A priest at a Jesuit University in Philadelphia announced he was gay during Mass Sunday night to kick off the school's "Unity Week."
During the homily, Thomas J. Brennan, S.J. said he was active in "Unity Week" and said his homosexuality was one "the worst kept secrets" on the campus of Saint Joseph's University so he might as well say it outright. Most of Fr. Brennan's homily was on Catholic themes of acceptance and tolerance. However, he did not offer any thoughts or statements on the Church's stance on homosexuality.
During the petitions after the sermon, Sister Betsy Linehan, Chair of The Gay/Straight Alliance on campus, asked that the Church accept all and judge not.
Unity Week at Saint Joseph's University includes a play called "Beauty Is" which highlights the scourge of crystal meth in the gay community, as well as a seminar called "Before Brokeback" about how Hollywood has portrayed homosexuals in the movies.
Unity Week was formerly called Rainbow Week but a critical article in the Catholic Standard & Times prompted the University to change the name of the weeklong event two years ago due to widespread controversy over the school's position on homosexuality.
According to the school newspaper, Unity Week follows in the Rainbow Week tradition of educating and promoting acceptance of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered students and faculty.
Brennan wrote a chapter in the book "Jesuit Postmodern" entitled "A Tale of Two Comings Out: Priest and Gay on a Catholic Campus."
Bishop Joseph P. McFadden, the former Secretariat of Catholic Education and current Auxiliary to the Archbishop of Philadelphia, said in the above mentioned article in the Catholic Standard & Times, “There’s a fine line between recognizing diversity and promoting a lifestyle. Being a homosexual is not sinful. Acting on the homosexual lifestyle is — as is all sex outside the bond of marriage, which is defined as a union between one man and one woman.”
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So, what say you brother Deacon about a priest that can't contain his proclivities? Should that man resign his position?
I found your blog by way of the weblogawards.org web site. I'm looking for a good conservative blog to vote for. Please don't let my vote influence your answer. I wish you well in the voting.
Here is the key question: Is the good Jesuit chaste, as he (and every one of us) is supposed to be, or not?
Reb...
Bishop McFadden stated the Church's teaching on this pretty clearly.
Based on what's contained in this post, it's debatable whether the priest has violated that teaching.
But if there's evidence he has broken his promise of chastity, or committed heresy, or contracticted the magesterial teachings of the Church...well, that's something else.
I'd need to know more.
Blessings,
Dcn. G.
There is a name for the mental illness that compels someone to parade around advertising his sexual abnormalities--it is called "exhibitionism." That, combined with the disgrace so many homosexual priests have brought on the Church--would seem to make some sort of action by his bishop mandatory. Many Church members--especially parents and grandparents--are really getting fed up with the lunacy going on in Church precincts.
No. It is not incoincidental that, with all the "outbreaks" of sodomites and their activites these last two months, this man would do the same. They are trying to force the Church into a position which compromises our ecumenical dialogue with the conservative Anglican communities who wish to bind themselves in Full Communion with the Church which Christ founded. This will only get worse. It will become more prominent and more clergy will "come out" to try and to force acceptance.
But it is they who have turned their back on the Church, not the other way around. Do not be fooled. The Jesuits, Dominicans and Sisters of all sorts are leading the helm with the help of a very powerful gay community.
This is where the Church makes a stand. These men (and women) are dis-oriented in that they have chosen to orient themselves toward man, not toward God. They are playing the Jesus card so that they can continue to sin and so that you will not look at their sin.
But I assure you, their motives are directly connected with your own personal destruction. Perhaps they do not even know what they mean by their actions and their voices, but some do, of course.
They treat you like sheep, bending to the will of Sophism, they manipulate our vocabulary by calling their unholy union a 'sacramental love', which is most certainly is not.
This is a desparate last stand for them and it will be a powerful one. If the conservative Anglican church is accepted into full communion, then the politics of the Church will be considerably changed: the nuns who have weilded a kind of psuedo-authority in local parishes will be undermined after years of repressing the Priesthood, a priesthood which is finally rebounding with committed celibate-straight me in the wake of judicial Papal doctrine to remove the pedophiles and sodomites from formation.
