Celebacy has worked so well for Catholic priests they are seeking to spread it to gays.

[dsc]

The ministry is called Courage, and its aim, in the words of its executive director, is to "assist men and women who are afflicted with the thorn of same-sex attraction." A 29-year-old international ministry with about 90 U.S. chapters, the Courage Apostolate will serve as a kind of support group -- like Alcoholics Anonymous -- for men and women who want to remain celibate.

The move is part of a more aggressive push by the dioceses of Raleigh and Charlotte to march in step with the Vatican on the issue of homosexuality. On Feb. 24, the bishops of both dioceses will hold a news conference at the legislature to announce their support for an amendment to the state's constitution defining marriage as a union of a man and a woman. The effort is intended to quash the possibility of same-sex marriage, should a court find North Carolina's law prohibiting gay unions unconstitutional.

snip

The late Pope John Paul II endorsed the work of Courage. More recently, Pope Benedict XVI reiterated the implacable opposition of the church to homosexuality. The Vatican refused to back a United Nations resolution urging the banning of criminal penalties against homosexuality. Last year the Vatican urged seminaries to enlist the aid of psychologists in screening candidates for homosexuality and other "psychic disturbances."

snip

Next month, the Rev. Paul Check, national director of Courage, will lead a workshop in Raleigh for priests and lay leaders. A priest in the Diocese of Bridgeport, Conn., Check has written widely on homosexuality, including one article in which he suggests that gay men come from broken homes or grew up alienated from their fathers and overprotected by their mothers.

"For example, many men with same sex attraction lack hand-eye coordination and as a result were spurned or the subject of jokes by their fathers or the neighborhood boys because they could not play certain sports easily," Check wrote in the St. Austin Review's November-December 2008 edition.

end of quotes

http://www.newsobserver.com/102/story/1406567.html

This is hilarious until you think of all the children who lost their childhoods on the alter of celibate priests. Will they never learn?

[Stevenmarc]

1. The only thorn they are afflicted with is religious guilt

[Submariner]

2. Pope Benny the Rat and his boys are up to their eyeballs

in an international child rape scandal.

Millions of collection plate dollars are being paid out in court settlements as hush money to the rape victims and their families. Benny would be well advised to STFU and stay under the radar for the next century or so.

[ThomWV]

3. Actually I thought Catholic Priests often were gay.

[mmonk]

4. That has always been their position. They are just becoming

more emboldened with it with the current pope. Its a crazy thought process that homosexuality is not a sin unless you engage in sex. The funny thing about it is they think all sex is a sin and thus, the obsession about birth control for heterosexuals as well as their thinking that god only recognizes sex engaged for the purpose of procreation, all other intentions are considered wrong. Also, it explains the obsession of the Virgin Mary concept. Before I'm attacked for being anti-Catholic, I'm Catholic so I'm speaking from knowledge. BTW, I think the notions are preposterous.

[closeupready]

9. Yep. It's not God who is cruel; it's the perverted, corrupt Vatican.

Sex is evil, and gays must suffer for life, yadda yadda. :puke:

[mmonk]

11. Unfortunately, this crazy premodern bigoted thought process still exists.

I still don't understand while much of western Europe has abandoned these thought processes and teachings (despite the Vatican being there), the US still clings to much of it. I guess they've grown up and we're still young.

[closeupready]

12. Wow, I just had a similar conversation the other night with a guy who'd moved back from England

after a number of years, and he said, it's a bit of culture shock when they have civil unions and the US doesn't; and I remarked how weird that, during Thatcher's time, gays were still subject to arrest in the UK, just like in the US, and isn't it weird how fast things have changed there, and yet we are still stuck in the Middle Ages.

[mmonk]

14. It's rather embarrassing actually.

[salguine]

5. Does the Church have an official position on institutionalized child molestation?

[Ikonoklast]

13. Yes.

They hate paying for it, so they hire some of the most expensive legal help this nation has to offer to fight it.

The hypocrisy is stunning.

[mmonk]

6. You should also point out the last part of the article about being divisive.

People here like their brush strokes. But the overall sad thing was this pope being elected and thus conservative bishops also being appointed. It is causing some people to leave.

[closeupready]

7. So what about Bernard Law?

Why is the Vatican protecting him?

[gollygee]

8. Men who are gay lack hand-eye coordination?

What bullshit. Tell that to gay male athletes. Gay men are overprotected by their mothers and alienated by their fathers? Tell gay men with good relationships with their parents. This guy comes across as a completely irrelevant anachronism.

[mmonk]

10. Bigoted thought always at some point tries to create its own "science".

It's nothing new in the folly of men.

[dsc]

15. actually hand eye coordination is one of the few athletic talents I do have

[Eryemil]

16. As I said in the GLBT forums thread:

If there really is a god a meteor would be hurling towards Vatican city at this very moment.
These bastards are a disease.