₦airaland Forum

‘It Is Not a Closet. It Is a Cage.’ Gay Catholic Priests Speak Out

The crisis over sexuality in the Catholic Church goes beyond abuse. It goes to the heart of the priesthood, into a closet that is trapping thousands of men.


By Elizabeth Dias

Photographs by Gabriella Demczuk

Feb. 17, 2019

MILWAUKEE — Gregory Greiten was 17 years old when the priests organized the game. It was 1982 and he was on a retreat with his classmates from St. Lawrence, a Roman Catholic seminary for teenage boys training to become priests. Leaders asked each boy to rank which he would rather be: burned over 90 percent of his body, paraplegic or gay.

Each chose to be scorched or paralyzed. Not one uttered the word “gay.” They called the game the Game of Life.

The lesson stuck. Seven years later, he climbed up into his seminary dorm window and dangled one leg over the edge. “I really am gay,” Father Greiten, now a priest near Milwaukee, remembered telling himself for the first time. “It was like a death sentence.”

The closet of the Roman Catholic Church hinges on an impossible contradiction. For years, church leaders have driven gay congregants away in shame and insisted that “homosexual tendencies” are “disordered.” And yet, thousands of the church’s priests are gay.


The stories of gay priests are unspoken, veiled from the outside world, known only to one another, if they are known at all.

Fewer than about 10 priests in the United States have dared to come out publicly. But gay men probably make up at least 30 to 40 percent of the American Catholic clergy, according to dozens of estimates from gay priests themselves and researchers. Some priests say the number is closer to 75 percent. One priest in Wisconsin said he assumed every priest was gay unless he knows for a fact he is not. A priest in Florida put it this way: “A third are gay, a third are straight and a third don’t know what the hell they are.”

Two dozen gay priests and seminarians from 13 states shared intimate details of their lives in the Catholic closet with The New York Times over the past two months. They were interviewed in their churches before Mass, from art museums on the weekend, in their apartments decorated with rainbow neon lights and between classes at seminary. Some agreed to be photographed if their identities were concealed.

Almost all of them required strict confidentiality to speak without fear of retribution from their bishops or superiors. A few had been expressly forbidden to come out or even to speak about homosexuality. Most are in active ministry, and could lose more than their jobs if they are outed. The church almost always controls a priest’s housing, health insurance and retirement pension. He could lose all three if his bishop finds his sexuality disqualifying, even if he is faithful to his vows of celibacy.


The environment for gay priests has grown only more dangerous. The fall of Theodore E. McCarrick, the once-powerful cardinal who was defrocked last week for sexual abuse of boys and young men, has inflamed accusations that homosexuality is to blame for the church’s resurgent abuse crisis.

Studies repeatedly find there to be no connection between being gay and abusing children. And yet prominent bishops have singled out gay priests as the root of the problem, and right-wing media organizations attack what they have called the church’s “homosexual subculture,” “lavender mafia,” or “gay cabal.”

Even Pope Francis has grown more critical in recent months. He has called homosexuality “fashionable,” recommended that men with “this deep-seated tendency” not be accepted for ministry and admonished gay priests to be “perfectly responsible, trying to never create scandal.”

This week, Pope Francis will host a much-anticipated summit on sex abuse with bishops from around the world. The debate promises to be not only about holding bishops accountable but also about homosexuality itself.






The heads of the world Gay Mafia are the Jewish Jesuits and they actually do have a homosexual network that recruits within the church. Gays can't reproduce because there is no Gay Gene so they are actively involved in organized ritual child rape.

Wake up out your slumber

4th century to 2019 that's 16 centuries of satanic activity in the church.

Wow

Wow

Wow

The road to hell is paved with tge bones of priests and monks, and the skulls of Bishops are the lamp posts that light the path.

The church since the days of St. Peter has struggled with sodomy and sodomizing children.

Wake up out your slumber

Greetings


There is no gay gene so the gays have to recruit so like the White gays are heavily involved in child rape so are the Black gays. There are organized groups of Black homosexual cults that commit subtle rape upon Black children in schools, day cares and churches. The church is the main recruiting grounds for the Black gay movement and the black church is reportedly 3 times worse in rapes. Don't take my word for read the works of Chicago minister Dr. Donald Mathews who lays out these horrifying statistics.


