Cutie's Book Raises the Issue of Gays in the Priesthood: When Will the Hypocrisy End?

Fr. Alberto Cutié is back in the news. For those who don't remember his first 15 minutes of fame, the Catholic priest made headlines in 2009 when photos appeared in a Hispanic magazine showing the Florida priest in an amorous tryst on the beach with the "love of [his] life." While initially taking responsibility for his actions and saying he wasn't attacking the Church's teaching on celibacy, Cutié later left, joined the Episcopal church, "married" his enamorata, and had a baby girl by her in December. He also shifted to victim status. What else could he do after all? As he once said, he wears pants under those vestments. We all know a man has needs, right?

And now the priest dubbed "Fr. Oprah," has written a book, Dilemma: A Priest’s Struggle with Faith and Love, which was released this week. I haven't read the book yet, but early reports are that Cutié uses it as a platform to attack the hypocrisy of the Church hierarchy who, he says, accept homosexual and heterosexual relationships among priests as long as they remain hidden. Exposure equals expulsion, the priest says. And so, Cutié writes, he became disillusioned with the Church and the "hypocrites" in the hierarchy.

He has this to say about homosexuality in the priesthood: “There are so many homosexuals, both active and celibate, at all levels of clergy and Church hierarchy that the church would never be able to function if they were really to exclude all of them from ministry.” Tell us something we haven't figured out for ourselves.

While I can't accept the legitimacy of Cutie's argument that the hypocrisy of Church leaders justifies his own hypocrisy; I think it's important to listen to what he's saying about homosexual priests. Cutie echoes priestly voices before him, voices as diverse as Fr. Enrique Rueda who warned about the homosexualization of the priesthood several decades ago, to dissenter-sociologist priest Fr. Andrew Greeley who described a "lavender mafia" subculture in the Church, to Fr. Donald Cozzens who wrote in The Changing Face of the Priesthood that the Church "is or is becoming a gay profession." Cozzens is okay with that, while many of us wonder how someone whose orientation to life and relationships is fundamentally disordered, not to mention the occasion of sin caused by living in close quarters with the sex to which you are physically attracted, can be the face of the Church.

The scandal of active homosexuals in the priesthood was graphically illustrated last July when an Italian magazine ran an exposé of three gay priests in Rome who offer Mass by day and engage in sodomy by night. The author, investigative reporter Carmelo Abbate, pursued the story undercover for twenty days and documented it with secretly taped videos showing the priests dirty dancing at parties and having sex with male escorts even on Church property. Abbate told Newsweek Magazine, “This is about private vices and public virtues. This is about serious hypocrisy in the Catholic Church.” The magazine claimed that 90% of Rome's priests are gay.

Regardless of the actual numbers, serious hypocrisy in the Church is alive and well. It's obvious when a faithful priest like Fr. James Haley is thrown out for exposing the rot in the rectory while homosexual parishes all over the country thrive. It's obvious when a priest is disciplined for hiring a detective because the chancery won't do a thing about a gay pastor embezzling from the Church. How many homosexual priests are living like the priests in Rome, one life by day and another by night? And how many good men have left because they wouldn't cooperate with the conspiracy of silence and protection that covers up for the fornicating or sodomizing priest as long as his double life is discreet?

Fr. Cutié is shining the light once more on a serious situation in the Church. Does anybody with authority care?

Fr. Haley's Out and Richard Rohr Continues to Scandalize?

I did a blog post about Richard Rohr today at the Les Femmes site. (See him in the photo at right with his young friends.) It got me thinking once again about the grave injustice of allowing heretics like Rohr to scandalize the faithful, while Fr. Haley is out in the cold for daring to expose the homosexual cabal in Arlington. "Oh, he was a snoop!" some priests say. That is apparently the capital crime while being actively homosexual is a private matter. Frankly as a parent, I'd rather have my kids and grandkids in the company of a snoop than a homosexual -- or a heretic. Of course some priests are both. One certainly has reason to wonder about priests who advance the gay agenda. They are either homosexuals or homosexualists. In either case, they are a serious threat to the faith.

I have to laugh (ruefully) about Richard Rohr giving workshops on male spirituality. Here's someone who advocates homosexuality and blesses same-sex unions. That doesn't show much understanding of what it means to be a healthy male. Beating drums and conjuring images of the native American sweat lodge appear to be his thing. A paragraph from a recent issue of the The Drumbeat newsletter describe a March 2010 "Gateway to the Temple Within" event:

Drumming called the group together in the sacred circle, around a fire bowl that burned constantly, symbolizing the fire within each of us that calls out to more than what is, that drives us toward what lies beyond us and beyond the immediate surface of the person or object in our gaze. This fire within calls us to embrace some deeper reality or truth within the people and things that attract us in life.

