The Episcopal bishops of Massachusetts have stuck their nose into Catholic doctrinal issues in a Boston Globe op-ed today. (The actual text of the op-ed is here. The other link is to a news story about the op-ed.) They warn that if the Vatican doesn’t allow gays and lesbians to be ordained, then it could result in hate crimes. Huh? Oh yes, it’s the old liberal canard that if you disagree with me, if you don’t embrace everything about me completely and without reservations, you’re a violent Neanderthal, and not just someone with different principles.
- Suggestions that gays molest children lead to homophobia and create a dangerous atmosphere in which hate crimes flourish. They are irresponsible.
What a load of bunk. I detect a logical fallacy. The first premise does not necessarily lead to the second. But it does if you equate believing that homosexuality is a moral disorder with hatred for homosexuals.
The descendants of Henry VIII claim that just because someone is gay doesn’t mean that he is more likely to abuse children. That’s not true. According to research done by a psychologist who has been interviewed in Catholic World Report, the fact is that many gay men admit that they had early homosexual experiences—i.e. adult gay men having sex with underage boys—and such early experience leads to promiscuity and deviance in adulthood. So, girls and boys who have a heterosexual experience at a young age are much more likely to be heterosexually promiscuous as adults and the same is true for homosexual experience. And when the homosexual experience is an older man with a young boy, then the boy is more likely to grow up to abuse children.
In addition, there is much credible evidence that the incidence of pedophilia among homosexuals is much higher than in the general population. I forget the exact numbers, but it’s something like, if 1 percent of all men are pedophiles, then 3 or 4 percent of homosexuals are. It may be more than that.
But it’s not just about abuse of children. It’s about what’s right and what’s not. Sex is not neutral. It has an impact and bearing on our moral lives. Should an alcoholic or drug addict be ordained if it is discovered that he has the problem? No, because it becomes a further obstacle and burden to the life of his priesthood. Unless, of course, he can be the rare person who can show he has overcome even the psychological pressures of such a condition. The same is true of homosexuality.
Homosexuality is not a good and it is not neutral. It is a disorder—both psychologically and spiritually. It is something that should be actively opposed in yourself, not to be embraced or even ignored.
Methinks the Episcopal bishops should keep their nose out of other people’s business, and mind their own. With the collapse in the numbers of Episcopalians (even worse in Britain than here), perhaps they should start to aks themselves why people are abandoning their church. Perhaps it’s because when a church says anything is permissible, people get the hint that perhaps it’s not speaking with the authority of Truth.
