Catholics, Condoms and Confusion

So Pope Benedict XVI has said - finally - that he could see some cases where condom use to prevent the spread of HIV as being morally permissible. A small step, but in the minds of many folks (including many Catholics) definitely a step in the right direction.

Here's where the confusion comes in: The Vatican is insisting that this does not represent a change in Catholic teaching on condom use.

Uno momento. For decades now, popes have been saying "no" to condoms. Even if you're married and preventing the spread of HIV. Absolute rule, no exceptions. Then the current pope says he can see where, in certain cases, it's a good thing. That's not a change?

Well, according to the Associated Press report...

The Holy See's chief spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, stressed that Benedict was not "morally justifying" the unbridled exercise of sexuality and the church's main advice in the fight against AIDS remains the same: promoting sexual abstinence and fidelity among married couples.

The logic, apparently, is that since the Vatican is still stressing abstinence and monogamy, then its fundamental teaching hasn't changed. Except for one thing: An even more fundamental aspect of the church's moral philosophy has changed.

Originally, the leadership of the Catholic church adhered to absolutism - there is only one morally correct answer, and no deviation is allowed. And that's been the Vatican's problem in terms of being able to adapt to new facts and realities: absolutism allows no exceptions. As soon as you allow an exception, for whatever reason, you're no longer absolutist.

As soon as the Pope said that condoms can be used in certain circumstances, even very narrow ones, then he crossed the line from absolutism to contextualism. So, in a sense, this is representing a shift in Catholic teaching. Maybe Benedict and the other Cardinals are just too stubborn to admit it.

Well, it should be obvious to anyone who reads this blog that I consider it a welcome change. If the Catholic church is indeed going to stand for life, then they need to take the realities of life into account. And if this small step helps them to do that, we should applaud and support it.

Compassion for the Closeted - And the Real Hypocrisy Behind It

Recently someone on my Facebook list posted a link to a scandalous story. In it, the president of a prominent Catholic high school in the Midwest had been caught in a sex sting, groping an undercover police officer in a park notorious for anonymous gay sex.

You'll notice I've refused to give any personal details here. It's bad enough this fellow has been forced out of the closet in his home town. Does he really need a kinky heretic like me adding to his misery?

There are different reasons different people keep their sexual identity away from public view. Whatever that reason, we should lean towards respecting them. If the person in question is a public figure renowned for "promoting family values", then exposing such hypocrisy seems more important than privacy.

In this case, however, we're dealing with a private individual with no record of espousing anti-GLBT propaganda. Yet he's also caught in the dilemma of having to deny his desires for intimacy and pleasure out of obedience to church doctrine. Well, you can only do that for so long. Is it any wonder, then, that he resorted to such risky action?

So I feel compassion for this fellow, and I hope he can find a way to come to grips with his sexuality, and to reconcile it with his faith. I feel that way for so many who feel they are caught between competing desires - the erotic and spiritual - and hope that they and their families and communities will come to see that these need not be mutually exclusive.

What really bothers me is the real hypocrisy behind all of this. Men like this school administrator can confess their sins, do their penance, and be forgiven for what is seen as a temporary lapse in moral judgement. If, however, they chose to live in a committed loving relationship, then all bets are off. Thus the churches which continually condemn anything outside of "traditonal marriage" wind up showing greater tolerance for behavior which is furthest away from that ideal.

This is the problem with a sexual moralism which fixates on form instead of being concerned with content. The forms are so many, contradictions and conundrums are inevitable. And in all of this, where is the value of love - not just for those who repent and obey church doctrine, but those who are willing to question bravely how those doctrines do more harm than good?

Core Values ... or Puritanical Legalism?

You'd have to be a hermit in the tundra to be unaware of how conservative Christians have upheld opposition to abortion, contraception, homosexuality and sex education other than "abstinence-only" as going against their beliefs. What you may not have heard is how it's been ratcheted up. These positions aren't just beliefs, or even "deeply-held religious beliefs" -- they are now deemed "core values."

So now we have a conservative Christian university student claiming a right to refuse to counsel openly gay clients because she claims it would contradict the "core values" of her faith.

On the flip side, a nun who approved an abortion to save a critically ill woman's life is not only fired from her post at Saint Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center in Phoenix but excommunicated from her church, because Bishop Thomas Olmstead apparently holds as a core value of Catholic faith that "the mother may in fact die along with her child."

When Jesus was asked: "What is the greatest commandment?" he did not talk about carrying pregnancies to term, rejecting anything outside of heterosexuality, or more generally talking about sexual purity. All of that was secondary. He answered the question about the greatest commandment -- the core value of his day -- thusly:

"You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind." This is the great and foremost commandment. The second is like it, "You shall love your neighbor s yourself."

Let me go further, and give an example of how Jesus put this into practice. That would be when a Roman centurion -- not just a gentile, but an active participant in the military occupation of Judea -- comes to him asking that he heal his servant, who is seriously ill. And not just any servant. In the extant Greek, the centurion describes him specifically as his pais and entimos duolos -- denoting not just any male slave but one obtained to share his bed as his lover.