So that's what being a male is? Lighting up the firepit? Hey, that must be why men do the grilling! It lets them experience the sweat lodge - especially if its 98 degrees out. But this goofiness pales in comparison to Rohr's attitudes on nudity and healing. Here's an excerpt from a presentation by Fr. Rohr at a New Ways Ministry Symposium in 1997 reported on by Stephanie Block. You remeber New Ways Ministry - the homosexual advocacy group run by Sr. Jeannine Gramick and Fr. Robert Nugent who were both censured by the Vatican. (By the way, I don't believe Fr. Rohr doesn't "encourage nakedness." Read the complete article. I doubt you'll believe it either.):

"The nakedness thing, I must comment on, is really uncanny to me. I could give a whole talk just on that. I never encourage nakedness, as such, but it always happens. I will normally have on the fourth day of a five-day retreat, a day where I send them out into the canyons or into the desert alone. I've prepared them for that day. A lot of men, and women too. I'm sure have never spent a day alone, in solitude. And then that night we come back and process: What happened in the canyons alone?
"Well, there's always one who in that processing will raise his hand and, sort of with embarrassment, admit that when he got out there he took off all his clothes. And then there's chuckles all around the room — I can just predict it, it happens every time — there's chuckles all over the room. 'Oh! I did, too!' I did, too!' I did, too!' There's something about nakedness in the male psyche — and now I've studied initiation rites — it's universal. The boy always gets naked, as you see in the sweat lodges, too.

"And I think it's this desire to get rid of all this persona. All this stuff you have to live up to — you pay a big price for being a patriarch. And feminism has sometimes not been sympathetic enough with that. You pay a big price for having roles and titles and importance and power and significance and the male is just finding every way he can to take it off, to take it off. They always tell me they had to do it and it's amazing how often some wonderful things happen in this sitting there in the sunlight naked — exposed, as it were."

At times, nudity at the retreats is communal. ' 'We often have camp-fires, and I know some of you have been at these where it happens, so you know what I'm talking about. Always, always, there's some guys — I mean, is it in their hard wiring? — they'll strip and have to leap over that fire, burning their balls. . . .1 don't know what it is. They're the 'real' men, who can leap over the fire, naked."'

According to Fr. Rohr, this nudity occurs spontaneously. "This is not part of my agenda that they're supposed to . . . it's just that we have a fire, and then predictably men start doing the same old damn things, all again and again and again. There's this deep desire to get naked, to somehow, even risk nakedness in front of one another. To expose the self. That's really pretty archetypal. It shouldn't really surprise us at all, should it? I mean, that's really what all lovemaking is, of course — could you love me when you see me in my nakedness? Could I still be beautiful, could I still be attractive to you in my nakedness? Can you see it all and still be desirous of me?"

Fr. Rohr understands that many of the retreat activities may appear peculiar to an outside observer. "Certainly the outsider — and this happened one time — would think it's a homoerotic or homosexual group, and it's just not really the character of the group, as such, in a formal or holistic way."

One of the rituals done at some of Fr. Rohr's retreats is a healing ritual. "I give [the men] a talk on the body and I tell them to go alone and do a compassionate meditation on their body from head to foot. I give them all a foot and a half of red tape and wherever their body is holding a memory, a shame, a fear, a guilt, an anger — whatever — to wrap a little piece of that on their body. And then they come back and they sit in a big circle and I always say they look like a field of wounded soldiers. They're always very quiet when they come back. You can feel, like a self-massage almost. The pain came out when they touched each of those spots, I guess.

"And then beginning with the elders I lead them through an extended meditation. . . . I invite them to lie down in what is, for the male, the most vulnerable position — on his back. Then the other men surround them and cradle their bodies and especially touch and lay hands on and pray over those places where the man holds wounds...."

Given the high percentage of homosexuals at his retreats, it is conceivable that a good number of the participants' "wounds" are of a sexual nature. The listener is intrigued to consider the ramifications of this ritual. "[It] sounds like a rather simple, innocuous ritual — well, it blows them out of the water. It usually goes on the whole night. They don't want to stop. The man becomes their father that they never had; their father that they could never touch; their grandfather who died when they were a boy; their brother that they wanted to be friends with.

"Then when the older men are doing it to the younger men, it all, of course, reverses. But the tears just astound me. This readiness to cry and the readiness and the tears seem not be evoked by my words but by the touch itself, by the laying on of hands, by the communion, the connection that seems to happen there. And again, without any unnecessary encouragement from me, many of the men will invariably take off their shirts to expose the red tape, maybe on their chests."

