He Who Pays the Piper

… Calls the Tune

Perhaps it’s best to put up a GOVERNMENT HEALTH WARNING: “Too much speculation is bad for your spiritual health!” before going any further. Well, I’ve just done so. Let the speculation begin…

The suspicion is growing on me that the supposedly theological battle – loosely framed as conservative/traditional vs. liberal/modern – for the very heart and soul of the Church is just a red herring. In my view it’s something akin to a conjuring trick, where the conjuror gets you to look in one direction, diverting your attention away from the trick he intends to pull on you. The real issue, in my opinion, is a political one, and is largely determined by what’s happening behind the scenes. Who is taking hold of the reins of power within the Catholic Church? Who is calling the shots? Who is paying the piper, thus deciding the tune?

There are those of you who are reading this and saying to themselves: Okay, here goes another fancy conspiracy theory. Well, not really. Instead, I would like to point to certain inconsistencies that are, at the very least, a bad PR exercise, but when put together undermine the Catholic Church’s authority and standing. Let’s have a look at the upcoming creation of 22 new cardinals, and the implications of this move. You may follow the link to the article in the Tablet for the statistics.

Gay Marriage: What Pope Benedict did NOT Say

A number of news reports this week have stated that Pope Benedict has described gay marriage as a threat to humanity:

Gay marriage a threat to humanity's future — Pope

GMA News - ‎19 hours ago‎

VATICAN CITY - Pope Benedict said on Monday that gay marriage was one of several threats to the traditional family that undermined "the future of humanity itself." The Pope made some of his strongest comments against gay marriage in a New Year address ...

Gay marriage is a threat to humanity, claims Pope

Daily Mail - ‎Jan 10, 2012‎

By Graham Smith Gay marriage is one of several threats to the traditional family unit that undermines 'the future of humanity itself', Pope Benedict XVI warned yesterday. The pontiff told diplomats from nearly 180 countries that the education of proper ...

Liberal family values, same-sex marriage a threat to the future of humanity: Pope

National Post (blog) - ‎Jan 9, 2012‎

Pope Benedict XVI attends his annual meeting with Holy See Diplomats at the Hall of the Throne on January 9, 2012 in Vatican City, Vatican. During his speech the Pope pleaded for religious tolerance and an end to discrimination against Christians ...

And plenty more of like ilk. If such a patently and obviously false and malicious statement is really what he said, then the LGBT community, and queer Catholis in particular, would be justified in painting him as public enemy number one.



So - did he say it?

Andrew Brown at the Guardian denies this, and I agree with him.

My Vatican Dossier, and Papal Backing for the Soho Masses

It's official. I now have confirmation that somewhere in the depths of the Vatican, someone (indeed, more than one) has a dossier on me. More accurately, the dossier is on the nefarious doings of the Soho Masses, in which I am infamously involved, and the "homosexualist bloggers" (c'est moi!) that it includes and shelters. These dossiers (there seem to be multiple copies of one original) were not put together by a curial official, but by the interfering busybodies who ludicrously believe that in their determination to prevent a few hundred Catholic men and women from attending a Mass of their choosing, a Mass which has the formal approval of the Westminster diocese, and was initiated by the diocese with the full knowledge and co-operation of the Vatican at the highest levels, they are somehow acting "Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice" (PEEP!)

It would be funny, if it were not in fact so sad.

.......two of us decided to go to Rome in October to discuss just these two points and the future appointment of sound bishops in this country. As usual we took dossiers with us illustrating the present position on the SOHO Masses and the officially approved religious instruction in most schools and parishes. We were kindly received in every Curia Office we visited and we went through our dossiers with the officials we met, leaving a set behind for their further study.

SOHO Masses. This dossier contained News Letters from the Church of Our Lady and St Gregory, Warwick Street, which showed encouragement to walk in the GAY PRIDE MARCH carrying banners proclaiming “Proud to be Catholic, Proud to be Gay”; promotion of books, talks and films by advocates of the homosexual lifestyle; the spread of these Masses as they are not being stopped; the recruitment of young Catholics to join them etc. We also included addresses of web-sites run by regular members of this congregation stating their hostility to Church teaching and their programme to spread this practice quite explicitly, with names of priests and bishops who facilitate all this. ……

(from the PEEP Newsletter, February 2011)

Pope Benedict, and the Queer Lessons in the Church's Martyrdom of St Joan.

At Enhanced Masculinity, I came across a post which reported on an address by Pope Benedict about the martyrdom and later canonization of St Joan of Arc. I was pleased to see this, as I have written before of the importance of Joan as a queer saint who was first martyred by the church, and later rehabilitated and honoured. Much the same will surely occur in time to those modern queer heroes who have been professionally martyred, by the Church which has deliberately destroyed their careers, for the great sin of attempting to speak the truth on sexual ethics or LGBT inclusion.

Benedict's frank admission of the patent error of the church theologians who presided over Joan's trial and passed sentence on her, together with his quotation from Vatican II's Lumen Gentium on the constant need for purification, made a welcome contrast with the usual glossing over of past mistakes and the insistence on a constant and unchanging tradition. His words also immediately reminded me of the words of a much younger man, when he as Fr Joseph Ratzinger he wr0te a commentary on the Second Vatican Council:

"Not everything that exists in the Church must for that reason be also a legitimate tradition.... There is a distorting tradition as well as a legitimate tradition, ....[and] ...consequently tradition must not be considered only affirmatively but also critically."

