientation,” a persistent pattern of attraction.

Yarhouse argues that people do not typically have a choice about what sort of attractions they experience and how those attractions cluster into an overall orientation. While some people can experience change at those levels through therapy or religious activities, many do not. However, Yarhouse argues that when we move from orientation to the level of identity, human freedom becomes much more explicitly involved. Identity is not a given, but is at least partly chosen. It entails a certain social status, values, and lifestyle choices.

Yarhouse seems to want to wake people up to the reality that even though they may experience SSA and/or are stuck with a homosexual orientation, they do not need to center their identity on this. He offers a helpful alternative to the cultural “gay script” that says that these attractions reveal your true self and that in order to be happy, one must identify with them, embrace them and live them out.

Rather, Yarhouse suggests that SSA is but one element of a person’s experience, and each person can choose whether or not to center their identity and lifestyle around that experience. Instead of centering their identity on SSA, Yarhouse argues that people can establish their identities on other things such as their gender as a man or a woman, their spousal or familial roles, or their spirituality (e.g., a disciple of Christ).

In so doing, such a person can learn to live with unwanted SSA with an attitude of acceptance while still embracing and pursuing more central values, such as their faith in Christ. Yarhouse goes on to apply this framework to numerous situations such as when a child, adolescent, young adult, or even a spouse announces a gay identity. Many will find his guidance extremely helpful.

What of those for whom living with SSA as a persistent feature of their lives is not adequate? After all, the Christian faith teaches that in the beginning it was not so, that man was created for woman and vice versa so that the two can become one flesh. For those individuals who struggle with SSA and desire a deeper level of healing, there exists a scattered network of reparative therapists.

The leader of this movement is Joseph Nicolosi, whose writings on the subject have shaped the field and whose recent book Shame and Attachment Loss is the main textbook for the theory and technique of reparative therapy.

Nicolosi’s goal is clear: to heal homosexuality and enhance heterosexual potential. While acknowledging that biology may play a role in predisposing certain people for developing SSA, he places greater emphasis on experiential factors, principally in the family of origin. His is the most detailed and nuanced theory regarding the development of male homosexuality. Drawing on attachment research, family systems theory, psychodynamic theory, and interpersonal neurobiology, Nicolosi provides a highly nuanced and plausible account of the development of male homosexuality.

Nicolosi regards homosexuality as a shame-based system. Because of problems in the family of origin – including the relationships with mother, father, and the marital relationship – the young boy experiences his attempts to individuate from his mother to bond with his father and thereby identify with his masculine role as failures. These failures are met with disapproval and disconnection, leaving the boy in a state of shame.

Furthermore, he feels that this shame is somehow his fault, that it is a reflection of who he truly is. As a result, he gives up on this important developmental task and instead develops a “false self” such as the “nice little boy” in order to keep some semblance of an attachment to his parents alive.

Reparative therapy derives its name from Nicolosi’s notion of homosexuality as a reparative drive. He theorizes that homosexuality is a maladaptive attempt to make up for the developmental failure described above and finally achieve a secure masculine identity and acceptance in the world of men. It is a striving to finally get it right and is most likely to arise when those early shame states are triggered in the adolescent or adult male’s life. When this occurs, he is likely to feel depressed and worthless.

Homosexual behavior then looms large as a shortcut to masculine identity and attachment security, but according to Nicolosi, it fails to deliver. Nicolosi’s approach to therapy involves helping the individual experience and understand the underlying emotional states such as shame that drive his homosexual desires and behavior and gradually help him to see the futility in trying to fill up what was lacking in the family of origin through homosexual means. Rather he needs to stop defending against a deep sadness and despair about what should have been but what was not. In a word, he needs to grieve.

Through emotion-focused therapy, grief work, and resolving childhood traumas, Nicolosi aims to help his male patients more consistently achieve a healthy assertive stance in relating to others and experience truly intimate friendships. In doing so, the true self is restored and the false self abandoned. Gradually, the homosexual compulsion is weakened and a secure masculine identity is strengthened.

Nicolosi’s work is masterful in terms of detail and clarity. He frequently draws on his 20+ years of treating male homosexuals by providing reflections from his patients and extensive transcripts from sessions to illustrate aspects of the theory and the therapy. While there is little published research to support his views or therapeutic strategies – a fact which, in the eyes of the psychological establishment, justifies their marginalization – Nicolosi has done a laudable job of developing the academic and clinical foundations of reparative therapy.

They deserve study by any psychologist or other academic or professional motivated to understand how family experiences may contribute to the development of homosexuality, and how psychotherapy may help to resolve it for those who wish to be healed.

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Restoring the Broken Image: Healing Homosexuality 1 — Andrew J. Sodergren

April 8, 2013
Jones and Yarhouse, evangelical Christian psychologists, sought to conduct the first ever prospective, longitudinal study of adults attempting to change their sexual orientation by religious means. Needless to say, merely raising the issue invites dismissal from some segments of society as “homophobic hate speech.”

Jones and Yarhouse, evangelical Christian psychologists, sought to conduct the first ever prospective, longitudinal study of adults attempting to change their sexual orientation by religious means. Needless to say, merely raising the issue invites dismissal from some segments of society as “homophobic hate speech.” Yarhouse utilizes a Christian understanding of original sin (“the Fall” in his terms) to explain how people may come into the world with unchosen predispositions to engage in behavior that is contrary to God’s design. He considers homosexuality one such condition, and he shows great compassion for people who carry this burden.

A reblogging of a recent article in Humanum, the following essay reviews these books that Homosexualists fear:

Stanton L. Jones and Mark A. Yarhouse, Ex-Gays? A Longitudinal Study of Religiously Mediated Change in Sexual Orientation (InterVarsity Press, 2007), 414 pages

Mark A. Yarhouse, Homosexuality and the Christian: A Guide for Parents, Pastors, and Friends (Bethany House Press, 2010), 239 pages

Joseph J. Nicolosi, Shame and Attachment Loss: The Practical Work of Reparative Therapy (InterVarsity Press, 2009), 474 pages

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It is difficult think of a more contentious issue in today’s culture than the “healing” of homosexuality. To even raise the question already invites dismissal from some segments of society as “homophobic hate speech.” This is especially the case in the field of psychology, which happens to be the profession of the present reviewer. One unfortunate consequence of this cultural climate is the discouragement of true scholarship on the topic of healing homosexuality for those who seek to be free of this condition.

Despite negative pressures and professional dangers, a few heroic psychologists have stepped up with the aim of honestly addressing the question of healing homosexuality from both academic and clinical perspectives. These courageous individuals include Mark Yarhouse, Stanton Jones, and Joseph Nicolosi, all of whom have authored recent, important works being reviewed in this essay.

Many readers of Humanum are likely aware of the controversial study by Robert Spitzer published in 2003 in the prestigious journal Archives of Sexual Behavior, addressing the question of whether some homosexual men and women can change their sexual orientation. Spitzer, it should be noted, was instrumental in the removal of homosexuality from the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, Third Edition, in the 1970s.

He was moved to conduct his 2003 study because of an experience he had in which he was confronted by protestors who claimed to have left homosexuality and embraced heterosexual identities and lifestyles. Curious of their claims, he decided to study the question of whether change of sexual orientation was possible, so he recruited and interviewed 200 men and women who claimed to have experienced some degree of change from homosexuality to heterosexuality. Based on his investigation, Spitzer found that approximately 66% of males and 44% of females in the study seemed to have achieved some measure of “good heterosexual functioning,” though rates of complete reversal of sexual orientation were considerably lower. 

Spitzer’s study was highly publicized, praised, and condemned. After several years of rancorous discourse around his study, Spitzer issued a public statement in 2012 recanting it, stating that it was severely flawed, that he wished he had never published it, and that he believes homosexual people cannot and should not try to change their sexual orientation. To be sure, his study was very weak methodologically; even if it showed enough rigor that the Archives of Sexual Behavior accepted it for publication. Despite Spitzer’s retraction, the findings, whatever their worth, still stand.

Many people are not aware of the fact that Spitzer’s study was not the first – nor the last – study to examine whether or not homosexual people can change. There are many older studies published in the psychological literature reporting therapeutic change from homosexuality toward heterosexuality using a variety of strategies. Most of these are from decades ago, when such research was more acceptable in the field.

Similar to Spitzer’s, these earlier studies tended to suffer from severe methodological shortcomings. Despite these various published – though questionable – findings, the American Psychological Association as late as 2005 categorically proclaimed on its website that sexual orientation is not changeable. The APA went on to question the safety of attempts to change, strongly suggesting that attempts to do so are likely harmful to the homosexual person.

Enter Jones and Yarhouse. These evangelical Christian psychologists sought to conduct the first ever prospective, longitudinal study of adults attempting to change their sexual orientation by religious means. Specifically, they designed their study to answer two questions:

  1. Is homosexuality changeable, and
  2. Is the attempt to overcome homosexuality inherently harmful?

They recruited 98 adults (72 men, 26 women) participating in the umbrella organization Exodus Ministries. All of these individuals were seeking to overcome homosexuality and achieve either chaste continence or healthy heterosexuality. Jones and Yarhouse utilized very rigorous assessment methods to gauge sexual identity, attraction, behavior, fantasy, and the like along with measures of psychological distress and pathology. These measures were utilized at the outset of the study (T1) and were repeated annually throughout the duration of the study (T2, T3, and so on). To date, they have published results regarding these longitudinal assessments 6-7 years (T6) after the start of the study.

While Jones and Yarhouse’s sample size is somewhat small by professional standards and has eroded over time (N=63 at T6), which is typical in longitudinal studies, their study design and rigorous, prospective assessments mean that this is the best attempt to date to study sexual orientation change. They found that over the course of study, on average, their sample experienced statistically significant change on various measures of sexual orientation away from homosexuality and toward heterosexuality. However, the overall magnitude of these changes was modest in size, suggesting more of a shifting along a continuum rather than a categorical change. 

  1. In addition to these “on average” findings of diminished homosexuality, Jones and Yarhouse tabulated rates of various outcome categories among their participants.
  2. Of their T6 sample 23% demonstrated “Success: Conversion.” These were individuals who established a fairly robust heterosexual identity and lifestyle.
  3. Another 30% achieved “Success: Chastity,” meaning that they were no longer acting out nor distressed by homosexual impulses but had not fully achieved a hetersosexual identity and lifestyle.
  4. Sixteen percent (16%) had experienced some progress and were “Continuing” to pursue change but had not yet achieved either form of “success.”
  5. Another 7% were regarded as “Nonresponse,” meaning that they are continuing to pursue change but had not experienced any progress.
  6. Lastly, there were two “Failure” categories: “Failure: Confused” and “Failure: Gay Identity.” The former characterized people who experienced no change of orientation and gave up on the attempt to change but had not embraced a gay identity. This comprised 5% of the T6 participants. The latter (“Failure: Gay Identity”) comprised 20% of the T6 sample and was characterized by individuals who had given up on the attempt to change and embraced a gay identity.

