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AN INFLUENTIAL PRIEST, who is a consultant to the Vatican’s communication division, says no group should be “targeted” in the way that the LGBT community was by Father Séan Sheehy.
Recently, Father Séan Sheehy, a retired priest who was deputising for parish priest Fr Declan O’Connor, told parishioners at St Mary’s Church in Listowel that sex between two men or two women is sinful.
Fr Sheehy added: “You rarely hear about sin but it’s rampant. We see it for example in the legislation. We see it in the promotion of abortion, we see it and in the example of this lunatic approach of transgenderism and in promotion of sex between two men and two women. That is sinful. That is mortal sin.”
However, Father James Martin says Fr Sheehy’s comments were both “insulting” and “hurtful”.
Fr Martin is Editor-at-Large of the Jesuit magazine ‘America’ and was appointed by Pope Francis as a consultant to the Vatican’s Secretariat for Communications.
He is well known for his outreach work to the LGBT community from within the Church, including his book “Building a Bridge” in which he calls for Catholics to show more respect and compassion to the LGBT community.
Martin Scorsese has acted as an executive producer for a documentary based on Fr Martin’s LGBT ministry, also called “Building a Bridge”.
In 2018 Fr Martin, who is half-Irish and has family in Castlebridge in Co Wexford, also delivered a talk in Dublin at the World Meeting of Families festival.
In his speech, he said LGBT Catholics had been “deeply wounded” by the Church and added: “Sadly, many people still believe people choose their sexual orientation, despite the testimony of almost every psychiatrist, biologist, and the lived experience of LGBT people.”
However, he has often received virulent abuse from some Catholics for his outreach work.
In an article for The Washington Post, he revealed the contents of a letter he received for offering support from within the Church to the LGBT community: “You’re leading souls to hell where you will surely reside in a few years.”
In that same article, he said such people “end up trying to be so Catholic that they are barely Christian”.
Speaking to The Journal, Fr Martin said: “To call ‘transgenderism’ lunacy is to say that all transgender people are insane, which is not only untrue but insulting.
“It is not a sin to be LGBT. I am not challenging any Church teaching here. This is simply how God has created some people – even Pope Francis has said that.”
In 2013, Pope Francis told journalists: ”If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?”
Fr Martin also noted: “In fact, the Catechism says that we are called to treat LGBT people with ‘respect, compassion and sensitivity’.”
While the Catechism of the Catholic Church says “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered”, it adds: “They (LGBT people) must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided.”
Pope Francis re-iterated this in 2016, saying: “I will repeat what the Catechism of the Church says, that they (LGBT people) should not be discriminated against, that they should be respected, accompanied pastorally.”
The pontiff also called on the Church to apologise and seek forgiveness for the way it has treated LGBT people.
The Bishop of Kerry, Dr Ray Browne, apologised for Fr Sheehy’s homily and said the views expressed he were not representative of Christianity.
“I apologise to all who were offended,” said Bishop Browne.
“The views expressed do not represent the Christian position. The homily at a regular weekend parish Mass is not appropriate for such issues to be spoken of in such terms.
“The Gospel of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ is a Gospel of love. It calls on us all to ever have total respect for one another.”
Fr Martin said it was heartening to see this reaction.
“It’s a reminder that pastoral care for LGBT people varies widely from parish to parish, and from diocese to diocese,” said Fr Martin.
“Bishop Browne was speaking as a pastor not only to LGBT people, but to their friends and family members.”
Fr Martin described Fr Sheehy’s comments as “hurtful”, adding: “In response to people who have been hurt, I would say that the Church is not one priest, and it is certainly not one homily.
“Sometimes I use the analogy of a doctor. If you had a bad experience with one doctor would you give up on the entire medical profession?
“More bluntly, I say to LGBT people, it’s your Church too. If you’re baptised, then you’re as much a part of the church as your local priest or bishop, or even the Pope. It’s your church too.”
