Pope Benedict XVI has stated it clearly: homosexuality is incompatible with the priesthood. But Elizabeth Scalia, a writer/blogger for First Things and The Anchoress on Patheos, disagrees. In a blog post which may be found here, Ms. Scalia cites Joshua Gonnerman, "If Christians have any interest in reaching out to the gay community, if we have any hope to speak a message which can touch their hearts as well, we absolutely must be willing to live as their family. Behind his blundering obscenity, behind his facile attempts to explain Scripture away, behind the blatant hypocrisy of his behavior toward those who disagree with him, what Dan Savage means to tell us is, 'The church has far too often, and for the most wrong-headed reasons, failed to be family to gay people." And then she writes:
I completely agree. And I really believe that the way to begin to do that is for our bishops and the curia to stop turning a blind eye to a simple truth, that numbered among our priests are faithful, celibate, joyful priests who are homosexual. As I wrote [previously]...
I wonder if [the Church's] bishops and religious leaders will, for example, have to acknowledge with loving support the numerous celibate homosexual priests who, throughout history and still today, serve her faithfully, courageously, and with great joy. Such an acknowledgment could go a long way repairing that disconnect that keeps everyone talking about tolerance while walking away from it.
It would speak to the value of the human person as he is created; it would reinforce the church’s own teaching that the homosexual inclination is not in-and-of-itself sinful; in a sex-saturated culture where 'gay' has become in some minds synonymous with 'promiscuous' [gee, I wonder where that notion came from?] and both heterosexual and homosexual couples see no particular value in chastity, it would present the radical counter-narrative.
Most importantly, such an acknowledgment would be call of olly-olly-oxen free for the church herself. Battered by the revelations of the past decade, poorly served by past psychological studies suggesting that child abusers could be 'cured' and therefore distrustful of more recent findings that homosexuals are no more inclined to pedophilia than heterosexuals*, the church has reflexively pulled the curtains over a number of her priests, and in doing so, she has hidden the idea of 'acceptable otherness' from a flock that is sorely in need to see some of it.
I love our priests, and honor them, but it’s hard to argue that an unfaithful straight priest is better than a faithful gay one. I would rather see a homosexually-inclined happy, celibate priest be able to live in honesty about who he is, than learn about a hetero priest living a lie. A faithful priest is a faithful priest. A happy, joy-filled priest serves the body of Christ in a powerful way.
Allow me to anticipate the argument that the priesthood cannot be open to people the Eastern religions call 'imbalanced' and our church calls 'disordered.' Find me a priest who doesn’t have some sort of disorder, whether it’s an eating disorder, or an attention-seeking disorder, or a disorder of social ineptness, a hearing disorder, or even a learning disorder. Our priests are human, imperfect, faulty and sometimes broken, just like the rest of us.."
What Ms. Scalia refuses to acknowledge is that before entering into any state of life, a divine vocation is necessary. This because without such a vocation, it is difficult if not impossible to fulfil the obligations which pertain to that state and to obtain salvation. This is particularly true for the ministerial priesthood or any other ecclesiastical state. After all, it was Our Lord Who said: "He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up another way, the same is a thief and a robber" (John 10:1).
Consequently, the man who takes holy orders without a call from God is convicted of theft in taking by force a dignity which God has not called him to and does not desire to bestow upon him. This is the teaching of Saint Paul: "Neither doth any man take the honor to himself, but he that is called by God, as Aaron was. So Christ also did not glorify Himself that He might be made a high priest; but he that said unto Him: Thou art My Son; this day I have begotten Thee." (Hebrews 5:4,5).
It matters not then how learned or prudent or holy a man may be. No man may place himself into the holy sanctuary unless he is first called and introduced to the same by Almighty God. Jesus Our Lord was certainly the most learned and holy among all men, full of grace and truth (John 1:14), the Son of Man in Whom were (and are) hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge (Colossians 2:3). And yet, Jesus required a divine call to assume the dignity of the priesthood. This is the teaching of the Council of Trent; that the Church regards the man who assumes the priesthood without a vocation not as a minister but as a robber: "Decernit sancta Synodus eos qui ea (ministeria) propria temeritate sibi sumunt, omnes, non Ecclesiae ministros, sed fures et latrones per ostium non ingressos habendos esse" (Session 23, cap. 4).
Those who seize the priesthood without a vocation may labor and toil exhaustively. But their labors will profit them very little before God. In fact, the very works which would be considered of much merit when performed by others will deserve chastisement for such souls. Because such men are not in conformity with the divine will, not having a vocation to the state of life which they have usurped, the Lord Jesus will not accept their toils: "I have no pleasure in you, saith the Lord of hosts, and I will not receive a gift of your hand" (Malachi 1:10).
Not only will God refuse the gifts of their hand, He will punish the works of the minister who has entered the sanctuary without being called; without a vocation: "What stranger soever cometh to it (the Tabernacle) shall be slain." (Numbers 1:51). Bearing all of this in mind, please read the following which first appeared in The Wanderer [I submitted it back in 2001] and may be found at the Faithfulvoice.com website:
"On October 1, 1986, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith published an instruction entitled, Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on Pastoral Service for Homosexual Persons, signed by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger and approved by Pope John Paul II. In this Instruction, Cardinal Ratzinger writes, 'It is necessary to point out that the particular inclination of a homosexual person, though not a sin in itself, nevertheless constitutes a more or less strong tendency to an intrinsically evil behavior from the moral standpoint. For this reason, the very inclination should be considered as objectively disordered.' (No. 3).
This would appear to be especially significant since Canon 1040 of the Code of Canon Law states that: 'Persons who are affected by a perpetual impediment, which is called an irregularity, or a simple impediment, are prevented from receiving orders.' Now, irregularities arise either from defect (ex defectu) or from crime (ex delicto). It seems clear to me that a homosexual inclination, which Cardinal Ratzinger has referred to as 'objectively disordered,' constitutes an irregularity ex defectu.
In fact, when asked by a Bishop if it is licit to confer priestly ordination to men with manifest homosexual tendencies, the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments replied with a letter signed by Jorge Cardinal Medina Estevez which stated that, 'Ordination to the diaconate and the priesthood of homosexual men or men with homosexual tendencies is absolutely inadvisable and imprudent and, from the pastoral point of view, very risky. A homosexual person, or one with a homosexual tendency is not, therefore, fit to receive the sacrament of Holy Orders.'"
* See here.
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