In summary, of the 61 participants who remained in Jones and Yarhouse’s study for the full six years, the sample as a whole showed statistically significant – though modest – change on several measures of sexual orientation away from homosexuality from T1 to T6. Further analysis showed that 53% achieved some version of “Success,” 25% resulted in either kind of “Failure,” with roughly 23% of the sample in between. As Jones and Yarhouse point out, rigorously documenting even one case of intentional sexual orientation change would suffice to refute the APA’s categorical statement that such change is impossible. They clearly have done more than that.

What of the question of psychological harm resulting from the attempt to change? Jones and Yarhouse used several measures of psychological distress at each time point over the six years of the study, including the SCL-90, a widely accepted measure in the field. Over the course of their study, Jones and Yarhouse found no change on most measures of distress, psychopathology, and well-being.

In addition to the lack of any psychological deterioration, Jones and Yarhouse detected a statistically significant trend on two scales [2] of the SCL-90 in the direction of improved psychological health. In other words, on most measures there was no change regarding psychological distress, and on a couple of key indices, this sample seemed to get slightly healthier as a function of the efforts to change their homosexuality over a span of 6-7 years.[3]

Jones and Yarhouse’s findings have received very little attention from the rest of the field of psychology. To be sure, there are limitations to their study, and much more research needs to be done. To their credit, in Ex-Gays? Jones and Yarhouse candidly discuss these limitations and arguments for and against dismissing their findings as well as provide great detail regarding each of the pivotal decisions required of them as they conducted the study. Regardless of whether the rest of the field of psychology takes notice, their achievement is a landmark one that hopefully will spark subsequent and even more rigorous attempts to study the healing of homosexuality.

As important as Jones and Yarhouse’s study is, it gives little insight into what helps those who seek to heal homosexuality. The ministries involved under the Exodus umbrella use a variety of spiritual, educative, and therapeutic methods. As a result, Jones and Yarhouse do not offer any particular guidance in Ex-Gays? However, Yarhouse, in his book Homosexuality and the Christian, has offered a number of useful insights and much wise guidance for individuals struggling with homosexuality, their friends, families, spouses, and religious leaders. Yarhouse’s tone is clearly of one who has personally known many such people and developed a deep respect for them.  He is pastoral and gentle while at the same time faithfully presenting an up-to-date understanding of the scientific literature.

For instance, on the controversial issue of the sources or causes of homosexuality, Yarhouse reviews the major areas of the literature in a clear and accessible way for the lay reader. He discusses possible genetic factors, prenatal hormones and other biological contributions. He reviews the fraternal birth order effect, which, having been replicated in many studies, shows that on average male homosexuals tend to have more older brothers than male heterosexuals. Yarhouse discusses childhood gender nonconformity and how this has been linked with later homosexual tendencies.

He also discusses the issue of childhood sexual experiences. As Yarhouse shows, the research literature has substantiated a large link between childhood sexual abuse and later homosexuality among males, but not all male homosexuals have had such experiences. The situation for females is more mixed. Lastly, he discusses various views on parent-child relationships and family dynamics. While this last topic is perhaps of the most interest to therapists and parents, the research is severely lacking. In the end, Yarhouse explains that we know a few things about the above factors, but the most faithful scientific answer to the question of what causes homosexuality is “we don’t know.”

As frustrating as the lack of hard scientific evidence is in explaining the development of homosexuality, Yarhouse does a wonderful job of pointing out a problem with the question of origins. He illustrates how many people – Christian, secular, or otherwise – tend to fall into the trap of “nothing-but-ism.” In other words, homosexuality is caused by nothing but [fill in the blank]. Yarhouse rejects this kind of thinking as both inaccurate and unhelpful.

He chides religious people who get fixated on this question because they think it necessary to show that homosexuality is learned or chosen in order to uphold a moral conviction that the behavior is wrong. Rather, Yarhouse rightly shows that the moral question (e.g., are homosexual acts morally licit?) is distinct from the question of origin (e.g., where do homosexual tendencies come from?). Furthermore, he utilizes a Christian understanding of original sin (“the Fall” in his terms) to explain how people may come into the world with unchosen predispositions to engage in behavior that is contrary to God’s design. He considers homosexuality one such condition, and he shows great compassion for people who carry this burden. 

Furthermore, in his discussion of the possibility of change, Yarhouse is very modest in explaining that change is possible for some, but likely not for all. Again, we are limited by our lack of understanding. Basing himself in the best psychological science, including the study by Jones and himself discussed above, Yarhouse concludes that with sustained effort and the right helps, some people can move along a continuum of decreasing their homosexual experience, but very few will fully emerge into a heterosexual identity and lifestyle.

In his compassion and realism, Yarhouse seems to want to tell the struggling homosexual Christian that it may be possible to change if you want to try, but you need to accept the real possibility that these attractions may not go away. As a result, the Christian community is called to respond with realism, compassion, and acceptance.

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A Social Experiment Without Science Behind It — Nelson Lund

March 28, 2013
George Mason University professor Nelson Lund

George Mason University professor Nelson Lund

Advocates of same-sex marriages can’t back up claims about positive long-term effects. This article is based on an amicus curiae brief in support of the petitioners in Hollingsworth v. Perry, filed on behalf of Leon R. Kass (University of Chicago), Harvey C. Mansfield (Harvard University), and the Institute for Marriage and Public Policy.It appeared in yesterday’s WSJ.

George Mason University professor Nelson Lund has written widely in the field of constitutional law, including articles on constitutional interpretation, federalism, separation of powers, the Second Amendment, the Commerce Clause, the Speech or Debate Clause, the Equal Protection Clause, and the Uniformity Clause. In addition, he has published articles in the fields of employment discrimination and civil rights, the legal regulation of medical ethics, and the application of economic analysis to legal institutions and legal ethics.

Professor Lund graduated from St. John’s College in Annapolis, Maryland, after which he received an M.A. in philosophy from the Catholic University of America and a Ph.D. in political science from Harvard University. He left the faculty of the University of Chicago to attend its law school, where he served as executive editor of the University of Chicago Law Review and chapter chairman of the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies.

After law school, he held positions at the United States Department of Justice in the Office of the Solicitor General and the Office of Legal Counsel. He also served as a law clerk to the Honorable Patrick E. Higginbotham of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and to the Honorable Sandra Day O’Connor of the United States Supreme Court. Following his clerkship with Justice O’Connor, Professor Lund served in the White House as associate counsel to the president from 1989 to 1992.

Since joining the faculty at George Mason, Professor Lund has taught Constitutional Law, Legislation, Federal Election Law, Employment Discrimination, State and Local Government, and seminars on the Second Amendment and on a variety of topics in Jurisprudence.

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The Supreme Court is hearing two cases this week that represent a challenge to one of the oldest and most fundamental institutions of our civilization. In Hollingsworth v. Perry and United States v. Windsor, the court is being asked to rule that constitutional equal protection requires the government to open marriage to same-sex couples.

The claimed right to same-sex marriage is not in the Constitution or in the court’s precedents, so the court must decide whether to impose a new law making marriage into a new and different institution. The justices are unlikely to take so momentous a step unless they are persuaded that granting this new right to same-sex couples will not harm children or ultimately undermine the health of our society.

A significant number of organizations representing social and behavioral scientists have filed briefs promising the court that there is nothing to worry about. These assurances have no scientific foundation. Same-sex marriage is brand new, and child rearing by same-sex couples remains rare. Even if both phenomena were far more common, large amounts of data collected over decades would be required before any responsible researcher could make meaningful scientific estimates of the long-term effects of redefining marriage.

The conclusions in the research literature typically amount at best to claims that a particular study found “no evidence” of bad effects from child rearing by same-sex couples. One could just as easily say that there is no reliable evidence that such child-rearing practices are beneficial or harmless. And that is the conclusion that should be relevant to the court.

Social-science advocacy organizations, however, have promoted the myth that a lack of evidence, so far, of bad effects implies the nonexistence of such effects. This myth is based on conjecture or faith, not science.

Nor is the leap of faith from “no evidence” to “don’t worry” an accident. The late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, himself a distinguished social scientist at Harvard, once observed: “Social science is rarely dispassionate, and social scientists are frequently caught up in the politics which their work necessarily involves . . . [T]he pronounced ‘liberal’ orientation of sociology, psychology, political science, and similar fields is well established.”

This orientation has been on rich display in the research on same-sex parenting, which is scientific primarily in the sense that it is typically conducted by people with postgraduate degrees. There are no scientifically reliable studies at all, nor could there be, given the available data. Yet the Supreme Court has been solemnly assured by many scientific organizations, such as the American Psychological Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics, that the overwhelming weight of evidence indicates that same-sex couples are every bit the equal of opposite-sex parents in every relevant respect. The number of studies may be overwhelming but the evidence assuredly is not.

The prominent National Longitudinal Lesbian Family Study, for instance, relied on a sample recruited entirely at lesbian events, in women’s bookstores and through lesbian newspapers. Other studies relied on samples as small as 18 or 33 or 44 cases. The effect of parenting by male homosexual couples remains in the realm of anecdotes. Most research has relied on reports by parents about their children’s well-being while the children were still under the care of those parents. Even a social scientist should be able to recognize that parents’ evaluations of their own success as parents might be a little skewed.

In 2012, sociologist Loren Marks conducted a detailed re-analysis of 59 studies of parenting by gays and lesbians that were cited by the American Psychological Association in a 2005 publication. Mr. Marks, who teaches at Louisiana State University, concluded that the association drew inferences that were not empirically warranted.

There has been only one study using a large randomized sample, objective measures of well-being, and reports of grown children rather than their parents. This research, by Mark Regnerus, a sociologist at the University of Texas Austin, found that children raised in a household where a parent was involved in a same-sex romantic relationship were at a significant disadvantage with respect to a number of indicators of well being—such as depression, educational attainment and criminal behavior—compared with children of intact biological families.

One might expect this work at least to raise a caution flag, but it has been vociferously attacked on methodological grounds by the same organizations that tout the value of politically congenial research that suffers from more severe methodological shortcomings. This is what one expects from activists, not scientists.