When Fr Martin was asked if Fr Sheehy was simply expressing – however crudely – Church teaching, he replied: “LGBT people are the only people whose lives are framed this way by some Catholic leaders.
“Yet no one’s life is 100% in conformity with the Gospels, with the Catechism or with church teaching overall.
“What about Catholics who don’t attend Mass every Sunday? More to the point, what about people who are cruel, or unforgiving, or never give to the poor?
“These groups are never singled out as ‘sinners’. It’s important to see that no Catholic is perfect. Besides, no group, especially one that is already marginalised in society, deserves to be targeted like this.”
A event was organised for the LGBT community during the main Sunday mass at St Mary’s Church in Listowel yesterday.
It was in response to Fr Sheehy’s comments and people were encouraged to bring flowers and peaceful messages.
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Correct me if I’m wrong but doesn’t Catholic doctrine state that homosexuality is a mortal sin and one that will lead an individual to that dreaded make believe place called hell?
Despite the nice things that Pope Francis has said, Catholic doctrine regarding gay people hasn’t changed so in essence, Fr Sheehy is technically correct. He is only stating what the Church actually teaches behind all the diplomatic waffle.
The Church likes talking out both sides of it mouth.
Why would any gay person (or any person for that matter) want anything to do with this shower?
@Will: you just took the words out of my mouth… just about to post a similar comment… but you put it better than me, agree with you 100,%
@Will: your first sentence is wrong… So there ya go. Your request is complete, you have been corrected.
@JG: it’s the sexual act that is the mortal sin according to Catholic catechism not the “ality” part.
@Will: I’m assuming you refer to leviticus 18:22 in your statement.
Homosexuality in our modern understanding wasn’t a thing when the old testament was being formed so thrusting such a view into the text is a bit intellectually lazy at best.
Many biblical scholars have studied these texts and while there isn’t a definitive meaning to this passage, it’s pretty resounding that it in no way refers to our current views of LGBT people. The prevailing scholarly theories more wrestle with whether it refers to incest or even pederasty, among other such ideas, based on the cultural historical landscape during that era.
It’s always worth remembering that reading the English verse is often a translation of a translation of a translation moving through Latin, Greek and Hebrew. Going back to the original Hebrew is the best way of examining verses like this but linguistically, it’s complicated and hence why we have competing theories.
@Will: The stringent adherence to make believe needs to evolve. Commendable that at least this person is willing to openly speak about it. He’ll get nowhere tho, as is the way on this oily rock.
@Antaine O’Labhradha: You need professional help, you really do.
@Kevin Organ: Your comment really shows how the Bible is a human document written a long time ago with no understanding of the future. People will pick from it what they want to suit their own predjudices
@JG: “it’s the sexual act that is the mortal sin according to Catholic catechism not the “ality” part.”
So, according to you and the Church, an individual can be homosexual in theory (not a sin) but never in practice (because, going to hell)?
And you see no problem with such a ludicrous position?
Lets be honest, the Church has only adopted this double speak in an attempt to seem like it is connecting with a changing society. I don’t believe too many people are fooled by such nonsense.
@Kevin Organ: Catholic Doctrine and the bible are not the same thing. I personally don’t care what the bible says but I have a definite interest in what the Church says considering they still have such a hold over parts of our society.
@Will: I’m in no way religious but in my opinion when something is made up, surely it can be changed!! It is after all interpretation and opinion and as we know in time they change.
@Will: well said. He is speaking the church’s truth. If you don’t agree with him maybe the catholic church is not for you. Treat people as you’d like to be treated – simple.
@Justin Healy:
There is no such thing as the “church’s truth”. Truth is not subjected to who believes it or who doesn’t believe it. The truth of the matter is that when the Bible is translated from the original text in which it was written in Context with the time it was written with an open honest and critical mind armed with scientific facts at no point does it condemn same-sex romantic loving monogamous committed relationships between peers and the carnal expression of love within such relationships. In other words same-sex marriages.
