Affiliate Alerts
VOTF members frequently pass on local/regional news
items that point to the need for continued vigilance in
the protection of children. We note three of these below.
Please also see the West Suburban Boston, MA affiliate’s
Nov. 17 meeting minutes for a substantive accounting of
where state and local efforts merge in the shared work
of protecting children. Go to Parish
Voice - Best Practices.
VOTF Naperville, IL member Dee O’Neal alerted us
to a disturbing development in the Joliet diocese as reported
in the Chicago
Tribune: “A clinical psychologist who reviewed sexual
abuse complaints for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Joliet
has resigned amid allegations that he molested two brothers
when he worked for the DuPage County Health Department almost
30 years ago.” Go to ; additional disturbing news comes from Phoenix,
AZ “The only Valley Catholic priest to risk trial on
child abuse charges paid dearly Thursday when a jury found
him guilty of six sex crimes that carry an 81-year minimum
sentence.” Go to Southwest
Valley Republic ; and another priest meets the hand
of the law in Barnstable, MA. Read
more.
Affiliates
with web sites are invited to place the following
link to current issues of In the Vineyard on
their home pages - http://www.votf.org/vineyard/index.html
WALKING the TALK in Philadelphia
[From VOTF member Dick Taylor: Whereas VOTF members participated,
this was not a VOTF-sponsored event. About 100 people came
with signs and rainbow banners. Among the participants were
gays and straights, Catholics, Protestants, Jews and non-affiliated
people. We stood along the seminary fence by the entrance
and prayed in silence (with a bell tolling) for those inside
-- the Rector, the Apostolic Visitors, seminarians, faculty
-- that their minds might be opened to greater truth, their
hearts to greater compassion and their consciences to greater
responsibility. The overall theme was that the bishops need
to take responsibility for their cover-up of sex abuse, rather
than blaming the crisis on gays. At the end, we had an open
mike for anyone to share further thoughts or prayers. Among
many stirring moments, a Jewish transgendered teenager asked
for prayers for Church leaders. We closed with a Quaker participant
leading us in a lovely song.
My hope is that people around the country will find the
itinerary of the Apostolic Visitation and greet them in a
similar way when they come to town.]
A group gathered in a peaceful demonstration on Nov. 27
from 1-2 pm at the gate of St. Charles Borromeo Seminary
in Wynnewood. Notice was short since the organizers had just
found out about the Apostolic Visitation two days earlier.
Examiners arrived Nov. 27 and will stay one week.
The purpose of the gathering was to “express our profound
dismay at the Catholic Church's linking of the clergy sex
abuse crisis to homosexuality. Although the Visitation is
to examine various aspects of priestly formation, the “Instrumentum
Laboris” which spells out the process clearly, asks “Is there
evidence of homosexuality in the seminary? (this question
must be answered.)” It also mandates that the moral doctrine
taught at the seminary must conform to the Vatican's document, “The
Pastoral Care of Homosexual Persons,” which called homosexuality “an
objective disorder” and a “tendency ordered toward an intrinsic
moral evil.”
The organizers agreed with Bishop Thomas J. Gumbleton's
warning that a major fallout of the clerical sexual abuse
crisis and the bishops' disastrous cover-ups "is the scapegoating
of homosexual priests and seminarians."
Concerns for a permit to demonstrate were met by the Lower
Merion Police who noted the constitutional right to such
peaceful protest, so long as vehicular or pedestrian traffic
would not be blocked and profanity would not be used. The
Seminary Rector was advised (an excerpt from the letter sent
to Rev. Prior is below), as well as the press, about the
demonstration.
Most of us are Catholics, but all those gathering on
the 27th will be expressing our profound dismay at the
way the Church is linking the clergy/bishops' sex abuse
crisis to homosexuality. We agree with Bishop Thomas J.
Gumbleton that "one major fallout of the current crisis
of leadership in the Catholic Church is the scapegoating
of homosexual priests and seminarians" (America, 9/30/02,
pg. 10). We are appalled (although no longer surprised)
that Church leaders, who covered up sexual abuse and thereby
vastly increased the number of children who were grievously
harmed, would try to shift blame from their own shoulders
to homosexuals, a vulnerable group, already marginalized
by our society. Jesus spent time with the outcasts of his
day; Church leadership seems intent on condemning and blaming
them for the leadership's own sins. This even though we
are sure that Church leaders - intelligent men all-must
realize that there is no connection between homosexuality
and sexual abuse. The abuse problem is not caused by homosexual
priests, but by seriously underdeveloped, mentally and
morally ill priests, and by the bishops who covered up
their crimes.
Many of us know wonderful, dedicated gay
priests who are true to their vows and who serve others
with compassion and fidelity. Will the Catholic leadership's
next step be to expel them from the priesthood? We can
only imagine the devastating effect on them of the Church's
increasingly harsh attitude toward homosexuality. Do
we really want to deprive the Church of the blessed ministry
of priests - yes, and of bishops - who are gay?
This
harshness,
which shows nothing of the love of Jesus Christ, only
contributes to the homophobia so prevalent in our society.
When bishops
condemn gays, ordinary people are more likely to harass
and discriminate against them; bigots feel more of
a license to mistreat, even to kill them, as has happened.
We appeal
to you to help turn the Church away from this disastrous,
scapegoating course.
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