As everyone knows, some states have begun to experiment with legalizing same-sex marriage, and public opinion seems to be shifting in favor of the change. Perhaps this will work out well, and the overwhelming majority of states that have been more cautious will eventually catch up. But experiments are never guaranteed to succeed, and one advantage of democracy is that it allows failed experiments to be abandoned.

If the Supreme Court constitutionalizes a right to same-sex marriage, however, there will be no going back. The court cannot possibly know that it is safe to take this irrevocable step.

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Equality Of Marriage And The Supreme Court – Derek Jeter

March 27, 2013
Not these guys again...

Not these guys again…

One of America’s leading purveyors of Catholic Spirituality, the representative icon of a certain NY Yankee shortstop, vents his fears for the week of momentous Supreme Court decisions.

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In recent years the “equality of marriage” movement appears to be hurtling towards a final denouement which many of us fear is the sweeping ukase of the Supreme Court declaration in Hollingsworth v. Perry that “will review Proposition 8, a 2008 California referendum that overturned that state’s supreme court ruling creating a right for gays and lesbians to have their relationships legally identified as marriage. The claim is that the one man, one woman definition violates the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection. That is also among the claims in U.S. v. Windsor, which challenges the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), the 1996 law that uses the traditional definition for federal law and says one state’s definition cannot bind another’s.”

The net effect of those two decisions will support the notion that laws based on sexual orientation lack any “rational basis.” And that the only motivation for such laws is prejudice against gays – Don’t accept gay marriage? Oh you must be homophobic. Hence through overturning Prop 8 and striking down DOMA the Supreme Court will designate homosexuals as a legally protected group like minorities or women and apply to Proposition 8 the highest levels of constitutional protection, called strict or heightened scrutiny. You have to be shitting me.

Now as a Catholic and someone who believes that sin is a real and present danger in our society(read the two previous posts by Benedict XVI to understand what sin is) I believe that homosexuality or same-sex attraction, while not in of itself a sin unlike same-sex acts, sets up a dynamic within the soul that the church has labeled a “moral disorder” — something that increases the likelihood of the human to waver in its propensities and desires and lead it eventually towards an expression of one’s sexual desires that will find itself fundamentally out of  harmony with God’s will, such as same-sex acts.

In the face of this — and one can think here also of another curse of modern life, masturbation using online pornographic images — the Church urges that those beset with such disorders seek training in the virtues. From The Ministry to Persons with a Homosexual Inclination: Guidelines for Pastoral Care:

“To acquire a virtue — to become temperate, brave, just, prudent or chaste — we must repeatedly perform acts that embody that virtue, acts that we accomplish with the help of the Holy Spirit and with the guidance and encouragement of our teachers in virtue. In our society, chastity is a particular virtue that requires special effort. All people, whether married or single, are always called to chaste living by the Church. Chaste living overcomes disordered human desires such as lust and results in the expression of one’s sexual desires in harmony with God’s will.”

The Church exists to tell those who seek divine forgiveness that everything is OK, you’re going to be all right. God loves you and if you practice chastity someday you will find true love and for a man that is the love of a good Catholic woman. She will drive you crazy, yes – but that’s what complementarity gets you, it’s no walk in the park and while I understand guys who want to setup housekeeping together and never argue over which way the silverware gets put into the dishwasher and not deal with how celebrities date each other, spending your life with a same-sex partner is a cop-out.  Where’s the challenge in that? As a marriage it is NOT the same. You guys don’t have to put up with women. So don’t even talk to me about equality. You’ve never really suffered until you’ve put up with a woman in marriage.

The phenomenon of homosexuality poses challenges that can only be met with the help of a clear understanding of the place of sexuality within God’s plan for humanity. In the beginning, God created human beings in his own image, meaning that the complementary sexuality of man and woman is a gift from God and ought to be respected as such. “Human sexuality is thus a good, part of that created gift which God saw as being ‘very good,’ when he created the human person in his image and likeness, and ‘male and female he created them’ (Genesis 1:27).”

The complementarity of man and woman as male and female is inherent within God’s creative design. Precisely because man and woman are different, yet complementary, they can come together in a union that is open to the possibility of new life. Jesus taught that “from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother [and be joined to his wife], and the two shall become one flesh’” (Mark 10:6-8).

The purpose of sexual desire is to draw man and woman together in the bond of marriage, a bond that is directed toward two inseparable ends: the expression of marital love and the procreation and education of children. “The spouses’ union achieves the twofold end of marriage: the good of the spouses themselves and the transmission of life.”

This is the order of nature, an order whose source is ultimately the wisdom of God. To the extent that man and woman cooperate with the divine plan by acting in accord with the order of nature, they not only bring to fulfillment their own individual human natures but also accomplish the will of God.
Fr. Richard John Neuhaus, quoted in Homosexuality and Love’s Duty

Your welcome to your choice free to exercise your disobedience and I will never inflict my choice on you but when it comes to raising kids, you need one of each, a man and a woman for that to succeed. The sociological data is overwhelming; kids need a dad and a mom, and don’t tell me otherwise. The modern heterosexual record at successful marriage is grim at best, don’t get me wrong, but don’t use that as an excuse to justify your little Timmy Has Two Daddies housekeeping experiments. Happy you are happy and great that Timmy is doing well but no government aid because this is different from what is described by Father Neuhaus.

So to maintain your sexual desires in harmony with God’s will, you need to practice the virtues. The rest of us have to practice training in the virtues (whether we know it or not, it comes as part of living life) and resist our temptations to sin and control our out-of-whack disorders but our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters have mounted a powerful lobby that seeks to get a pass on their disorders and sins by tossing out this canard of “equality” that now seeks to use the Supreme Court to exercise the equal protection clause to create a new category of people who need extra legal defenses. Sort of an I’m OK You’re OK cultural move when Catholics know I’m Not OK, I”m a Sinner and So Are You. When you wake up you can join us.

Holy shit! It’s a brilliant political move. For some reason serial lechers like myself have never banded together to get our rights defined and defended. Maybe I should rebrand my site as Paying Attention to the Broads. We need to fall in line behind the child molesters, excuse me, I mean, those who now defend the rights of man-boy love that we keep badgering with our distorted sense of good and evil. “Keep Molesting Alive!” I can see the picket signs now, “Our Jails Are Filled With Innocents!”

Excuse me, but homosexuals are not disenfranchised like blacks in the mid-20th century, despite the protestations and chatter of the homosexualists in our midst. When blacks sidled up to lunch counters and demanded equal protection to gain access to the same hamburgers and cokes as everyone else in the 1960s, they didn’t ask for extra cheese or lettuce and tomato with theirs – they just wanted what was on the menu, the hamburger remained the hamburger. And theirs was a problem because they were black and out of slavery. They still suffer from that. So they got a pass and bless them for it.

The Homosexualists demand that the definition of marriage itself with all its attendant benefits that arise from the very nature of the complementarity that exists between men and women (and which are totally absent, by definition, in their same sex unions) – these petulant self-promoting homsexualists demand that meaning of marriage itself  be changed and demand that vanilla ice cream now come with nuts and cherries while still bearing the name “vanilla ice cream.”

Bullshit sez I, That ain’t Vanilla. A modern replay of the emperor has no clothes. That ain’t marriage, that’s a woman with a German Shepherd. Call it a civil union, get all your rights or whatever and call off this “equality” crap. It really is a joke, without any redeeming social value or cultural grace.

I refuse to create a separate class of human beings beyond the two that God created. I’d like to tell you to go fuck yourselves but suspect you’re already doing that. Can’t you find some peace with who you are without bothering the rest of us? Brokeback Mountain to you, a filthy crater to Benedict XVI. I’d rather follow him to the top of the mountain.  Some of Jesus’ finest moments came on mountain tops and I place my bets with the Vicar of Christ.

Well maybe the Pope and I are about to get our comeuppance. Perhaps the Supreme Court-mandated marriages that the Homosexualists envision will at long last tell millions of Americans that their deep moral convictions concerning marriage are “artifacts of invidious bigotry,” absent any “rational thought.” Rather than seek a state by state vote on the matter, we will now get a federal definition of marriage, a ukase that will expand marriage to include man on man, uncle with nephew, woman on woman, two sister whatever marriages; thereby legislating cultural change rather than going state by state to confer the benefits of marriage on whomever. And we will shutter our Roman Catholic Churches when we fail to perform the sacrament. We’ll go back to meeting secretly in our homes and build escape tunnels for our radical priests. Those were the days.

Put it to a vote, sez I. No, sez the Homosexualist, let’s ram it down your miserable homophobic throats by a court diktat like Roe v. Wade in 1972.  Well that’s what we need: instead of finding a rough consensus inside the political mainstream using state by state ballot measures, let’s create another abortion fiasco, that all-or-nothing combat that still rages forty years later. More all out culture wars, less resolution of differences. Hooray.

No wonder people are watching that zombie epic The Walking Dead. Zombies are all over the news these days: Prominent politicians informed their sons now regard themselves as “gay,” suddenly experience a change of heart, and support Gay Marriage. Perhaps they started a vegetarian diet as well. I don’t get the rationale or reason myself. And they don’t give any, come to think of it. Married men and women are happier and more stable so should married men and men and married women and women. Is that it?

Really? Have you ever thought that they are happier and more stable because they are men and women and the combination in marriage is something you’re not and never will be? They are special; they have families with their own kids (they procreate, duh) or maybe they adopt. The government defines what they do as marriage and grants them special privileges, tax breaks, etc. They may suck at what they do and make a general mess of it but we wish them well and they deserve the consideration. And they get my blessing. You assholes don’t and never will.

If I were doing something 3% and out of the mainstream I wouldn’t demand that others treat me like I were part of the 97%. But that’s just me, I guess. Be happy and more stable because you’re allowed to do what 97% of the other are doing, you can add nuts and cherries to your vanilla ice cream, call it vanilla and no one bothers you. If someone drags your ass behind a pickup truck one night, well we have laws against that and they will be punished – homosexual asses are no different from the rest of us asses. You’re already equal, you nitwits. Getting others to change the definition of vanilla ice cream to include your idiot concoction doesn’t improve anything and God only knows the unseen repercussions that may follow – somebody may start adding nuts and cherries to cream cheese.

And you are our gay brothers and if some Chinaman or Islamic Republic guy comes in and starts dragging your asses we will go to war to protect you because you are American gay asses, your one of ours. Let them do what they please. 70,000 dead in Syria and we don’t give a fuck. Not that I agree with Obama on anything but you want to add nuts and cherries and call it vanilla, go straight ahead. I’m not going to play for your softball team or shop at your ice-cream store but I get it. God bless you. Jerry Seinfeld expressed the same sentiments as I recall.