Consider that Fr. Rohr gave this address at a homosexual meeting. Not surprising. I'm sure many homosexuals immediately signed up for a retreat. The "touching" ritual reminds me of the scenes in Brave New World with all the participants chanting "Georgy Porgy" over and over as they engage in a sexual orgy. (Do Fr. Rohr's "retreat" participants smoke peyote along with the rituals?)

But Fr. Rohr is still a priest in good standing - giving talks to parish staff, addressing audiences at Fordham and Trinity University in D.C.... while Fr. Haley is out living like a nomad in an RV. Go figure!

Gay priests leading double lives should get out!

Come out, then get out
California Catholic Daily


After exposé, Vicariate of Rome asks homosexual clergy leading 'double lives' to leave priesthood

Rome, Italy, Jul 23, 2010 (CNA) -- After an Italian media report exposed sexual activity by gay priests in Rome, the Vicariate of Rome responded quickly by calling on all priests who are leading such "double lives" to come out and leave the priesthood for the good of the Church community.
The Italian weekly magazine Panorama ran a feature story on the morning of July 23 titled, "The wild nights of gay priests." The article tracks three supposed priests, monitoring their behavior in gay nightclubs, where they solicited sexual encounters from male prostitutes hired by the magazine.

The author, Carmelo Abbate, claims to have everything on tape, including the sexual acts and the same priests celebrating Mass. Panorama has set up priests before using false requests for the Sacrament of Confession to "poll" what they teach on moral or political issues and then publish the results.

In response to the story, the Vicariate of Rome, the office which assists the pope in running the Diocese of Rome, released a message stating that "the purpose of the article is obvious: to create scandal, defame all priests... discredit the church and -- in another way -- put pressure on that part of the Church defined by them as 'intransigent, that strives not to face the reality' of homosexual priests."

The vicariate did not deny the information in the article, instead saying the Church community cannot help but feel "sorrow and dismay" at seeing the report, knowing its priests intimately "not by their 'double lives,' but with a 'single life,' happy and joyful, consistent with their vocation, given to God and the service of the people, committed to living and witnessing to the Gospel and model of morality for all."

Because the Panorama article painted the 1,300 priests of the Diocese of Rome using gross generalizations, the vicariate replied that the essence of the Church of Rome is not found in those with "'double lives,' who haven't understood what 'Catholic priesthood' (is) and should not have become priests."
"Know," the statement continued, "that no one forces them to remain priests, exploiting only the benefits."

"Coherence,” said the statement, “would require them to come into the open. We don't wish to hurt them, but we cannot accept that due to their behavior the integrity of the all the rest might be tarnished."

"Before such facts," the vicariate asserted, "we firmly adhere to what the Holy Father Benedict XVI has repeated several times in recent months: 'the sins of priests' call us all back to conversion of heart and life and to be vigilant so as not to 'pollute the faith and Christian life, damaging the integrity of the Church, weakening her capacity of prophecy and testimony, tarnishing the beauty of her face.'"

Bishop Kevin Boland, A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing!

Remember when it was a sin for a Catholic to participate in Protestant services? In this modern age of mass confusion, Catholics are led to wonder if anything is a sin at all. When a Catholic bishop, Kevin  Boland of Savannah, Georgia actively participates in the installation of an Episcopal bishop, particularly one who is on record approving of sins that cry to heaven for vengeance, one can only say, "The bishop is a wolf in sheep's clothing, a hireling, and a false shepherd to his diocese."

But let me introduce readers to the rising Episcopal bishop in question who Boland so clearly affirms. His name is Scott Benhase and he was elected to head the Diocese of Georgia in 2009. His installation as 10th bishop of Georgia took place in January.

From the liberal branch of the church, Benhase is known for blessing same-sex unions and for affirming the election of active homosexual bishop Gene Robinson. David Virtue writing at his website Virtue Online,  has this to say about him:

Benhase has voiced support of the national church's decision to allow gays and lesbians to be ordained as deacons and priests. "Our church has acted with humility in faith, and I believe that the church has acted rightly," he said in an August sermon to members of St. Alban's Episcopal Church in Washington, D.C. one of five parishes where he has been rector.

One local resident, Jamie Maury, a member of the local chapter of Integrity USA, the openly Episcopal pansexual organization, praised the election of Benhase. “This is an encouraging sign for Episcopalians who support gay and lesbian clergy. We're very excited, very happy," he said....

In other sermon revelations, Benhase compares Jesus to a Zen master. In a sermon delivered at St. Alban’s in Washington DC he said, “The reason Jesus sounds like Zen Master in today’s Gospel is that too many people don’t understand what Jesus is up to.” Really.

