Twenty five years ago this month, Cardinal Mahoney of the Diocese 0f Los Angeles initiated a formal ministry in outreach to the city’s lesbian and gay Catholics. In the LA Times, Mitchell Landsberg has written of this anniversary, and its intervening years, asking if anything has changed for LGBT Catholics during the past quarter century?

Superficially, of course, the answer is no. As Landsberg points out, formal doctrine remains the same, and official teaching continues to describe homosexuality as intrinsically disordered, and homosexual acts as immoral. This however, is only the formal teaching. In a very real way, things have changed very substantially.

When Mahoney launched the LA ministry, this was in itself a remarkable event. Today, formal ministries to LGBT Catholics exist, in a variety of forms, in many parts of the world. Beyond the ranting of a lunatic fringe, their existence is hardly controversial. Twenty five years ago, most Catholics would have agreed with the formal teaching on homosexuality. Today, we know from formal research that most do not. The majority of Catholics do not believe that homosexuality is in itself a matter of morality, and by a large margin approve of legal recognition for committed same-sex partnerships, either in marriage or in civil unions. While there has been no change in the formal teaching, there has been a marked change in emphasis and tone from the Vatican and from the bishops, especially in the recent past, under Benedict’s papacy.

One of the clearest signs of this change in tone may be seen in a suggestion in the report that for some lesbigay Catholics, the need for ministry is fading away, as they become fully integrated into parish life. There is now a recognition that teaching on the morality of sexual acts, supposedly unacceptable except in marriage and open to conception, is no different for heterosexual and homosexual persons. Pastoral workers in youth ministry do not concentrate on teaching the evils of masturbation, and work with married couples does not major on the importance of avoiding contraception.

Contrary to popular belief, the details of sexual ethics are not a fundamental part of Catholic belief (formally, they are of quite a low “order” of Catholic teaching), and we are free in conscience to disagree - as many do. There is also a widespread awareness that the whole of orthodox sexual teaching may be simply wrong - an awareness shared by a large majority of lay Catholics who have lived experience of sexual love, many priests who work with them directly and a substantial proportion of professional theologians. It is no wonder then that Catholic priests are avoiding talking too much about the Church’s sexual teaching, for gay or straight Catholics. (Research has shown that Catholics are less likely than other denominations to hear negative messages in church about homosexuality).

There remains a long way to go. While the number of dioceses and parishes with explicit programmes of LGBT ministry is expanding, there remain far too many with none. And as long as the flawed teaching remains in place, creating a genuine welcome is to live in a place of tension, similar to DADT in the military, where neither our sexual lives nor formal teaching are freely and openly discussed.

Looking ahead, though, it is fair to say that the teaching will be changed - we just don’t know when.

“I feel that the church might actually be going through a process of ‘coming out,’ ” declared Father Brian Doran, a retired priest who spoke of himself as having come out as a gay man. In his homily, he described it as a long and difficult process, moving through stages of depression, anger, bargaining, acceptance and, finally, joy.

He said the Catholic Church is now in the bargaining stage, reflected in statements such as: “You can come to the church, but I don’t want you to talk about being gay.”

“And the acceptance part … it is coming,” he said. “And the joy part — well, you know what? We may not live to see the joy part on the part of the church.” He observed, however, that hundreds of Catholics are baptized every Sunday, and many of them will grow up to be gay.

“Twenty-five years from now, they will be standing up here, those little gay Catholic people, they will be standing up here and they, God willing, will be talking about the joy that they are experiencing and that we have worked and brought their way.”

LA Times

And note, please, that little throw-away description of Father Doran - as “a gay man”, who described his own coming out process. One of the worst kept secrets in the Catholic Church is the high proportion of our priests who are in fact gay, although few are able or willing to admit it. (The few exceptions are mostly, like Doran, now retired). As in other denominations, some are now creeping out of the closet, and many more will find ways to do so.

Related articles

• Growing Catholic Acceptance Of Gay Relationships, LGBT Equality
• Homophobic Priests: Doctrinally Correct, Pastorally Wrong.

• The Minneapolis (and Online) Premiere of Catholics for Marriage Equality (thewildreed.blogspot.com)
• Local Catholics Premier Video Series on Faith, Family and Marriage (thewildreed.blogspot.com)
• 10 years later: Mychal Judge, gay saint of 9/11 (jesusinlove.blogspot.com)