Wake up out your slumber

Wow

Wow

Wow

Wow

Wow

Truth is powerful and indisputable

kkins25:
how the fuuuuxk did heeknow the fucxkimg moon was plasma? How can mattee in plasma form even maintain ita shape for auch a lengthy peeiod of time.

Evocation.

US Catholic Church reports big rise in sex-abuse allegations

By DAVID CRARYMay 31, 2019

NEW YORK (AP) — Quantifying its vast sex-abuse crisis, the U.S. Roman Catholic Church said Friday that allegations of child sex abuse by clerics more than doubled in its latest 12-month reporting period, and that its spending on victim compensation and child protection surged above $300 million.

During the period from July 1, 2017, to June 30, 2018, 1,385 adults came forward with 1,455 allegations of abuse, according to the annual report of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Secretariat of Child and Youth Protection. That was up from 693 allegations in the previous year. The report attributed much of the increase to a victim compensation program implemented in five dioceses in New York state.

According to the report, Catholic dioceses and religious orders spent $301.6 million during the reporting period on payments to victims, legal fees and child-protection efforts. That was up 14% from the previous year and double the amount spent in the 2014 fiscal year.

The number of allegations is likely to rise further during the current fiscal year, given that Catholic dioceses in New Jersey and Pennsylvania have started large compensation programs in the wake of a scathing Pennsylvania grand jury reportreleased in August. The grand jury identified more than 300 priests in six of the state’s dioceses who have been credibly accused of child sexual abuse committed over many decades.

Since then, attorneys general in numerous states have set up abuse hotlines and launched investigations, and a growing number of dioceses and Catholic religious orders have released names of priests accused of abuse.

“Victims are coming forward now because of real progress by secular authorities,” said the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. “Lawmakers are increasingly getting rid of archaic, predator-friendly laws and 16 attorneys general have launched investigations, so many victims are feeling hopeful.”

The advocacy group urged officials in every diocese to turn over sex abuse records to their state attorney general for investigation. The group also said church staff should be instructed to report suspected abuse to secular law enforcement before filing a report internally.

According to a survey included in the new annual report, more than 90% of the alleged abusers were already dead or removed from the ministry. Most of the reported abuse occurred between 1960 and 1990, with a peak in the 1970s.

Compilation of the annual report entails an audit of Catholic dioceses across the U.S. to assess their compliance with a 2002 charter outlining the church’s child-protection policies. Only one diocese, based in Lincoln, Nebraska, was found noncompliant due to lack of transparency in public communications about child sex abuse cases.

Members of the audit team made on-site visits to more than one-third of the 196 U.S. dioceses and found shortcomings in 14% of them that will warrant follow-up visits. Among the problems detected were poor record-keeping of background-check data, and allowing some clergy, staff and volunteers to have contact with children without undergoing training or background checks.

The findings were evidence of “complacency and lack of diligence on the part of some dioceses,” said a letter included in the report from Francesco Cesareo, who chairs a review board created by the bishops in 2002 to monitor sex abuse prevention efforts.

Referring to the Pennsylvania grand jury report, and the abuse allegations that led to the defrocking of former Cardinal Theodore McCarrick , Cesareo said the events “have led to both frustration and anger among the faithful in the Church, a loss of the credibility of the hierarchy, and a questioning of the efficacy of the audit itself.”

The introductory section of the annual report said the McCarrick scandal and the grand jury report helped turn complacency into urgency, and it commended some of the steps taken in response.

“While it is unfortunate that it took such grave sins and crimes to spur action, as Catholics, we are grateful that God can bring good out of such evils,” the report said. “However, there remains work to be done.”

Specifically, the report urged new steps to address the accountability of bishops engaged in abuse or cover-ups, as well as increased involvement of lay experts in investigating abuse allegations.

Those issues are expected to be discussed at the bishops’ upcoming national meeting in Baltimore starting June 11.




Gay Marriage has embolded them the recruiting is on the rise..


Wake up out your slumber

Blacks, Gays And The Church: A Complex Relationship

May 22, 20126:26 PM ET

COREY DADE

The Apostolic Tabernacle Mass Choir performs in Oakland, Calif., in 2010.

