Having been raised Catholic, I am well aware of the Church's obsession with all things sexual and the constant message that sex is bad and sinful (as are women, who are temptresses out to drag men down into sinfulness). The obsession with celibacy and living "chaste" but miserable lives - except, of course when it involves the sexual abuse of minors which received a blind eye - stems in large part from the sexual dysfunction of those in the Church hierarchy and a subconscious desire to make everyone as miserable as the Church's supposedly celibate clergy and religious order members. Now, Adele Stan - one of the LGBT Blogger Summit attendees I met last year - has a column that looks at the Church's betrayal of its social justice message because of the above noted unrelenting obsession with sex. Here are some highlights from Adele's column:*
They lead a church that claims to stand on the side of the sick and the poor, the meek who shall inherit the earth. But in the course of a single week, the bishops of the Roman Catholic Church proclaimed themselves willing to see health-care denied to millions of uninsured Americans, and to yank the social-service rug out from under the feet of tens of thousands of urban poor in the nation’s capital—all to serve the bishops’ obsession with the sex lives and reproductive organs of others.
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"This is the way the church has dealt with every human being from time immemorial—and that is to somehow make everybody else feel guilty, and they’re never guilty," said Kissling, the former president of Catholics for Choice, in an interview with AlterNet. "It’s true in your personal life, it’s true about if you have an abortion, or if you’re gay, or if you want to get divorced. It’s always, somehow, you who is being selfish."
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By its own account, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops reports that it has paid a total of $2.6 billion to settle sexual-abuse claims made against its priests. Since the Globe broke the story of the bishops’ practice of concealing the crimes of abusive priests while moving them from parish to parish, where they claimed additional victims, seven dioceses have filed for bankruptcy because of the abuse claims.
*
There is no small irony in the church’s self-appointed role as the moral arbiter of human sexuality, whether in the areas of human reproduction or non-heterosexual sex. As an institution, it ranks among the world’s most sexually dysfunctional. Its demands for life-long celibacy from its priests and nuns attract no small number of people who are uncomfortable with their own sexuality—be it something as benign and normal as homosexuality, or something criminal and predatory, as in the case of the priests who preyed on minors.
*
By its actions, the church seems to say it’s not the sex that’s the sin, but evidence thereof. And that makes heterosexual sex primarily a woman’s sin, evidenced by pregnancy, a dynamic that feeds the misogyny of the church’s all-male leadership. . . . The church has long excluded women from the priesthood for no reason other than their sex. Only a very naive or stupid woman would take church leaders at their word when they stake their abortion position on their purported love for the fetus.
They lead a church that claims to stand on the side of the sick and the poor, the meek who shall inherit the earth. But in the course of a single week, the bishops of the Roman Catholic Church proclaimed themselves willing to see health-care denied to millions of uninsured Americans, and to yank the social-service rug out from under the feet of tens of thousands of urban poor in the nation’s capital—all to serve the bishops’ obsession with the sex lives and reproductive organs of others.
*
"This is the way the church has dealt with every human being from time immemorial—and that is to somehow make everybody else feel guilty, and they’re never guilty," said Kissling, the former president of Catholics for Choice, in an interview with AlterNet. "It’s true in your personal life, it’s true about if you have an abortion, or if you’re gay, or if you want to get divorced. It’s always, somehow, you who is being selfish."
*
By its own account, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops reports that it has paid a total of $2.6 billion to settle sexual-abuse claims made against its priests. Since the Globe broke the story of the bishops’ practice of concealing the crimes of abusive priests while moving them from parish to parish, where they claimed additional victims, seven dioceses have filed for bankruptcy because of the abuse claims.
*
There is no small irony in the church’s self-appointed role as the moral arbiter of human sexuality, whether in the areas of human reproduction or non-heterosexual sex. As an institution, it ranks among the world’s most sexually dysfunctional. Its demands for life-long celibacy from its priests and nuns attract no small number of people who are uncomfortable with their own sexuality—be it something as benign and normal as homosexuality, or something criminal and predatory, as in the case of the priests who preyed on minors.
*
By its actions, the church seems to say it’s not the sex that’s the sin, but evidence thereof. And that makes heterosexual sex primarily a woman’s sin, evidenced by pregnancy, a dynamic that feeds the misogyny of the church’s all-male leadership. . . . The church has long excluded women from the priesthood for no reason other than their sex. Only a very naive or stupid woman would take church leaders at their word when they stake their abortion position on their purported love for the fetus.
*
How many pregnant women will the Archdiocese of Washington abandon in favor maintaining a discriminatory practice against those LGBT people willing to speak the name of a love once denied them. How many babies born to mothers unable to care for them would the church prefer to see languish in foster care rather than place them in the home of a same-sex couple capable of raising them? Does love for the fetus end at the outer bank of the birth canal?
*
At press time, leading members the city council of the District of Columbia seemed unwilling to yield to the church’s demands. . . . But in the Congress, things are different. There a stand against the newly invigorated church can mean major policy losses, thanks to the efforts of conservative Democrats like Stupak, recruited by the Democratic National Committee to run in less-than-liberal districts, who are allied with the bishops on matters concerning women’s rights.
*
"So the bishops were able to get their way," Kissling says of the anti-abortion measure added to the health-care bill. "And the thing with the bishops is, if they can get their way, no nuance or doubt enters their minds about whether getting their way is the right thing to do."
*
At press time, leading members the city council of the District of Columbia seemed unwilling to yield to the church’s demands. . . . But in the Congress, things are different. There a stand against the newly invigorated church can mean major policy losses, thanks to the efforts of conservative Democrats like Stupak, recruited by the Democratic National Committee to run in less-than-liberal districts, who are allied with the bishops on matters concerning women’s rights.
*
"So the bishops were able to get their way," Kissling says of the anti-abortion measure added to the health-care bill. "And the thing with the bishops is, if they can get their way, no nuance or doubt enters their minds about whether getting their way is the right thing to do."
*
The Church - due to its leadership - is increasingly a toxic force in society and seems even more Hell bent to inflict guilt and self-loathing on its members. All so the bishops and hierarchy can feel self-satisfied and retain their grip on control. It's really all about sexual dysfunction, power, control and money. Christ's message is lost from the mix completely.
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