That he accepts such non-biblical and unholy sexual positions and calls the church’s actions filled with “humility in faith” shows that he is not in touch with Biblical revelation....

He will say and do nothing to give gospel-driven Georgian Episcopalians any hope or comfort. They have no future in his diocese. He will, over time, squash them like bugs, all in the name of “humility in faith” of course, not to mention inclusivity, diversity, pluriformity and any all other Episcopal shibboleths.

The die has been cast it is only a matter of time. You will conform or else. Benhase has spoken.

On January 23, Benhase will be consecrated the 10th bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Georgia in a formal ceremony taking place at the Savannah International Trade & Convention Center. It will be his beginning; for orthodox clergy and laity in the diocese it will be their end.

That Bishop Boland would participate in the installation of Scott Benhase amidst the rainbow vestments and  clownlike costume of the presiding female bishop, Katharine Jefferts Schori, advertises his lack of orthodoxy and even common sense. Bishop Boland (and the monsignor accompanying him) deserve to be publicly rebuked for their public scandal. Photos from the event clearly indicate they participated actively by joining the processional and recessional. They should not have attended the event in any capacity because they could not do so without giving scandal.

It is ironic to me that Bishop Boland who has engaged in the persecution of an orthodox Catholic in his diocese, has no problem giving his approval to a clergyman who is a champion ear tickler and anything but orthodox. But the two things obviously fit together. The wolf runs with other wolves and together they feed on the lambs. That he continues to be a bishop in the Church while my brother in Christ, Fr. Haley, was cast out frankly makes me sick.

I hope you'll pray for Bishop Boland and the poor people of his diocese. Fr. John Hardon, a holy Jesuit (yes, there are a few), used to say that the faith would disappear in entire dioceses in the United States. I think he must have had Savannah in mind. May God have mercy on Bishop Boland's poor flock.

As for Bishop Scott Benhase, you can read the complete article quoted above which is linked in the articles sidebar and for another article see:

Destruction From Within, Georgia Style

And now for the photos:

The presiding bishop, Katharine Schori, in what can only be described as an outlandish and clownish costume, walks in the entrance procession. When the Episcopal Church began ordaining women and homosexuals it threw dignity to the wind, but this is almost laughable. She makes me think of the Queen of Hearts. 

Bishop Boland walking in the entrance procession.

A closer shot of the entrance procession showing Bishop Boland and his companion, who appears to be a monsignor, walking together.

I believe this is a shot of the recessional procession

The Storm around the Pope

I've been watching with sorrow the storm around the pope as the sex abuse scandals widen. Did he know what was going on in Germany? Was he involved in protecting the guilty? Obviously the anti-Catholic news media doesn't care about the truth. They want to see the Church and the highest churchman discredited. Funny, though, how they save their most vicious attacks for those considered "orthodox." Villains like Mahony and Weakland, by comparison, get the soft soap treatment.

Occasionally, I come across an article that seems pretty clear cut and this one from the Associated Press which appeared in The Washington Times on Good Friday is disturbing:

Vatican waited years to defrock AZ priest

Is there really any excuse for ecclesial courts to take over a decade to decide a case? Is the right to a speedy trial only a constitutional right in a U.S. civil court? Shouldn't it also be a moral right in the Church? Something is wrong here with both the delay and the secrecy.

Pray for poor Holy Mother Church. Beg the Lord to send us priests like those of the early Church many of whom gave their lives for the faith. And let us pray for the same spirit among the laity. We are often too quick to point the fingers at others and give ourselves a pass.

Active Lesbian Advising the USCCB on Healthcare

See the Vortex about Mary Kay Henry who works for the SEIU and is an adviser to the USCCB. This is one more scandal that indicates the bishops have no control of their bureaucracy or are open advocates of this type of immorality. It's time for any orthodox bishops to pull out of this corrupt organization.

Journalism is War and so is Fighting Homosexuality in the Church

Matt Abbott has a column today talking about George Archibald's new book. Archibald is the former Washington Times reporter who investigated the homosexual priest problem in Arlington. Abbott describes Chapter 16 as "a doozy."

The gutsy and thorough Archibald — who was raised Anglican, by the way; he's not Catholic — names names, even more than I have. He's not afraid to be sued, and he has been sued (for libel) "at least three times" during his tenure at the newspaper; but, he writes, "no one has ever laid a glove on me because the documentation was always there."

I haven't read it yet but plan to order Journalism is War. Some stories should not be allowed to die.

Please keep praying for Fr. Haley.