It does not matter if they have never acted out their sinful, wishful thinking. They are already guilty for what they have done in their hearts, what they have done against Christ and His Church. It is not US who reject them, it is most certainly THEY who reject the Church by rejecting the teachings of the Church.
In Genesis chapter 3, most people read "the devil was crafty". In fact, what it reads is "the devil was subtle". For years now, the work of the gays, the sodomites, has been subtle in the Church, only the most extreme cases being prosecuted by law, but still protected by so-called powerful Bishops in the Church, for their actions against minors. But I assure you, these cases, while tried for pedophelia, were, in fact, cases of sodomy acted out by the gays.
If my opinion carries any weight, then let it echo loudly. I am a seminarian. I see what is in our seminaries, and about 1 out of every 10 is a sodomite, aka, homosexual. What is in our seminaries today will be in your church and in your home tomorrow. As for me, it is a challenge always, but I would rather have a single moral priest, than hundreds of these new gays, who are more clever than you.
Up til now they have been 'subtle', but it will not be so for now. For at this hour, the devil is railing against the teachings of the Church to 'beguile' you. He will befuddle your minds, and like Eve, he will convince you that you are doing a good thing, but like Eve, you will bring Death into your houses.
For years, they have been working in media, in universities, and in parishes, slowly, subtly changing the minds of impressionable youth. They need to make this push hard anmd intensely for now because the election of the USCCB is now, the Anglicans who wants to be Catholic are now, the Pope is coming to the US this Spring, World Youth Day is this summer. All of these things will certainly have positive impacts of the formation of our national conscience as Catholics and as emerging leaders. The gays want to own your voice and they are threatening your very liberty to gain it.
Hear me, I was an adopted child, I suffered under great sexual abuses before being adopted. I can tell you the reality of 'nature v. nurture' and I can tell you that from years of experience and of research, there is nothing 'Natural' about claiming a 'so-called-Gay' identity. What is natural is that if anyone were to nurture a habit for any length of time, it fosters a new kind of nature, one not attributed to birth. So, while it is true that one can be decidely Gay by nature; it is as Jesus says, "In the beginning, it was not so." Thomas Aquinas, in his Summa Theologica affirms my statements as well as the best of contemporary science. But, be aware, there is also the science of manipulation. Skewed staistical reports demonstrate nothing except a talent to contrue lies against the virtues of humanity and the grace of Jesus Christ.
There is no such thing as one who was CONCEIVED as a homosexual. But formation begins in the womb, tendencies are fostered, nurtured there.
Be clear, to accept gay propaganda is to reject Church teaching and one cannot do that unless one rejects the Church as well. There is no partial-Catholic. Such would be the fruit of Relativism. Do not be so arrogant to believe that you and these liars have more wisdom than the Church. It is The Church we believe in, for it is Christ who gives us His Church.
"Be of one mind" - homosex is grave danger.
I am less concerned about a priest acknowledging a homosexual orientation (in fact, the fact that he can acknowledge it publicly probably means that he's worked through these things to a point where he can be chaste/celibate) than I am about bishops and popes having covered up sex abuse and not being held accountable.
By the way, a question: my Dad thinks that Pope John Paul II should not be made a saint because (according to my Dad) he knew about the sex abuse cover-up and didn't stop it, didn't hold the bishops accountable, didn't tell the bishops to tell the police, etc. -- my Dad contrasted his behavior with Oprah's recent response to the situation at her school in Africa. Now, I, on the other hand, think it's not so simple as that -- that while it may have crossed his desk, so to speak, it just didn't really "click" with him that what was going on was a cover-up that enabled even more crimes, etc. My Dad doesn't buy this. Any ideas on how to respond?
This, by the way, is one reason he gives for not raising my two half sisters (not step sisters, half-sisters), ages 14 and 10, as Catholics. (It's more complicated than that though, of course, particularly since they were obviously born before 2002 when the major scandals broke; the other reasons have to do with my Stepmom not being Catholic, etc.)