Karl Rove muses that perhaps a big-tent Republican party should embrace a gay rights platform. That’s right Karl, let’s drain the swamp. We’ll deal with the alligators in your pup tent later.

Posted in Homosexualism | Tagged , , , , , , , | 6 Comments »

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With The Pope Against The Homoheresy 4 — Fr. Dariusz Oko, Ph.D.

March 7, 2013
The Resurrection by Piero della Francesca, 15th century

The Resurrection by Piero della Francesca, 15th century

“The church will become small and will have to start afresh more or less from the beginning. She will no longer be able to inhabit many of the edifices she built in prosperity. As the number of her adherents diminishes…she will lose many of her social privileges… As a small society, [the Church] will make much bigger demands on the initiative of her individual members… But when the trial of this sifting is past, a great power will flow from a more spiritualized and simplified Church. Men in a totally planned world will find themselves unspeakably lonely. If they have completely lost sight of God, they will feel the whole horror of their poverty. Then they will discover the little flock of believers as something wholly new. They will discover it as a hope that is meant for them, an answer for which they have always been searching in secret. And so it seems certain to me that the Church is facing very hard times. The real crisis has scarcely begun. We will have to count on terrific upheavals. But I am equally certain about what will remain at the end: not the Church of the political cult, which is dead already, but the Church of faith. She may well no longer be the dominant social power to the extent that she was until recently; but she will enjoy a fresh blossoming and be seen as man’s home, where he will find life and hope beyond death.”
Pope Benedict XVI

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Our Struggle
It is important to understand the reasons for which the Church has been unable to deal with the problem of the homolobby for so long. It is not only about the influences of the homolobby itself, where complaints about one homosexual wearing a cassock end up on the desk of another, then in the dustbin or, worse even, in the hands of the wrongdoer himself – so that he can freely take revenge on his victims. It is not only the evil kind of group solidarity, defending those who are “one of us”, no matter how guilty they are. [37].

There is yet another reason, and that is ignorance, failure to understand the weight of the problem. For a normal priest, it is inconceivable for such terrible evil to be taking place behind his back. Moreover, decent, well-meaning clergymen are usually burdened with so much work they feel unable to deal with yet another problem. Who would want to deal with such filth, unless they were forced to, anyway? That is why until a really huge scandal erupts, people tend to act like “it’s rickety, it’s wobbly, but at least it’s moving”.

After all, we are at times dealing here with criminal activity, and the Church is not the police, it does not have the tools necessary to deal with organized crime. If a priest has caused a car accident or committed an economic crime, he must first be dealt with by the police or the prosecutor, not the bishop or provincial. And acts of paedophilia and ephebophilia belong to the most serious offences against the bodies, psyche and souls of children and youth. What a great disturbance in clergymen who repeatedly do things like that for a moment’s pleasure! They ruin the lives of their neighbours.

It was first of all about paedophiles and ephebophiles that Jesus said: “Woe to you”. He said that for anyone who “causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin it would be better for him to have a large millstone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea” (cf. Matthew 18:6-11 and Luke 17:1-2). Such abuse is the most abominable, terrible harm for a normal boy, it is like killing his soul.

Sometimes the victim of an ephebophile is unable to get over such an abuse for his entire life, to trust others, to respect himself or to obey any moral norms. If such brutal evil is done by a clergyman, the issue becomes even more painful, because harm is inflicted by the one who has preached beautiful ideas, whom the boy trusted, from whom he had the right to expect all that is good and noble.

Abused boys then say: “I will never go to church anymore”, “all priests are bastards”. Sometimes, they lose faith altogether or join some sect, and sometimes they really never come back to the Church. Even though they used to be part of the young group closest to the priest, particularly involved in their religion, most of them coming from families of believers; they used to be altar boys, lectors, went to summer camps, retreats, pilgrimages, they were the treasure and future of the Church. The ardent work of a multitude of decent parents, religious sisters, catechists, priests, bishops, is destroyed by the crimes of a group of vile men.

In that situation, those wronged may be helped especially if defended by another priest. That is the most effective way of restoring their trust in the Church, to have another priest defend the victim from a perverted fellow priest, and take them to the police. That is faithfulness to man and to Christ. It is necessary, because an act of paedophilia or ephebophilia is usually one in a whole series, and needs to be stopped immediately.

In such matter, there is no room for hesitation, no matter how much there is to risk, no matter whom we might fall into disfavour with, no matter what there is to lose. Just like a father has the duty to die to defend his child if necessary, so a priest has the duty to die to defend each and every one of the little ones, who are God’s children.

In Poland, the situation is particularly dangerous because some elderly gays and ephebophiles in cassocks may have connections with the former Security Service and other special services. Many secret collaborators recruited from them, since they were especially prone to blackmail. Sometimes, they are still blackmailed today. If their vile acts are exposed, the officers of such services will have nothing to blackmail them with, and thus their source of regular income will run dry. That is why a priest who stands up in defence of youth and opposes an influential paedophile or ephebophile may undergo an ordeal. He may find himself standing up against not only the homomafia in the local Church, but also the old structures of special services. And they are proficient in maltreating and murdering clergymen, as was the case not so long ago not only with Blessed F. Jerzy Popiełuszko, but also with F. Zych, F. Niedzielak, F. Suchowolec, and others.

Therefore, the homomafia in the Church must be dealt with in a very professional way – we must act like a prosecutor or an officer in the battlefield. We must be aware that the other party may have become internally degenerated by decades of living in sin and hypocrisy, that they may have gone downhill to the level of ordinary criminals, that they are prepared to do even the worst things, both in words and acts, to defend their interests and position.

We must be prepared, and not be surprised even if we are insulted with the worst curses, if we are accused of the worst things, for it is “out of the overflow of the heart that the mouth speaks” (cf. Matthew 12:34). Someone who has committed great iniquities for dozens of years is ready to do things at least equally vile to conceal evil and avoid responsibility. It is much easier to lie and say they have not done anything wrong than to beat or kill someone.

It is important that we find a possibly large group of people of goodwill to protect us and support what we do[38]. That group should include clergymen, as high in the hierarchy as possible, experts in various fields, archive records specialists, lawyers, policemen, journalists, and as may believers as possible. It is good to exchange information, documents, evidence.

The global network of the homolobbies and homomafias must be counterbalanced by a network of honest people. An excellent tool that can be used here is the Internet, which makes it possible to create a global community of people concerned about the fate of the Church, who have resolved to oppose homoideology and homoheresy. The more we know, the more we can do.

We need to remember that in these matters we are like “sheep sent among wolves”, and so we must be “as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves” (Matthew 10:16). We must have the courage to stand up against evildoers, as Christ had the courage to stand up against the Pharisees of his times. We cannot build our lives on sweet illusions, for only “the truth will set you free” (John 8:32), and that is why “God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of a sound mind” (2 Timothy 1:7).

The global network of homolobbies and homomafias must be counterbalanced by a global network of decent people.

All interventions should be made with utmost respect and love for every person, including the abusers. The essence of Christianity is reflected in the will to save everyone, and the worst criminals are especially at risk of losing both their earthly and their eternal life, so they need an especially abundant portion of concern and prayer. The greatness and beauty of Christianity resides also in the fact that Abel here should try not only to save himself, but everybody else too, including Cain.

Love And Truth Of The Church
In our struggle for the Church of Jesus Christ, we must not be misled by arguments like: “The Church is our mother, and one must not say bad things about one’s mother”. Such words are often heard from those who have hurt their mother the most, who have made her seriously ill, and now refuse to begin the treatment. If the best mother of all is sick, to treat her effectively we need the best possible tools and the best, most accurate diagnosis possible.

Thus, we must know about the illness and talk about it. If the Church in Poland is now heading for harder times, if it must prepare itself for persecution, if it must resist and fight, its organism must be healthy and strong, and any gangrene must be removed. President Joachim Hauck said that in the former East Germany the process of cleansing and compensation was opposed most strongly by those who had the most to weigh on their conscience, who had hurt their brothers and sisters the most, who betrayed them the most.

Similar charges of disloyalty could be brought against the Evangelists themselves, because they reported on the betrayal of Judas, Peter’s denial of Jesus, his being rebuked by Jesus, on Thomas’s incredulity, on the careerism of James and John. One might ask why they did not hide that shameful truth – especially in the times of the initial weakness of the first Church, in the times of the first bloody persecutions, when both the Apostles and other Christians were being killed, one by one?

And in the end, similar charges could be brought against Lord Jesus himself – why did he criticize the Pharisees so radically, why did he publicly expose their inequity, their falsehood, their hypocrisy and lies? He was, after all, attacking the religious and national elites of his time, the public form of a religion as valuable, as deserving as that of the Chosen People. And not only did the Evangelists write it all down, but then they described the way priests, Sadducees and Pharisees dealt with Jesus during the Passover. This way greatly undermining the highest religious and moral authorities of their nation – and all of that was done during the dark night of Roman occupation!

It was indeed the public fight against the social structures of sin, against Pharisees, that was one of the most important areas of Christ’s activity. We should follow in his footsteps as well – in his courage, in his determination to fight against evil, in the precision of his arguments in exposing evildoers. Whatever Christ did is a model to be followed in any age. But we need knowledge to make sure our struggle against evil is effective. And so, remembering to “recognize them by their fruit” (cf. Matthew 7:16), based on the publicly known events of the last quarter of the century, the reaction of the Holy See and the documents it issued, we must clearly, explicitly and resolvedly say: yes, there is a strong homosexual underground in the Church (just like in many other places), which – depending on the degree of involvement of its members, depending on their words and deeds – may be referred to as homoheresy, homolobby, homoclique or even homomafia[39].

Such circles in the Church strongly oppose truth, morality and Revelation, cooperate with the enemies of the Church, incite a revolt against the Peter of our times, the Holy See and the entire Church. Members of that lobby in the Church are a relatively small group, but often hold key positions (which they are very anxious to achieve), create a close network of relationships and support one another, which is what makes them dangerous. They are dangerous especially to the youth, who are threatened by sexual abuse. They are dangerous to themselves, as, more and more hardened in evil, they may finally “die in their sins” (John 8:23), as Christ warned. They are dangerous to honest lay people and clergymen who oppose them.