Christopher Polk/WireImage via Getty Image

Fairly or not, African-Americans have become the public face of resistance to same-sex marriage, owing to their religious beliefs and the outspoken opposition of many black pastors.

Yet the presence of gays and lesbians in black churches is common. And the fact that they often hold leadership positions in their congregations is the worst kept secret in black America.

While many black pastors condemn gays and lesbians from the pulpit, the choir lofts behind them often are filled with gay singers and musicians. Some male pastors themselves have been entangled in scandals involving alleged affairs with men.

"Persons who are in the closet serve on the deacon boards, serve in the ministry, serve in every capacity in the church," the Rev. Dennis W. Wiley, pastor of Covenant Baptist United Church of Christ in Maryland, says of black churches. Wiley is a prominent advocate of gay marriage. "I do believe a certain hypocrisy is there."



Persons who are in the closet serve on the deacon boards, serve in the ministry, serve in every capacity in the church. ... I do believe a certain hypocrisy is there.

The Rev. Dennis W. Wiley, pastor of Covenant Baptist United Church of Christ

President Obama's recent announcement that he supports same-sex marriage turned the spotlight on reservations many blacks harbor about gay rights. Most polls show African-Americans evenly divided about gay marriage, but the vocal opposition, led by preachers, has gained more attention.

"This particular decision I find appalling, and I could not disagree with the president more on it," the Rev. Patrick Wooden, senior pastor of the Upper Room Church of God in Christ in North Carolina, said on NPR's All Things Considered. Wooden helped lead the recent campaign that outlawed gay marriage in his state.

Last week, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People passed a resolution endorsing same-sex marriage as a civil right to be protected by the U.S. Constitution.

Churches Reap Benefits

Some say pastors' hostility cuts hard against the history of how countless black churches have flourished. The virtuosity of gay singers, musicians and composers has been the driving force in developing popular gospel choirs — even chart-topping, Grammy-winning acts — that make money for a church, help expand congregations and raise the profiles of pastors.

It all happens under an unspoken "don't ask, don't tell" custom that allows gay people to be active in the church, though closeted, and churches to reap the benefits of their membership.

Some say the arrangement is not only hypocritical, but exploitative.

"On the one hand, you're nurtured in the choir but you also have to sit through some of those fire and brimstone sermons about homosexuality being an abomination," says E. Patrick Johnson, an openly gay gospel singer and author of Sweet Tea: An Oral History of Black Gay Men of the South.

E. Patrick Johnson, who is openly gay, says modern gospel music is largely defined by the artistry of black gay men.


"But a lot of these choirs or choir directors, or ministers of music, will not be open about their sexuality for fear of repercussion from their pastors and church members, but they allow the church to exploit their talent," says Johnson, also a Northwestern University professor whose expertise includes black studies and sexuality.

Johnson and others believe that modern gospel music itself is largely defined by the artistry of black gay men.

Bishop Yvette Flunder of Oakland, Calif., is openly gay and the founder of The Fellowship, an organization of black pastors and churches openly welcoming of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender members. Flunder once said during a 2010 interviewthat gospel choirs "always" have been havens for LGBT people: "In our indigenous expression, that wasn't a problem. It was Christianity that demonized gay people."

As Johnson puts it, "You can't throw a shoe back through history without hitting gay and lesbian women and even transgender singers."

Johnson describes church choirs as a welcoming community within a community "where you meet other gay people, so it becomes a form of socializing."

Commentator Keith Boykin, who is African-American and gay, calls it a paradox: "The church might be the most homophobic and most homotolerant of any institution in the black community."

Wooden, the pastor in North Carolina, agrees that the presence of gays and lesbians in choirs or other church ministries reveals the "duplicity and, frankly, the hypocrisy of the black church. ... The thing that troubles me is these people are almost taken advantage of. As long as they can sing, people look the other way."

However, Wooden insists "we are not all homophobic." He says he welcomes members of the LGBT community to worship at his church. He says his church also has continued to support gay members who have contracted HIV/AIDS, unlike some other churches that ostracize them — a practice many people on both sides of the issue say has been common.

But that's where Wooden's self-described sense of fairness ends. He forbids LGBT people from participating in the choir or any other church ministries.

The Rev. Dennis Wiley of Covenant Baptist United Church of Christ in Maryland is a prominent advocate of gay marriage.