Great post, "Geistesswiesenschafte." My experience with students from Notre Dame Seminary in New Orleans 15 years ago, was that at least half were probably gay. So, you seem to report progress.
In response to "brendan mcgrath:" Please don't be so naive as to believe that "coming out" is a sign of working one's demons out. It's more likely a sign of pride or self-esteem; personal acceptance of who one is. Now, I don't know the priest in question, and I make no judgment nor condemnation against him. But the issue here is whether it is proper for priests to make such public confessions. The answer is clearly no. For one thing, it brings scandal on the Church and undermines unity in the larger Church as "Geistesswiesenschaften" so eloquently pointed out. Secondly, and more importantly , a priest should have no orientation toward sex. He should be chaste and pure. It would also be wrong and scandalous for a priest to "out" his desire for Playboy playmates. Society has become obsessed by sexuality and sexual gratification. The Church should be a refuge from this. We should be preaching modesty, purity, and chastity; not encouraging exhibitionism. And as for any bishop who was involved in enabling libidinous priests (gay or straight)in their perversion, they should be removed from their posts. We should be as intolerant of sin (albeit with true Christian charity) as Society is intolerant of true Christian conviction. Tolerance of sin is a sin in itself. What if we were to tolerate our neighbor's suicidal tendencies? Admonishing the sinner is a duty that we Catholics have forgotten. A life of unrepented sin is suicide of the soul. Love the homosexual, but in loving him, pray for him and beg him to repent!
I'm a recent graduate of St. Joseph's and stumbled upon this blog after reading the Creative Minority Report post on Father Brennan's "coming out." I have a few things I would like to say in response to the general reaction and some specific posts on this blog relating to the incident.
The majority of students on our campus have known for some time that Fr. Brennan is gay. This "coming out" at Mass was of little surprise to anyone associated with the school. St. Joseph's is a Jesuit university, and the first value any incoming student learns is that we must be "men and women with and for others." WITH others - we do not judge others or discriminate against them because they are different than us. The Jesuits at SJU demonstrate to the students how to live out this on a daily basis, and Fr. Brennan is no different from any other Jesuit at the school in this respect. His orientation has absolutely no impact on his teaching abilities.
Fr. Brennan is not a theology professor. He is an English professor. He does not teach Catholic doctrine; he teaches literature, writing, etc. Like every other professor at the school, he serves as an example to the students, and during Unity Week – a week designed to focus on openness and acceptance within the community – he made a statement about his own orientation. I do not know Fr. Brennan’s reasons for making this statement, but I would imagine they would have something to do with teaching students on campus a lesson on diversity and acceptance. I’m sure the gay students attending Mass (and no doubt there were at least a few in attendance) appreciated and were possibly inspired by Fr. Brennan’s openness.
Christian doctrine states that we should accept all and reject none; some of the above posts seem to be the antithesis of this value. Perhaps some of those calling Fr. Brennan’s actions ‘disgraceful’ and ‘sinful’ should examine their own actions of judging someone they have never met. The article you are discussing pulled one sentence from a twenty-minute homily; you do not know the context of this homily, or how this man was previously viewed by the campus community.
Declarations such as those in geistesswiesenschaften’s above post embody the reason so many young people today have turned their backs on the Catholic Church. Schools such as St. Joseph’s, which teach Christian values while also accepting change and other values, are one of the few Catholic institutions still attracting young people, and this is because of people like Fr. Brennan – “non-traditional” professors who are more in touch with current lifestyles and ways of thinking, rather than the more “traditional” priest standing on a pulpit condemning those who lead a lifestyle deemed “sinful” by an outdated doctrine.
Finally, in response to Daniel's post, where he states that "...Secondly, and more importantly , a priest should have no orientation toward sex. He should be chaste and pure." I think that it is important for us to remember that priests are also human - they cannot 'remove' any desires they may have for another, regardless of that person's sex. Priests simply choose to ignore these desires in order to more fully devote their lives to God. Fr. Brennan being homosexual but choosing not to act upon his desire is no different than a straight priest choosing not to act upon his desire for women.
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