What did Jesus do? Did he tell the centurion: "Sorry, but helping a gentile oppressor, and a homosexual to boot, goes against my core values"? No, he said very simply and clearly that he would go to the centurion's house to heal the young man. And when the centurion asserted his belief that Jesus had the power to heal without having to step into his house, Jesus praised him for his faith, and did so.

The very phrase core value depends on the concept that certain beliefs and principles are dependent upon others. Belief in prayer, for example, depends upon the belief that you are praying to some entity or power worthy of receiving those prayers. And the belief that one should help those in need regardless of their station in life depends in turn on the core values that each human being, created in the image of the Divine, is worthy of respect and love -- even a sinner or an enemy.

To hold up specific doctrines about sexuality above the more central value of compassion is more than mere legalism. It is virtual idolatry. It is confusing means with ends, giving more weight to selected issues than to the central message of one's faith, and in that process, distorting that faith beyond recognition.

Jesus condemned Pharisees and Saducees for doing much the same thing. What would he who healed the "honored slave" of a gentile soldier, and without hesitation, say to those who would refuse to do so today?

The End of Catholicism?

The Roman Catholic Church's sexual abuse scandals have now reached the papacy itself. Der Spiegel is reporting that hundreds of German Catholics have left the faith in the past month, while internal criticism of the church hierarchy continues to grow.

Reading some of the comments filtering to my Facebook account, there are many who wonder if this is the final death-knell for Catholicism itself. With Benedict XVI caught between a rock and a hard place, it would seem that the Vatican's credibility can only go further and further down. And so I see some actually proposing that the Church itself must inevitably go the way of the Byzantine Empire.

Not so fast.

For one thing, the Church and papacy have survived far worse scandals than this. It's also important to remember that faith has a logic all its own. People will choose to remain, perhaps to weather the storm, or more hopefully to rebuild from within. Some will argue that Catholicism is bigger than the papacy, or even the hierarchy of priests and bishops. Others, like Bill Donahue, will persist in trying to dismiss the current wave of criticism.

So the question is not whether the Church will survive, but in what form. Will it revert and retreat into a conservative core of true believers? Or will it accept the challenge to examine the contradictions between its highest values and its most questionable practices?

Ultimately, the Church need not become more "worldly" to maintain influence in the world. But its leaders do need to be mindful of what the world sees -- how we "picture" Catholicism. At one end of the spectrum are cold, cloistered clerics in denial about the damage they have inflicted on their own flock. At the other end are the charities and street ministries reaching out to, and speaking out for, the impoverished and disenfranchised. The College of Cardinals behind closed doors, versus the local church with its doors wide open to all. It is these contradictions which have defined Catholicism in the modern era, and which Catholics must now address.

And Now, Ireland: More News of Sexual Abuse in the Church

Living in Boston when news of the Catholic abuse scandals was on every day, one wonders how news of Ireland’s Murphy Commission Report could make it sound worse.

Here’s how: Not only did the Archdiocese of Dublin continually cover up reports of abuse, but Irish police and prosecutors were also complicit in those actions.

Fortunately, Ireland's government and national police force are already responding to these reports, promising swift action. And from the news reports I'm hearing and reading, it sounds like Irish voters will not soon forget those promises by the time elections roll around again.

Unfortunately, I’m sure we’ll also see so-called “Catholic loyalists” complaining that media reports of this are signs of “anti-Catholic bigotry” by the secular media. Yes, they will say, sexual abuse of children is horrible, but why single out the Catholic church?

First: Yes, other groups have sexual predators in their midst. Even my own Unitarian Universalist Association has seen such cases. But the question is how such institutions respond to reports and evidence of such abuse. Do you cover it up, or find the truth? Do you shuffle the abusers around, or remove them permanently? Do you try to silence the victims, or help them to heal? And, most important, do you merely hope that it doesn’t happen again, or take respond with proactive measures to protect those under your care?

Second: Yes, other groups have done atrocious jobs of handling sexual abuse allegations. Two which I can think of are the Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Boy Scouts. But when this happens with an institution as large and influential as the Roman Catholic Church, how can you expect the media to cover it any differently? It’s like having two companies going under due to fraudulent practices – a local business worth a hundred thousand dollars, and an international powerhouse with political connections worth a hundred billion – and the bigger company complains that the media is paying too much attention to them.

This brings me to my final point, directed at those within the church who complain about the media: If you are truly loyal to the church – to all of its people, not just those at the top, and to its essential core values as expressed in the Gospels – then why don’t you hold your leaders accountable, just as Jesus did to the religious leaders of his day? Yes, they have called conferences and put forward documents outlining changes. But it would help if you joined those who keep at the bishops to make sure they follow through. So, instead of complaining about the media for holding the church hierarchy accountable, I suggest that you focus your energies on taking on that job yourself.