So, in addition to the significance of this address to my own arguments about the relevance of the queer saints and martyrs, it also relates to the current theological ferment on sexual ethics and widespread criticism of the institutional church. When I then crossed to the Vatican website and read the address in full, I found even more in Pope Benedict's words that can guide and inspire gay in lesbian Catholics in our struggles to withstand the hostility of the traditional, disordered teaching on homoerotic relationships.

Pope Benedict's Strong Argument for Gay Marriage, Queer Families.

Last Sunday, I picked up a little book at the Soho Masses bookstall called "Christians and Sexuality in the Time of AIDS", a useful little book, which I bought at a ridiculously low bargain price. Some of the insights have little to do directly with the main theme, and it is one of these that is relevant here, an observation made by James Alison in his introduction, writing about Pope Benedict XVI and the nature of his theology.  James has frequently observed that when we respond too quickly or too superficially to the pope's reported remarks, we often underestimate his thinking, which is substantially more nuanced than we usually recognize. In his position, he argues, Benedict cannot do other than repeat the well-worn, established magisterial positions on topical issues.

The really interesting questions surrounding what a pope is doing are never the politically immediate headline grabbers, but always the small, apparently insignificant tinkerings around the edges which are either going to make change possible over time, or try to block it.

When I read these words, they brought into focus for me the speech that Benedict  gave to a group of Italian politicians and public officials last Friday, which has been widely interpreted as an attack on gay marriage. This is not the way I interpreted the speech: instead, I wrote (in the post below) that the reference to "marriage between a man and a woman", and to the forces undermining it, were curiously minor. The main thrust of the speech was more usefully seen as in praise of strong families - which could equally well apply to the families of same sex parents as to any other.   After reading James Alison, I thought how perfectly his warning applies to the present case: well, of course he made the obligatory noises about marriage between a man and a woman (how could he not?) - but the headline writers have missed the main points. With just a little "apparently insignificant tinkerings around the edges", this attack on gay marriage can instead be read as a statement in praise of all families - including those which are queer. 

I submit my original post below, just as I wrote it Sunday -- with profound apologies to my colleague Bart, who very generously responded to my request for preliminary comment with some very useful and helpful suggestions, which I have duly ignored. This is not in any way a reflection on his contribution - but just on my acute lack of time this week.  (I am writing this close to midnight, as it is). I will revise and refine this text later, to incorporate the additional links, Bart's contribution - and possibly later thought as well (both my own and that of readers' comments).

Pope Benedict, on "Homosexuals".

When I wrote earlier about Benedict and gay priests, I was responding to some commentary by Andrew Brown, without access to the complete book from which he was quoting. Now that I have my own copy, I have found that my post inappropriately combined two independent responses by the pope to two different questions by his interviewer: one question on homosexuality, and one on gay priests.
I now revisit my original post to disentangle them into the two separate issues that they are, and expand on my original thoughts.
(The complete question and answer I reproduce at the end of this post. Later, I will revisit the section specifically on gay priests).

On homosexuality, Seewald's question referred to the Catechism statement on "compassion, respect and sensitivity", and its counterpart on "grave depravity" and "intrinsically disordered". Seewald asked if these statements were contradictory.

I responded yesterday to Brown's extracts from the pope's response, noting in particular his complete misrepresentation of evolution as ordered to heterosexuality, and his entirely mistaken belief that "deep-seated homosexual inclinations" are a trial. I will say no more on these. Instead, I want to pick up on some other themes, identified in the French Jonathan & David press release:

Proclaiming himself the interpreter of God, he claims that homosexuality "is opposed to the essence of what God originally intended," without knowing whether it is innate or acquired (p. 200). If by any chance, homosexuality was innate, how could God create some of his creatures in a condition so contrary to his will?

Indeed. It's time for Benedict and his advisors to leave their theological ivory towers and enter the real world of human experience.

“Speaking the Truth” on Catholic LGBT Inclusion

Regular readers here will know that the infamous CDF document on "homosexuals", Homosexualitatis Problema (better known as then Cardinal Ratzingrer's Hallowe'en letter), is not my favourite Church document.  Nevertheless, it does include some important features, which many people in the Catholic Church too easily forget.

In its closing paragraphs, the document reminds us of the words of Scripture: "Speak the truth in love", and "The truth shall set you free". It is disgraceful that the document itself ignores its own advice here, but no matter: the advice itself is sound, and there are an increasing number of Catholics, lay and clerical, who are making up for the CDF omission, by speaking the truth in love on LGBT inclusion in church. The latest to do so is  Jody Huckaby, executive director of PFLAG (Parents, Families, and Friends of Lesbians and Gays), in an address October 21 at King’s University-College, a Catholic institution based at the University of Western Ontario. In doing so, he reminded us of the other neglected portion of the CDF letter - the exhortation to treat "homosexual" persons with dignity, compassion and respect.

I regret that the only report I have been able to find of Huckaby's address is from Lifesite News, which is not usually renowned for its sympathy with progressive causes in general, or LGBT Catholics in particular. Nevertheless, they quote some sections verbatim, which are worth taking on board:

“Out of the Shadows, Into the Light”:Blessed John Henry Newman, Soho "Gay" Masses

Last Sunday I went up to London for one of the regular LGBT – oriented “Soho Masses”. Earlier in the day, Pope Benedict had conducted the beatification service for Cardinal John Henry Newman. Cardinal Newman is now officially Blessed John Henry – and so the liturgy for used our Mass was, quite appropriately, the newly minted liturgy for his festal day.
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