Last week, the Mexican bishop of Santillo,Bishop Raul Vera, criticized homophobia as illness. In related news, the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury has labelled the traditional Christian attitude to homosexuality as “wicked” - and urged Christians to repent. (In doing so,…
Monthly Archives: August 2013
How an Ex-Gay Ministry Became an Ex-Ministry
California and New Jersey have legislated against ex - gay conversion therapy for minors, on the grounds that attempts to change one’s sexual orientation are damaging to one’s psychological health. People of faith should also note that the lesson to…
Books: Two Gay Spiritual Journeys
At Bondings 2.0, Frank DeBenardo writes about two new autobiographical books describing gay Catholic spiritual journeys - the knid of books that Dugan McGinley says should be read by other gay Catholics as “sacred texts” (in Acts of Faith, Acts…
The Natural Law Case for Same - Sex Marriage
In advance of the publication at Commonweal of his post on “A Catholic’s Case for Same - Sex Marriage“, Joseph Bottum gave an extended interview to the New York Times, in which he discussed the article and issues and around…
Confronting the Gender Binary: ” GOD is in the in-betweeness”.
In conversation last night after Mass at Farm Street, some of us were discussing the difficulties for LGBT groups, including Quest and the Soho Masses / Farm Street community, in moving beyond being simply gay, or gay lesbian, to fully…
The Distorted Christian Tradition of the Sodomy Myth (2)
The remarkable thing about the Christian tradition that the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah was because of the sin of homoerotic sex, is that this was never part of the Jewish tradition: not in the Hebrew Bible (First, or Old…
Inspired by John McNeill, “Take A Chance on God”: London, Nov 02.
In the history of gay and lesbian theology, and the steady path to full LGBT inclusion, Fr John McNeill holds a place of honour. His pioneering book, “The Church and the Homosexual” broke new groun when first published in 1976,…
The Conservative Uproar Over Joseph Bottum’s Evolution on Gay Marriage
Ahem! When I wrote this morning about Joseph Bottum’s article in Commonweal, I noted that there had already been some vigorous comment in reaction, and expected much more - and so it’s been. My Google News feeds for both gay…
A Conservative Catholic Evolution on Gay Marriage
At Commonweal yesterday (Friday 23rd August), the staunchly conservative, Catholic writer Joseph Bottum published a “personal essay”, under the heading “The things we share: A Catholic Case for Same - sex Marriage“, which has already drawn extensive commentary (at the…
Catholic Bishop: “Homophobia is an illness”
Introducing a report yesterday on a Jesuit scholar who says it is time to stop using the language of “disordered” in discussions about same - sex orientation or LGBT people, Frank DeBenardo of New Ways Ministry wrote: In my over…