Finally, they are dangerous to the Church at large, because when their iniquities are finally exposed, when they become a topic for media coverage, the faith of millions of people is weakened or destroyed. Many say then: “No, in a Church like that there is no place either for me, or my children or grandchildren”. And so, homosexual depravers and abusers scandalize millions of people, putting a huge obstacle on their road to faith, to Christ, to salvation. And all of that just for several dozen years of a comfortable life of sin.

Can there be a greater sin? The Church has been created as the most wonderful, most beautiful community of love and kindness, of believers living in peace with the Lord and with one another. We must not allow our greatest treasure to be destroyed. Let us be confident and peaceful. Normal, honest people are the overwhelming majority. They only need to be properly informed, mobilized and unified in action.

It was indeed the public fight against the social structures of sin, against the Pharisees, that was one of the most important areas of Christ’s activity.

Every truth, even that which is the most difficult, should lead us to work for the better, to struggle for the wellbeing of man and the Church. Despite all sin and weakness, the best, the most beautiful thing we have is the Church. Evil, including homosexual evil, is present to a much greater degree outside the Church, in other communities. Those who criticize us are often like hypocrites who cannot see “the plank in their own eye” (cf. Matthew 7:1-5).

That is why the Church is now hated so much and attacked with such vehemence – because its very existence is a constant prick of conscience, a constant admonition for those who live in sins which are much, much greater than those of some people in the Church. Let us keep the right proportions. There have always been and will most likely be baptized people in the Church who live like Cain or Judas, but we must not condemn Abel because of Cain, or reject the other eleven Apostles and Christ himself because of Judas. That would be a fundamental mistake, Judas represents only about 8% of the Twelve Apostles.

But neither should we allow Judas to dominate and rule in the Church. His influence must not be greater than that of John or Paul. It is the Peter of our times that is the most important person in the Church, and he should be listened to. Benedict XVI is a great gift of the Providence, just like his honourable predecessor, John Paul II. Let us stand together on Benedict XVI’s side, just as we would have stood on the side of Blessed John Paul the Great. They were such a wonderful, wise and courageous duet of apostles. They agreed and supported each other so much – also on this matter[40].

To say “I am leaving the Church because it is too evil for me, and too sinful” is to say that apparently “I am too good for it”, to say, in a way, that “I am a better, a more valuable person than Mother Theresa, or even Our Lady or Lord Jesus himself”, since for them that Church is good enough to stay in, to love and protect.

The Church is like the people who make it up, and that is why it is always sinful, but always holy as well. Among more then a billion of its members, there are thousands of people who commit vile and base acts, but there are also hundreds of millions of Catholic men and women who are honest and holy. More than half of them are women – persons who are particularly sensitive to the well-being of man, to the fate of children and youth, to pure love.

There are hundreds of millions of people who take up the great effort of work, marriage, family, bearing and rearing children. There are thousands of missionary men and women (more than two thousand from Poland alone) who devote all of their lives in the most difficult conditions, the greatest poverty. There are about 700,000 religious sisters who try to live their lives as unsparingly and evangelically as they can. There is Mother Theresa and several thousand of her sisters.

To say “I am leaving the Church because it is too evil for me, and too sinful” is to say that apparently “I am too good for it”, to say, in a way, that “I am a better, a more valuable person than Mother Theresa, or even Our Lady or Lord Jesus himself”, since for them that Church is good enough to stay in, to love and protect. For it is that Church that has the most of God in it, and thus the most of truth, goodness and beauty. That is why being part of it and growing in it, one may reach the topmost heights of Christianity and humanity – like Blessed Mother Theresa of Calcutta, like Blessed John Paul the Great, like Benedict XVI – the most beautiful people of our times.

We are all invited to become holy in the Church of Lord Jesus Christ through grace and our own work – no matter at which phase of development and what place in the Church we are in now. All we need to do is “arise and go” (John 14:31).

[NOTES]

[37] It should be added here that the failure to discipline clergymen who live an indecent life, particularly if they hold important positions, is part of a greater problem in the Church, it is a weakness and a sin that is structural in nature. A similar failure to react can be observed if a Bishop gives in to alcoholism, or starts to act like a fanatic campaigner for a political party. It may go on like that for decades, when the comfort of one clergyman is put before the spiritual welfare of millions of the faithful, when for the comfort of one person a whole multitude of people is exposed to the risk of weakening or losing their faith in the face of such terrible depravity. The same applies to parish priests having concubines. Even though these facts are publicly known, the wrongdoers do not even try to hide them too much, nothing changes. Sometimes, their superiors excuse themselves saying there is no indisputable proof. And yet, a great majority of personnel decisions are not taken based on detailed proceedings in court, but based on common knowledge, that which is generally known about a particular person (especially if that knowledge is confirmed by a number of reliable people). In any case, there is clearly an urgent need for developing institutions which are concerned with the discipline of religious life. We need many more people like F. Charles Scicluna and such offices as his. A Church which makes such high demands on the world, must first and foremost demand of herself and meet them. She may not let herself be exposed to ridicule. The sources of an evil that is so great cannot be tolerated for that long – especially seeing that it is taking an ever greater toll. The Peter of our time, Benedict XVI, says that one of the fundamental sources of the sea of iniquity which has flooded the Church of Ireland was abandoning the penal functions of Canon Law, because “Thus the awareness that punishment can be an act of love ceased to exist. This led to an odd darkening of the mind, even in very good people.” (Benedict XVI, Light of the World, op. cit., p. 26.)
[38] When helping the victims of sexual abuse, one should secure evidence, make sure the victim is examined by a physician, immediately record live the testimony of the victim and any witnesses. It is important, because sometimes even those most wronged withdraw their testimonies – because of shame, opportunism, fear of the abuser and his allies on whom they may be dependant or to whom they may be subordinated in many ways. Criminal cases should be reported to the police and the prosecutor, not only to Church authorities. In other cases, an attempt should first be made at solving them within the local Church. If the local situation is very bad, help should be sought from the Holy See, but making sure the request is received by the right, trusted person – one of the best persons here being F. Charles Scicluna. He should be written in Italian or in English, and it is worthwhile checking he actually received the documents. He will know what to do about the problem. One should remember that any sexual contacts with minors under 15 years of age are punishable and indictable offences in light of the Polish Criminal Code. In Canon Law, the age limit is even higher. Any abuse inflicted on a minor under 18 years of age by a clergyman must be reported to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
[39] It should be emphasized that not every clergyman with such tendencies belongs to these communities, some of them suffer very much seeing their brothers act that way.
[40] Cf. the document of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith of 2003 Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognitions to Unions Between Homosexual Persons, where John Paul II and Cardinal Ratzinger in one voice point out that “all Catholics are obliged to oppose the legal recognition of homosexual unions” (Section 10), and criticize the ideology behind such attempts. Cf. also John Paul II, Pamięć i tożsamość [Memory and Identity], Kraków 2005, p. 20. Blessed John Paul the Great repeatedly condemned homosexuality, calling it a “deviated behaviour, inconsistent with God’s intention” (1994), a “lamentable perversion” (1999); he also said that “homosexual acts are contrary to the laws of nature” (2005).

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With The Pope Against The Homoheresy 3 — Fr. Dariusz Oko, Ph.D.

March 6, 2013

 

The Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertonealso, points to the fact that “80 percent of paedophiles convicted in the USA are homosexuals. Among priests convicted for paedophilia, they represent 90 percent.

The Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertonealso, points to the fact that “80 percent of paedophiles convicted in the USA are homosexuals. Among priests convicted for paedophilia, they represent 90 percent.

Homoheresy In The Church
Not everyone wants to accept the above rules. There is resistance to what is taught by the Pope. The homosexual community in the Church defends itself and is on the attack. It also needs an intellectual tool, a justification, and that is why homoideology takes in their minds, words and writings the form of homoheresy.

The most open revolt against the Pope and the Church is headed by some Jesuits in the United States, who openly oppose them and announce that despite the above decisions, they will keep admitting homosexually-oriented seminarians, who are, indeed, especially welcome[26].

They have a long tradition in that vein, for years being the mainstay of homoideology and homoheresy. They take many views of the heretical moral theologian, ex-priest Charles Curran, for their own. They are also under the overwhelming influence of their former fellow friar, F. John McNeill SJ, who founded the pro-homosexual movement called Dignity, and published a book entitled The Church and the Homosexual, where he explicitly rejects the teaching of the Church and adopts homoideology. The book was given an imprimatur by his provincial from New York, and has been republished several times despite being banned by the Vatican. This way, it has become a homosexual bible for many American Jesuits.

McNeill seems to mean more for them than Jesus or Saint Paul, much less the Pope[27]. The Theological Studies and America papers they publish still uphold and promote pro-homosexual ideas. Consequently, it is estimated they have achieved the highest saturation with homosexuals, way above 30 percent. Gays feel more comfortable with them than ever, while other priests find the specific atmosphere less and less bearable[28].

It appears as though the Jesuits have replaced their traditional, fourth vow of obedience to the Pope with a fourth vow of arch-disobedience. We should not be particularly surprised or shocked, though, knowing that the clergy is submitted to all influences of their times, including the worst ones. If they are intellectually or morally weak, they are not only subject, but succumb to them. That is one of the basic sources of heresy in the Church, which has already seen so many of them that needed to be exposed and overcome so many times. In the age of fascist ideologies and Marxism, we also had fascist priests and Marxist priests in the Church. Now that the extreme leftists promote homoideology in turn, we naturally have homoideologist, and sometimes even homoheretic priests in the Church.

In Poland, their best known representative is F. Jacek Prusak, SJ, who had been trained by American Jesuits, after all. For eight years now he has taken on the role of a spokesman of the homolobby in the Church, fighting uncompromisingly to defend its interests. His vocabulary and his arguments sometimes seem to be literal quotations from handbooks on homoideology, copied from gay websites. His writings suffer from numerous defects both as to the contents and to logic, but their main goal is always the same: the ultimate apology of homosexuality in general, and homosexual priesthood in particular – no matter how much manipulation is needed to achieve that goal[29].

Whenever a priest or a lay person talks about what the Church teaches on homosexuality, when they defend and explain it and call for it to be followed, they should expect an immediate, brutal attack from Father Prusak – sometimes even on the pages of particularly anti-Christian papers. In this great struggle fought by the Church against homoideology, he explicitly takes sides with the enemy and excels in it. He was once supported by Father Tadeusz Bartoś OP, even though in a much less aggressive way. Since F. Bartoś left priesthood and his congregation in 2007, he has remained alone in that role[30]. He is the tried-and-tested commentator for the media particularly hostile to the Church in that regard.