Oh, and for the record what you have just done by encouraging people to leave the Catholic Church as it sees itself to be the one true Apostolic Church. Is considered to be a moral sin according to the church’s catechism.
@Tom Kelly: If you are not religious, how do you know its all made up ?
@Boatman: so in your opinion you have to be religious to understand the history of the church and/or biblical teachings? Pretty much every atheist I know could school any Christian on the bible, what it contains and what influenced it. Or how many times its been changed to suit the times. Reading the bible cover to cover and doing a little bit of studying is how you know its a load of bs.
I think it’s good we’re having this conversation about the catholic church nationally at least.
There’s a real collective cognitive dissonance going on in the country at the moment where society is expected to live and act in an accepting, progressive way and yet most people still baptise, marry and educate their children in the ethos of a group which states the exact opposite.
The Kerry priest is entitled to his views of course and I don’t think most people care what an old man with old views thinks is going to happen to them in a supposed post-life according to ancient scripture. But it’s wrong that these people are involved in education, healthcare and continue to be a pillar of Irish society when they’re seemingly so opposed to Irish people’s values in the modern age.
@Rochelle: well said
@Rochelle: Maith thú!
I remember some education minister [Labour, Rory somebody (I forget his surname)] saying he would excise the churches from our education system, then set out to do absolutely nothing to make it so! Thankfully the nosedive in vocations which followed the exposure of clerical child abuse helped reduce their numbers and their ability to continue to run schools!
@Rochelle: The Clergy account for 3% of Catholics in Ireland , the other 97% who identify as Catholic are not what you term “these people “ but citizens of this state . Most of them are proud of their schools and the excellent education available to all regardless of whatever faith or none they belong to.
See the Catholic churches numbers are dwindling away …so they will be able to pull out a letter that Saint paul wrote to the Corinthians that says we are all Equal no matter what our sexuality is. …he wrote alott of letters that guy…he must have had some amount of parchment in his bag
@Dave Ryan: must have cost him a fortune in stamps!
At this point it’s all just too full of contradictions to make sense anymore. The Catholic Church has fallen victim to a phenomenon which tends to eventually distort more or less any movement or entity with such a vast number of people involved – what does and doesn’t count as the “correct” view varies wildly from person to person, and no two clerics *or* lay people will ever give you the same answer.
This is why at least for me personally, disorganised religion is the only religion which really makes sense. Any religion with a hierarchal structure as vast and complex as the Church will inevitably end up tripping over itself as individual within that disagree. In my view, those who believe in God are better off reading the texts for themselves, forming their own conclusions, and having their own relationship with God in whatever form seems to make sense to them; relying on the organised entity that is “the Church” just isn’t viable anymore because it’s simply too huge an organisation to speak coherently on any issue.
Trying to be ideologically neutral in my previous comment but as far as my own two cents, the simultaneously beliefs that God loves all of his creations and that he would intentionally create people whose role it would be to be ashamed of themselves and suffer in silent self-hatred are mutually exclusive; you kinda have to pick one. Agnostic though I may be, I firmly choose the former.
Bigotry, cruelty and hatred have absolutely no place in any religion which claims to worship the God of the four Gospels. Those who find room for such toxicity are the kinds of people described in George Orwell’s 1984 – those who could read the phrases “war is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength” and somehow find absolutely nothing absurd or contradictory therein.
That would be an ecumenical matter.
@Alex Marquis: down with that sort of thing
@Dave Ryan: careful now!
Is there such thing as an” influential priest” these days?
Right is right, and wrong is wrong. Simple
‘….Calls for Catholics to show compassion to the LGBT community’ …. Definition of compassion ‘sympathetic pity and concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others’ yes folks … being gay is a suffering as misfortune….
The old testament also stated ‘You must not cut off the hair at the sides of your head or clip off the edges of your beard’ soooo
Yawn
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