Courtesy of Covenant Baptist United Church of Christ

"If you love them — truly love them — you will tell them the truth on the front side," Wooden says. "We believe homosexuality is a sin. Those who serve, you want their lifestyles to uphold the standards of the church. This is not limited to homosexuals or lesbians. If I know an individual is committing adultery or living with a member of the opposite sex who they're not married to, they can't serve either."

Consequences, Whether Closeted Or Out

A small but growing number of churches, such as the Rev. Wiley's and Flunder's City of Refuge United Church of Christ, publicly welcome LGBT members, and their ranks are swelling with people leaving intolerant churches.

But many others say they are torn between their allegiance to their churches, which form the cultural and institutional backbone of black communities, and their desire to live free of homophobia. They often chose the former, convinced that their sexuality is a sin.

"They would rather suppress their identity than denounce their church," says Sharon J. Lettman-Hicks, executive director of the National Black Justice Coalition, an LGBT advocacy group. "I've seen people refuse to divorce themselves from their church in spite of the ignorance that spews from the pulpit. ... It's their way of repenting. They victimize themselves through self-oppression."

Gospel music superstar and megachurch pastor Donnie McClurkin shocked the non-gospel world years ago by revealing in a 2001 book that God "delivered" him from a gay "lifestyle" that he said was a result of being sexually abused as a boy.

McClurkin, who has said being gay is a choice, was criticized by the gay community for setting back the LGBT goal of gaining acceptance.

When gospel music star Tonex (Anthony Charles Williams II) came out in 2009, the gospel music world turned on him, and his record sales plummeted. He left his family church, where he'd been a pastor, and reinvented himself as B. Slade, now a favorite in the LGBT music scene.

Rise Of Black Homophobia: Morality Turns Political

For decades, black ministers addressed LGBT people in their sermons only occasionally. This was true even as HIV/AIDS began claiming the lives of numerous African-American men in black churches, especially gospel singers in the early 1990s.

By 2004, a number of high-profile black ministers emerged as outspoken opponents of same-sex marriage as part of their alignment with the conservative Christian movement, which helped re-elect President George W. Bush that year. Black ministers and black lawmakers helped pass gay marriage bans in several states. In exchange, ministers received federal funds for their community programs through Bush's faith-based initiative.

In 2006, the National Black Justice Coalition held its first Black Church Summit in Atlanta, at which the Rev. Al Sharpton became the highest-profile pastor to denounced homophobia and call for greater inclusion of LGBT people.

Pastors No Strangers To Gay Sex Scandals

The sexual behavior of some male pastors, many of them also gospel singers, also has stoked rumors or led to scandal.

Bishop Eddie Long, the leader of one of the nation's largest black churches, in suburban Atlanta, was sued in 2010 by three young men who claimed Long coerced them into sexual relationships. Long denied the accusations and the cases were settled out of court.

The controversy was all the more notable because Long was a prominent supporter of Georgia's gay marriage ban, passed in 2004, and a proposed U.S. constitutional ban. He rankled many civil rights veterans when he and the Rev. Bernice King, a daughter of Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King (who supported gay marriage), led a march to protest same-sex marriage that started at the King family crypt.

"Some of my colleagues protest too greatly," Wiley says.

Prior to the accusations against Long, most controversies rarely escaped mention inside black communities and gospel music circles.

The Bay Area in the 1970s had arguably the most visible presence of LGBT members in black churches, just as the broader gay rights movement had gained momentum in the region. The Love Center Church in Oakland, Calif., founded by the late Bishop Walter Hawkins, one of gospel music's biggest stars in the 1970s and 1980s, made waves for welcoming black gays and lesbians.

Following the 1991 death of the Rev. James Cleveland, the gospel music legend still regarded as the "king" of the genre, a male member of Cleveland's choir sued his estate claiming that he contracted HIV due to his five-year sexual relationship with the singing icon. The lawsuit was settled out of court




Everybody that claim to speak truth want to blame Hollywood for the Gay Agenda yet I tell you the church is a Homo Factory.






https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2lPFn5wTCs

Wow

Wow

Wow

Wake up out your slumber

Wow

Wow

The Negro bed wench was the number one enemy of the black father and his family.

Wow

Wow

Wow

Wow

Wow

Sodomy the worst of evils

Wow

Wow