In 2005, right after the instruction prohibiting the ordaining of homosexuals was announced, F. J. Prusak published a devastating criticism in a paper whose editors are known for their fanatic propagation of homoideology[31]. Similarly, in his article entitled The Lavender History of the Church, precisely contravening the statements of the Magisterium quoted above, he claims that homosexual orientation does not preclude a candidate for priesthood. He questions the existence of a homolobby in the Church, even though he and his activities are particularly convincing evidence to the contrary[32]. Thus, he continues in the long line of priests who presented views contrary to the teaching of the Church, for which they were promoted in leftist, antichristian media, e.g. F. Michał Czajkowski, ex-Jesuit Stanisław Obirek, and ex-Dominican Tadeusz Bartoś.

One can easily see that, comparing his opinions with those expressed by the Pope quoted above and the documents of the Church mentioned here. One cannot allow, however, for a homoideologist priest to continue his attacks on the teaching of the Church and on the priests and lay people who defend that teaching, for homoideological minority to dominate the normal majority. The way in which Father J. Prusak opposes the Holy Father is inadmissible and scandalous.

The way Father Jacek Prusak opposes the Holy Father is inadmissible and scandalous.

This is about the very existence of the Church. Ideology and manipulation must be nipped in the bud, for if more clergymen like Father Prusak appear, it may be too late. The Church may destroy itself from within – just as has already been the case in many places in the West. A Church which contradicts itself, rejects its own teaching, becomes useless and dies – like the Church in Holland. Anything that is self-contradictory is bound to disappear.

Bad theology is deadly dangerous. An incompetent theologian may reduce faith, theology and philosophy to psychology, may infect the organism of the Church with viruses of the enemy’s sick ideas, may pick up and pass on somebody else’s illnesses.

That was, for example, the case with the ex-priest Eugene Drewmann, who began as a professor of dogmatic theology in Paderborn, and through a reduction of theology to psychology ended up with New Age and Buddhism. For him, Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung became more important than Jesus and Saint Paul. The consequences were already waiting around the corner[33]. If such theories are allowed to spread, their consequences may be destructive for the entire Church – as it was in Holland. It was there that the sick theology of Edward Schillebeecks contributed to the disintegration and near destruction of the Church which was once so full of life. Within a dozen or so years, it almost made it disappear. It was like a mine planted under a building. We should defend ourselves with all resolution against such “Dutch theology”.

This is about the Church’s to be or not to be. If homolobbyists are allowed to act freely, in a dozen or so years they may destroy entire congregations and dioceses – like in the USA, where the priestly vocation is more and more now called a gay profession (particularly with reference to American Jesuits), or like in Ireland, where men are hesitant about joining the emptying seminaries for fear of being suspected of suffering from some disorders.

In the USA, the priestly vocation is more and more often now called gay profession.

In Ireland, men are hesitant about joining the emptying seminaries for fear of being suspected of suffering from some disorders.

The situation is a bit like that in the beginning of the Reformation, when entire countries and nations left the Church, and when one of the fundamental reasons for that state of affairs was the unprecedented decline in morality and libertinism of some clergymen, including Pope Alexander VI himself. Just like the Council of Trent tried to save the Church first of all through repentance and discipline, Benedict XVI tries to save it by limiting the size and the influence of the homolobby within the Church.

This shows his prophetic and scientific genius, and emphasizes his importance as one of the greatest theologians of our time, capable of participating in spiritual warfare. This can be seen particularly in a longer perspective, when we think about how many other theologians flirted with fashionable ideologies, or even succumbed to them. As theologian and bishop, Ratzinger was always high-principled and made excellent, accurate decisions. He never came under such illusions, never went either into “newspaper theology” or “postmodern theology” with their utmost irresponsibility, making it is easy to put forward claims which profoundly contradict Christianity. Now, he has nothing to be ashamed about.

And yet, it is for that accuracy of opinion that he is so vehemently opposed, or even hated by some in the Church, especially by members of the homolobby which represents the very centre of internal opposition against the Pope. The greatness of Benedict XVI can also be seen in the way he suffers all that, peaceful, trustful and patient, when he humbly remains silent in reply to the most primitive attacks – from those who are “in the same camp”. He does not defend himself, what he cares about is first of all Christ and the wellbeing of man. He is a great scientist and a faithful witness to the Revelation. He is indeed not only the most outstanding intellectual, but also a “good shepherd who does not abandon the sheep or run away when he sees the wolf coming, but lays down his life for the sheep” (cf. John 10;12.15).

He cannot do it all by himself, however. He needs each and everyone of us. He needs support and healthy preaching in every local Church. It is a matter of remaining faithful to one’s conscience: defending the truth of salvation, no matter how much it should cost us. In this context the greatness and holiness of the Church can be seen particularly well.

Homoideology seems to be so powerful and is being as aggressively promoted as Marxism or fascism used to be in the past. Its victory seems unavoidable to many (just like with those other ideologies). In that situation, it is first of all the Church that openly defends elementary truth, defends that which is reasonable. When the demons of ideology rage, faith must, paradoxically, become a special guardian and defender of reason. The Church has survived through difficulties and heresies greater than this. That which is absurd must ultimately collapse, exhaust and devour itself. One cannot live in contradiction forever. We cannot always live against reason, against nature, against commandments, just like we cannot stand on our head forever. We must finally either repent or fall.

The greatness of the Catholic Church is revealed also in that it can admit to being wrong, acknowledge the faults of its members, apologize for them, embark on the road of repentance and cleansing. Other communities are capable of doing that to a much lesser extent, even though their faults are much greater. The media, which could at times be called CHC – Centres of Hatred against Christianity, present the situation as though that was the main or the only problem of the Catholic Church, as though ephebophiles were only found among priests and every priest should be suspected of the same thing. Exactly in the same way Catholic clergy was presented by Goebbels’ propaganda in the times of Hitler, with the same methods of generalization applied to individual cases. Honest journalists, however, say: “We can see the Catholic Church is the only institution to be doing anything with paedophilia. The paedophilia which is a common problem in all communities and educational institutions”[34].

One could ask, then, when will journalists start investigating the scale of the problem among themselves, including the owners of the newspapers they work for, among those who set the tone for manipulations and witch-hunts in the media? It may be hard – as for example in Belgium or Lithuania, where even people at the topmost levels in the hierarchy of various authorities are involved in paedophilia. But where is the courage and enthusiasm of those journalists who have been so willing to attack the Church? Reliable studies show that the problem is the least widespread in the Catholic Church. Why, then, it is the only thing we hear? According to researchers, only one for a thousand cases of pedo- or ephebophilia is related to the sphere of the Catholic Church, in the USA only one to five Catholic priests are involved in that problem per ten thousand people. Statistically, much greater risk exists e.g. with married Protestant clergymen or teachers, particularly sports teachers.[35].

There is no relationship between celibacy and paedophilia. Statistically, much greater risk exists e.g. with married Protestant clergymen or teachers, particularly sports teachers.

It is not celibacy, then, that is to blame here, contrary to what is sometimes suggested. This has been pointed out, among others, by the Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, who said that “many psychologists and psychiatrists have proved that there is no relationship between celibacy and paedophilia, while many others have shown that there is a relationship between homosexuality and paedophilia”. He also points to the fact that “80 percent of paedophiles convicted in the USA are homosexuals. Among priests convicted for paedophilia, they represent 90 percent”.

These data show that “the Catholic Church has had a problem with homosexuals rather than paedophiles.” He is backed up by Itrovigne Massimo, an Italian sociologist, who reminds us that “there is no relationship between celibacy and paedophilia, as there are more paedophiles among married clergymen than among Catholic priests …  In the USA, nearly one thousand priests have been charged with sexual abuse against minors, and only about fifty were found guilty. Meanwhile, there were as many as six thousand sports teachers and coaches, most of them married, convicted for the same abuse. [36].

Is that not a perfect scoop for the media? Why do they hardly talk about it? It appears their intentions are not so much to protect children and youth as to destroy the Church. If their intentions were honest, they would first strike at those who commit the greatest number of such crimes. But their shortage of “just men” is much greater than here, however, they lack people who would be willing to do something about the problem, to take the risk. Such incidents among those who are “one of us” are covered up and justified much more than was the case in the Church (e.g. the behaviour of Roman Polanski in Hollywood in 1978, which apparently was a standard in that community then). They seem to be saying: “if this is done by ‘one of us’, we will not lift a finger, let the children be tormented, we do not care, as long as we are fine.” Here is the hypocrisy and cynicism of the “brave” journalists and their employers.

[NOTES]

[26] Cf. for instance statements on the matter by two Jesuit provincials in the United States, F. John Whitney SJ from Oregon, and F. Gerald Chojnacki SJ from New York, published also in Polish papers: M. Gadziński, Gej to nie ksiądz [A Gay is No Priest], “Gazeta Wyborcza”, 1-2.10.2005, p. 2. Homosexual propaganda in the German church is illustrated particularly well by the example of the Dominican monastery in Braunschweig. Cf. : http://www.dominikaner-braunschweig.de/Kloster/Homosex/Homosex.html.

[27] Cf. J. McNeill, The Church and the Homosexual, Kansas City 1976.

[28] Cf. R. J. Neuhaus, Rozejm roku 2005? [The Truce of 2005?], op. cit., p. 15.

[29] Cf. e.g.. J. Prusak, Miłość czy potencja  [Love or Potency], ”Tygodnik Powszechny” 24.10.2004; Manifest teologiczny [Theological Manifest], ”Tygodnik Powszechny” 16.12.2005;  Inni inaczej. O prawie homoseksualistów do bycia zrozumianymi [Challenged Otherwise. On the Right of Homosexuals to be Understood] ”Tygodnik Powszechny” 25 (2919) 2005, pp. 1 and 7; Norma i kultura [Norm and Culture], ”Tygodnik Powszechny”, 31.01.2012. What is perfidious, dangerous and deceptive in F. Prusak’s efforts is that he tries to make the impression as though he alone in the Church best understood and properly accepted homosexuals. The truth is, however, that only helping them face the truth and providing them with therapeutic assistance in overcoming their tendencies is what can help them. This is what is done by those who actually work for their benefit.

[30] Cf. J. Prusak, Inni inaczej, op. cit. and id., Zgadzamy się nie zgadzać [We Agree Not to Agree], ”Tygodnik Powszechny” 27 (2921) 2005, p. 6; Homofobia Camerona niebezpieczna, także dla Kościoła [Cameron’s Homophobia Is Dangerous, Also for the Church], an interview with K. Wiśniewska, ”Gazeta Wyborcza” 19.05.2009; O homoseksualizmie przed Mszą [On Homosexuality Before Mass], an interview with R . Kowalski, ”Gazeta Wyborcza” 28.08.2009; J. Prusak, Lawendowa historia Kościoła [A Lavender History of the Church], Rzeczpospolita 26.03.2012, s. 3. Cf. also F. T. Bartoś OP, Kościół gejów nie odrzuca [The Church Does Not Reject Gays], ”Gazeta Wyborcza” 11-12.06.2005, p. 4 and id., Homoseksualizm w publicznej debacie [Homosexuality in the Public Debate],  ”Gazeta Wyborcza” 25-26.06.2005, p. 29.

[31] Cf. K. Wiśniewska in an interview with F. J. Prusak, Instrukcja ma luki [The Instruction Has Gaps], ”Gazeta Wyborcza” 30.11.2005, p. 11.

[32] Cf. F. Jacek Prusak SJ, Lawendowa historia Kościoła [A Lavender History of the Church], op. cit. p. 3.

[33] Cf. D. Oko, Wokół sprawy Drewermanna [Around Drewermann’s Case], (together with J. Bagrowicz), “Ateneum Kapłańskie” 4 (500) 1992, pp. 102-114; Sprawa Drewermanna czyli “Luter dwudziestego wieku” [Drewermann’s Case, or the Luther of the Twentieth Century], ”Tygodnik Powszechny” 51 (2267) 1992; Fałszywy prorok. W odpowiedzi Tadeuszowi Zatorskiemu [False Prophet. In Reply to Tadeusz Zatorski], ”Tygodnik Powszechny” 7 (2275) 1993.

[34] F. J. Augustyn SJ, Kościelna omerta [Omerta in the Church], op. cit.

[35] Cf. Benedict XVI, Light of the World, op. cit., p. 30.

[36] P. Kowalczuk, Watykan: nie zawinił celibat [Vatican: Celibacy Was Not To Blame], ”Rzeczpospolita” 14.04.2010. After the Roman symposium “Towards Healing and Renewal”, a delegate from Poland, Bishop Marian Rojek from Przemyśl, pointed out that „as far sexual abuse of minors in the U.S.A. is concerned, 0.05 percent of all cases involves clergymen …. Studies conducted in Italy show similar percentages. In Germany, in turn, 210.000 cases of abuse against minors were reported from 1995 until the middle of 2012. In that context, only 94 cases were related to the Catholic Church. Which means one in every two thousand cases of harassment in Germany involves a clergyman”. That is why the Church “will not remain silent about the distortion of the overall picture of paedophilia in the world” (M. Majewski, Prawda i miłość lekarstwem na nadużycia [Abuse Can Be Healed With Truth and Love], an interview with Bishop Marian Rojek, “Uważam Rze”, 20.02.2012, pp. 60-62, 61.) Cf. F. D. Kowalczyk, Mówić prawdę o pedofilii [Speak the Truth About Paedophilia], “Gość Niedzielny”, 19.12.2012, pp. 28ff.

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With The Pope Against The Homoheresy 2 — Fr. Dariusz Oko, Ph.D.

March 5, 2013
Gay marriage denies God and devalues human dignity, Pope Benedict XVI said Friday in his annual "state of the Church address at the Vatican. Speaking to the Curia, the bureaucrats who run the global church of 1.2 billion Catholics, the pope said opposition to gay marriage is a way of defending humanity: "Whoever defends God is defending man." Benedict also quoted the chief rabbi of France, Gilles Bernheim, who has written that promoting a right to same-sex marriage is an "attack" on the traditional family made up of a father, mother and children. The address echoed his recently released annual peace message, which said gay marriage, abortion and euthanasia are threats to world peace.

Gay marriage denies God and devalues human dignity, Pope Benedict XVI said Friday in his annual “state of the Church” address at the Vatican. Speaking to the Curia, the bureaucrats who run the global church of 1.2 billion Catholics, the pope said opposition to gay marriage is a way of defending humanity: “Whoever defends God is defending man.” Benedict also quoted the chief rabbi of France, Gilles Bernheim, who has written that promoting a right to same-sex marriage is an “attack” on the traditional family made up of a father, mother and children. The address echoed his recently released annual peace message, which said gay marriage, abortion and euthanasia are threats to world peace.

The Formation Mechanism Of The Homo-Community
As can be seen from the above examples, that lobby must have been allowed to have its way for a long time for such a situation to have been (and still be) possible. But the normal majority should not be intimidated by a disturbed minority. It is therefore necessary to understand the mechanism allowing that lobby to become so influential.

Everything begins with the fact that it is much more difficult for a seminarian with homosexual tendencies or an established homosexual orientation to become a decent priest. On the one hand, priesthood may appear attractive, seeming an ideal biotope, since he can stay here in his preferred manly company without the need to explain the absence of women in his life. On the contrary, this is, after all, seen as a great sacrifice for the Heavenly Kingdom, giving up the greatest value of marriage (even though he is not marriageable anyway). The situation appears to be very comfortable.

Consequently, if no requirements are made of such young men, in particular congregations or dioceses there may be many times more of them than in the world on the average, i.e. many times more than 1.5 percent[11]. Their exact number will depend on how dominating the position they have already achieved is, and how much other clergymen are intimidated or unaware of the significance of the problem.

On the other hand, homosexuality is a wound on the personality which may impair many other functions. Such impairments include distorted relationships with other men, women and children; the habit of constantly pretending, hiding something important in their lives; the pattern of playing a game which prevents honest, deep, emotionally fair relationships with peers and tutors.

It also hampers proper understanding and respect for the nature of femininity and marriage as the mystery of the love between a man and a woman. Besides, if a homosexual feel similar desires towards men as a man who is undisturbed in that regard feels towards women, these desires will be constantly aroused in him by the permanent, close presence of the objects of his desire. He finds himself in a situation analogous to that of a normal man who were to live for several years (or for the whole life) under one roof, using the same dormitory and common bathrooms with many attractive women.

The likelihood of maintaining chastity in such a situation would rapidly decline. We should respect and try to understand our homosexual brothers to the same extent we respect and try to understand any human being. They often do their best, try, and some of them succeed, live a decent or even a holy life. Objectively, however, it is much, much harder for them, and so they fail much more often.

If, however, they are unable to control their tendencies, and succeed in passing through the sieves of seminarian control, real trouble begins in priesthood or monastic life. They no longer benefit from the presence and control of their supervisors, their freedom is much greater. If they yield to temptation and go down the road of active homosexuality, their situation becomes desperate.

On the one hand, they administer the sacraments, celebrate the Holy Mass every day, deal with the holiest of holy objects; and on the other hand they keep doing the exact opposite, that which is particularly deplorable. This way they “become immune” to that which is higher, that which is holy, their moral life yields to atrophy, going steadily downhill towards the fall. The more of that which is higher dies in them, the more room there is for that which is lower – the desire for material, sensual things – money, power, career, lust and sex. They can hardly be helped, since the highest means of formation, faith and grace have failed.

They know well, however, that they may be exposed and embarrassed, so they shield one another by offering mutual support. They build informal relationships reminding of a clique or even mafia, aim at holding particularly those positions which offer power and money. When they achieve a decision-making position, they try to promote and advance mostly those whose nature is similar to theirs, or at least who are known to be too weak to oppose them.

This way, leading positions in the Church may be held by people suffering from deep internal wounds, hardly displaying the spiritual level expected of their office; people who have given themselves away to hypocrisy and are especially prone to blackmailing by the enemies of Christianity. People who never “speak from the heart”, never revealing it for fear of being brought to shame. Instead, they repeat what they have learned by heart, copy that which has been said by others. Often an atmosphere of hypocrisy and lifelessness can be sensed around them. Pharisaism in its pure form[12]. Even if they do not actively practice homosexuality, as a rule they try to shield and promote even those who do, with much solidarity, ready to “dig in their heels” together with them.

This way they prefer their own well-being to the well-being of the community, according to the rule which says: “Let the Church be disgraced, ridiculed and humiliated, as long as myself and “mine” are well-set for life, as long as there is always enough to satisfy us”. “Omertà” in its pure form. This way, however, they may actually achieve a dominating position in many areas of church hierarchy, become a “backroom elite” which actually has tremendous power in deciding about important nominations and the whole life of the Church. Indeed, they may even prove to be too powerful for honest, well-meaning bishops.[13]

The situation then becomes quite desperate for other priests. New clerical students may, for instance, include the younger partners of such homo-priests. When the vice-chancellor or another superior tries to remove them, they may end up being removed themselves instead of the homo-seminarians. Or, when a vicar tries to protect youth from the parish priest who molests them, it is the vicar and not the parish priest that is disciplined, ostracized and moved elsewhere. He goes through an ordeal for courageously fulfilling his fundamental duty. He may even be blackmailed, humiliated and slandered in the parish or among other priests as a victim of an organized campaign. And when a priest or a religious is molested by a peer or a superior and applies for help and protection to a higher instance, he often finds the office occupied by an even more ardent homosexual.

Along the road, members of the homo-clique can achieve such positions and influence that they come to believe they have extraordinary powers and will go unpunished forever.[14] Their life often becomes a diabolic caricature of priesthood, just like homosexual relationships are a caricature of marriage. As can be learned from the media, for instance, they act like homosexual addicts, becoming more and more unbridled, resorting to violence. They start to molest and abuse even minors. A grievous wrong may result, including murder and suicide.

I learned about Bishop Paetz by accident, from a seminarian who told me, all trembling from emotions and terror, about his having been molested by his own ordinary. He was at a brink of losing faith as well as mental and spiritual integrity. It was not an easy job to convince him that one man is not the whole Church, that such case is yet another reason to become a priest so that something as wonderful as that is not left in the hands of such people.

I have heard many similar stories from priests from Łomża and Poznań (where he served as an ordinary) I met during national and international academic symposia. Our interventions at various levels of Church hierarchy were of no avail, however; we encountered a wall that could not be overcome, even in a case as self-evident as that. In the case of a vicar or a catechist, a small part of such revelations would be enough to cause some reaction. In that case, a tremendous commotion in the media and reaching the Pope himself was necessary.

To quote F. Józef Augustyn once again: “The Church does not generate homosexuality, but falls victim to dishonest men with homosexual tendencies, who take advantage of its structures to follow their lowest instincts. Active homosexual priests are masters of camouflage. They are often exposed by accident. … The real threat to the Church are cynical homosexual priests who take advantage of their functions on their own behalf, sometimes in an extraordinarily devious way. Such situations cause great suffering to the Church, the priestly community, the superiors. The problem is indeed a very difficult one.“[15]

The Struggle Of Benedict XVI
Benedict XVI has come to know that type of clergymen well during his long years of work in Vatican. He has repeatedly stressed how shocked he was to learn the extent of the plague of homosexual abuses in the Church, the size of that underground and the terrible damage caused to youth and the Church as a whole. He recalls: “Yes, it is a great crisis, we have to say that. It was upsetting for all of us. Suddenly so much filth. It was really almost like the crater of a volcano, out of which suddenly a tremendous cloud of filth came, darkening and soiling everything, so that above all the priesthood suddenly seemed to be a place of shame and every priest was under the suspicion of being one like that too.”[16]

It was mostly about such clergymen that he referred to while still a Cardinal during the famous Way of the Cross at the Colosseum in 2005, shortly before the death of John Paul II and his own election as Pope: “Should we not also think of how much Christ suffers in his own Church? … how often must he enter empty and evil hearts! How often do we celebrate only ourselves, without even realizing that he is there! How often is his Word twisted and misused! What little faith is present behind so many theories, so many empty words! How much filth there is in the Church, and even among those who, in the priesthood, ought to belong entirely to him! How much pride, how much self-complacency! … We can only call to him from the depths of our hearts: Kyrie eleison – Lord, save us (cf. Matthew 8: 25)”.

The Pope also said: “The greatest persecution of the Church comes not from her enemies without, but arises from sin within the Church”[17]. He knew what task was awaiting him, and taking office on April 24, 2005, said: “Pray for me, that I may not flee for fear of the wolves”[18].

The greatest persecution of the Church comes not from her enemies without, but arises from sin within the Church.

And that is why he took resolute and fast action as Pope. He made cleansing the Church from homosexual abuse and preventing its reoccurrence in the future one of the priorities of his pontificate. He removed compromised clergymen from their offices with much energy. In the very first months following his election, still in 2005, he had an instruction issued to strictly forbid ordaining untreated homosexuals. The instruction was preceded by a letter sent from the Holy See to bishops around the world, ordering that priests with homosexual tendencies be immediately removed from any educational functions at seminars[19].

A letter from the Congregation for Catholic Education issued in 2008 prohibited known homosexual priests admission to seminars. It says explicitly they may only be admitted after they have been permanently healed[20]. These principles were confirmed in 2010 by a Note from the Vicariate of Rome for the Successor of Saint Peter – a standard for the entire Church[21]. A model to be followed in such cases was also provided by the Pope’s pastoral letter to the Catholics of Ireland, also in 2010, on serious sins against defenceless children[22]. Just like the current President of Germany, Joachim Gauck, carried out a successful, model inspection in the former East Germany, his fellow countryman in the Vatican has been carrying out a thorough, honest, Christian cleansing of the Church[23]. The Pope is also trying not to allow for a similar disaster to happen again in the future by strictly prohibiting the ordaining of homosexually-oriented persons, by preventing the rebirth of that community.

That should be stressed, because in the Polish Church the issue of the relationship between homosexuality and priesthood has been underestimated. It appears that the breakthrough in that matter accomplished by Benedict XVI and the Holy See is not sufficiently understood here. Its results could be summarized as follows:

1)  Instead of a division into active and passive homosexuality, in his official documents the Holy Father introduces a division into temporary homosexual tendencies which occur during puberty, and tendencies which have become deeply rooted. Both forms are an obstacle which precludes holy orders, so the  requirements is not merely (usually temporary) freedom from active homosexuality.

2)   Homosexuality is irreconcilable with priestly vocation. Consequently, it is strictly forbidden not only to ordain men having any homosexual tendencies (be it temporary), but even to admit them in seminars.

3)   Temporary homosexual tendencies must be cured even before admission to the first year of studies or the novitiate.

4)  Seminars and monasteries, presbyteries and diocesan curias must be completely free from any forms of homosexuality.

5)   Men with homosexual tendencies who have already been ordained as deacons, priests or bishops remain to be validly ordained, but are called to keep all commandments given by God and the Church. Just like other priests, they should live in purity and desist from any activities harmful to man and the Church, in particular from any rebellion against the Holy Father and the Holy See, or any mafia-like activities.

6)       Clergymen who suffer from such disorders are strongly encouraged to immediately commence appropriate therapy[24].

In Benedict XVI’s Light of the World of 2010, we find as an afterword a very important passage about homosexuality and priesthood. These words of the Holy Father are, in a way, a comment on the earlier documents of the Holy See. It seems he is speaking “from the heart”, and is quite explicit:

“Homosexuality is incompatible with the priestly vocation. Otherwise, celibacy itself would lose its meaning as a renunciation. It would be extremely dangerous if celibacy became a sort of pretext for bringing people into priesthood who don’t want to get married anyway. For, in the end, their attitude toward man and woman is somehow distorted, off centre, and, in any case, is not within the direction of creation of which we have spoken.

The Congregation for Education issued a decision a few years ago to the effect that homosexual candidates cannot become priests because their sexual orientation estranges them from the proper sense of paternity, from the intrinsic nature of priestly being. The selection of candidates to the priesthood must therefore be very careful. The greatest attention is needed here in order to prevent the intrusion of this kind of ambiguity and to head off a situation where the celibacy of priests would practically end up being identified with the tendency to homosexuality”[25].

The importance of the matter for the Pope and the Holy See is emphasized by the fact that despite a great shortage of priests and new vocations in Western Europe and America, the Church does not want to admit such candidates in its seminars; the grave abuses of homosexual clergymen have already caused too much evil, too many disasters, and have cost too much.

[NOTES]

[11] F. Hans Zollner SJ, Dean of the Institute of Psychology at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, says that “in lay circles … the number of molested girls is greater than boys. Why is that? It certainly points to a higher percentage of persons with homosexual tendencies or orientation in those church communities in which numerous cases of paedophilia with a  homosexual tinge occurred than in the society in general”. (F. J. Augustyn SJ, Kościelna omerta [Omerta in the Church], an interview with F. Hans Zollner SJ, transl. by F. B. Steczek SJ, “Rzeczpospolita”, 19.04.2012).

[12] This also partially explains why the representatives of both groups sometimes display so much mediocrity, both in moral and intellectual terms. And yet, it is of such immense importance whether the Church is led by such bishops as Wojtyła, Wyszyński, Nagy, Jaworski, Nossol, Nowak, Pietraszko and Małysiak, or such as Paetz, Magee or Weakland.

[13] For instance, when he became the Archbishop of Warsaw, Archbishop Jozef Glemp, the Primate of Poland, said: “When I came to this diocese, I was surprised to see how strong the homosexual lobby is in the Church.” Cf. the blog of F. Wojciech Lemański: http://natemat.pl/5729,ks-lemanski-juz-prymas-glemp-mowil-o-silnym-lobby-homoseksualnym. Another Polish cardinal said: “The most difficult job is dealing with the gay lobby”.

[14] The mechanism of formation with such „homo-cliques” and „homo-mafias”, the mutual, monstrous “pulling one another up” is in fact sociologically quite typical for “uniform” services, employing almost exclusively men who remain in a strong hierarchal relationship of subordination. Similar problems are encountered in the army, the police and the prison system. It is destructive for any human community – when decisions about taking up tasks of particular importance are made based primarily on homosexual orientation, instead of professional competence, dedication and performance at work. It is also a fundamental injustice, discrimination of the normal majority.

[15] J. Augustyn, Bez oskarżeń i uogólnień, op.cit.

[16] Benedict XVI, Light of the World. The Pope, the Church and the Signs of the Times], a conversation with Peter Seewald, transl. by Michael J. Miller and Adrian J. Walker, San Francisco 2010, p. 23.

[17] Benedict XVI, Light of the World, op. cit., pp. 27.

[18] Ibid., p. 20.

[19] The document being referred to is: Instruction Concerning the Criteria for the Discernment of Vocations with Regard to Persons with Homosexual Tendencies in View of Their Admission to the Seminary and to Holy Orders, Rome 2005. Cf. a commentary on the document by G. Mansini, L. J. Welch, W posłuszeństwie Chrystusowi [In Conformity to Christ], “First Things. Edycja polska” 1, Fall 2006, pp. 10-12. It is a particularly apt analysis of the nature of Christ’s priesthood as contrasted with the homosexual approach.

[20] The document being referred to is: Guidelines for the Use of Psychology in the Admission and Formation f Candidates for the Priesthood, Rome 2008.

[21] Cf. Nota del Vicariato in merito all’articolo di “Panorama”, pubblicato il 23 luglio 2010, Rome 2010. The Note is a response to an article in the Italian „Panorama” which, together with films posted on the Internet, shows the sexual lasciviousness and cynicism of homo-priests working in the Vatican. Cf. http://blog.panorama.it/italia/2010/07/22/le-notti-brave-dei-preti-gay-una-grande-inchiesta-in-edicola-venerdi-con-panorama/

[22] Cf. Benedict XVI, Light of the World, op. cit. pp. 189ff.

[23] The resolve with which Benedict XVI fights against the plague of paedophilia and ephebophilia in the Church, and the extent to which he applies the “no tolerance” rule to them is reflected in a list of what he has done about the matter. It can be found in Italian at http://paparatzinger5blografaella.blogspot.com/2011/10/le-decisioni-elesempio-di-papa.html, and http://benedettoxvielencospeciali.blogspot.com/2009/11/chiesa-e-pedofilia-la-tolleranza-zero.html, and in German at http://www.katch.net/detail/php?id=33076.

[24] As regards these decisions, it would be a good idea now to prepare an account of their implementation in Poland; how faithful have we been to the Pope and the Holy See in that regard? After all, we have more than 100 seminars, we could organize a symposium to share our experiences. We could ask, for instance: What is the procedure of admission to seminars in Poland? What is the procedure with regard to sexual tendencies? Do candidates sign some kind of a statement on the matter, or are they properly examined by a psychologist as provided for in the Vatican document of 2008? What is the scale of the problem in Polish seminars? Where are candidates with temporary homosexual tendencies sent who want to have them treated before they are admitted to a seminar? Do we need a national centre offering special therapy? How has the instruction of the Holy See of 2005 been implemented, saying that all homosexual vice-chancellors and educators should be removed? An important help in dealing with that problem can be found in: Richard Cross, Ph.D. (With research data from Daniel Thoma, Ph. D.), The Collapse of Ascetical Discipline and Clerical Misconduct: Sex and Prayer, “Linacre Quarterly”, vol. 73, Februry 2006, No. 1, pp. 1-114.

[25] Benedict XVI, Light of the World, op. cit., pp. 152f.

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