LETTER FROM A MALE ROMAN ESCORT

LETTER FROM A MALE ROMAN ESCORT

Dear Bishop Buckley,

You may be surprised to know that your Blog is being read by people in Rome and even in the Church in Rome?

For obvious reasons I have to ask you not to publish my real name. I am in my late 30’s and from the US but have been living in Rome now for nearly 18 years. I came here to study for the priesthood but the circumstances I want to tell you about led to my giving up my priesthood studies. I now realise that I do not have a vocation to the priesthood.

From the age of 15 I felt called to the priesthood. After finishing high school I applied to my local bishop to study for the priesthood and was accepted into the seminary. When I was 21 the bishop sent me to do my theological studies in Rome. I fell in love with Rome and still love it.

I have known since puberty that I was gay. I had one or two brief encounters with other guys when I was in high school. In the seminary the majority of us were gay and I fell in love with another seminarian there and we had a full relationship. The rector of the seminary found out about it and he expelled my friend but for some reason allowed me to stay. The other seminarians said that I was kept because I was so handsome?

When I came to Rome I was surprised at how many of the seminarians (and priests) here are gay and actively gay. The students from your own college, The Irish College were especially active on the gay scene.

I got into the gay scene and had many encounters with seminarians and priests. One of the priests introduced me to a visiting bishop and when he came to Rome I met him for dinner and stayed overnight with him in his hotel and we had sex.

This whole part of my life then developed into providing sexual services for priests, monsignors, bishops and even higher ranking church dignitaries. You would be shocked to hear of the people I looked after sexually – right up to the College of cardinals.

I came to realise that I did not have a vocation to the priesthood and I found my faith in God being challenged by the conduct of Rome’s clergy, bishops etc. For a while I gave up on God completely.

For providing these sexual services for high tanking church officials  living in and visiting in Rome I was showered with money and gifts – gifts like a Rolex watch, an Apple iPad and even a car.

When I left the seminary one of my senior clergy contacts provided me with a small apartment to live in and has time has gone along I have arranged to buy that apartment and should own it in the next 2 to 3 years.

I have an Italian partner and he knows about the “work” I do for the clergy. He is not completely happy about it and I intend to give it up when I have the apartment paid off fully. I would like to get a normal job and settle down with my partner and have a civil partnership.

I also realise that I am nearly 40 and even though I am still fit and handsome (the gym 3 times a week) the time is coming when I will be replaced by younger guys.

I have begun to go to Mass again and pray and realise that I must not mix up God with church people. I have been totally shocked by the corruption of the church in Rome and Italy.

I have read your book A Thorn in the Side. It was given to me by an Irish priest. I also know from the internet that you have recently had other difficulties. But at least you are who you say you are and you are open and honest about your life. For that I admire you.

If I come to Ireland I would like to meet you for a chat and if you come to Rome we could meet for coffee or lunch. I imagine you avoid Rome like the plague J

Please pray for me and my partner that we can settle down and that I can put the last 15 – 20 years behind me. Do not misunderstand me. I am not a victim. I played the game willingly. But as I get near 40 I realise that life is too short for games and I need to develop a totally new life and career. 

Maybe like Mary Magdala I can meet the Lord in a new way and make the rest of my life more meaningful and productive. Take care. ……………………… 

BISHOP PAT REPLIES:

DEAR...........

Thank you for your very unexpected email with all it's honesty and truthfulness. Nothing you said came as any surprise or shock to me as you can well imagine.

I am glad that after the years you have had you are on the verge of creating a new life for you and your partner. Like you say, you were not a "victim" as such - but you were very young?

Now you are older and wiser and you are realising that there is more to life than pleasure and money. In fact some of the unhappiest people I know are rich!

These past few days I have been thinking and praying a lot about King David from the Bible. David was a sinner - he not only committed adultery but murdered his mistress' husband. And yet God forgave him and used him greatly. The great thing about God is that when he FORGIVES - He FORGETS.

I have loved Mary Magdaly since I was 21 - forty years ago now. In fact I placed her image on my ordination card when I was ordained at 24. I have also celebrated Mass in Magdala in her honour.

You and your partner would be very welcome here at my house any time. No, I do not go to Rome often. I would not be beloved there. But if I do I will let you know.

I had been hoping that Francis might have named me one of the new cardinals :-) But I will just have to wait until the next consistory :-)

I wish you well in your future. Thank you for writing to me and trusting me with your name and personal details. We can keep in touch.

+ Pat 

HORRIFIED BY IGNORANCE OF HIV AND AIDS BEING DIFFERENT THINGS

HORRIFIED BY IGNORANCE OF HIV AND AIDS BEING DIFFERENT THINGS

I have been quite amazed and even shocked by the number of people who still do not know the difference between HIV and AIDS.

I AM ALSO SHOCKED TO THINK THAT 25% OF PEOPLE WITH HIV ARE WALKING AROUND NOT KNOWING THEY HAVE IT!

Even otherwise highly intelligent people get these two things very mixed up. So allow me, in my own non-doctor way try and explain:

What Is HIV?

To understand what HIV is, let’s break it down:

H – Human – This particular virus can only infect human beings.

I – Immunodeficiency – HIV weakens your immune system by destroying important cells that fight disease and infection. A "deficient" immune system can't protect you.

V – Virus – A virus can only reproduce itself by taking over a cell in the body of its host.

Human Immunodeficiency Virus is a lot like other viruses, including those that cause the "flu" or the common cold. But there is an important difference – over time, your immune system can clear most viruses out of your body. That isn't the case with HIV – the human immune system can't seem to get rid of it. Scientists are still trying to figure out why.

HIV transmission can occur when fluids containing HIV from an infected person enter the body of an uninfected person. These fluids include: Blood, Semen (cum), Pre-seminal fluid (pre-cum),Vaginal fluid, Breast milk

HIV can enter the body through: Lining of the anus or rectum, Lining of the vagina and/or cervix, Opening to the penis, Mouth that has sores or bleeding gums, Cuts and sores,Needles (syringes)

We know that HIV can hide for long periods of time in the cells of your body and that it attacks a key part of your immune system – your T cells or CD4 cells Your body has to have these cells to fight infections and disease, but HIV invades them, uses them to make more copies of itself, and then destroys them.

Over time, HIV can destroy so many of your CD4 cells that your body can't fight infections and diseases any more. If that happens, the infection can lead to AIDS.

What Is AIDS?

To understand what AIDS is, let’s break it down:

A – Acquired – AIDS is not something you inherit from your parents. You acquire AIDS after birth.

I – Immuno – Your body's immune system includes all the organs and cells that work to fight off infection or disease.

D – Deficiency – You get AIDS when your immune system is "deficient," or isn't working the way it should.

S – Syndrome – A syndrome is a collection of symptoms and signs of disease. AIDS is a syndrome, rather than a single disease, because it is a complex illness with a wide range of complications and symptoms.

Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome is the final stage of infection. People at this stage of disease have badly damaged immune systems, which put them at risk for opportunistic infections (OIs). You will be diagnosed with AIDS if you have one or more specific OIs, certain cancers or a very low number of CD4 cells.

Antiretrovirals:

As noted above, when used consistently, ART prevents the HIV virus from multiplying and from destroying your immune system and becoming AIDS. And there are other treatments that can prevent or cure some of the illnesses associated with AIDS, though the treatments do not cure HIV itself. The earlier you detect your HIV infection and start treatment, the better.

But not everyone is diagnosed early. Some people are diagnosed with HIV and AIDS concurrently, meaning that they have been living with HIV for a long time and the virus has already done damage to their body by the time they find out they are infected. These individuals need to seek a health care provider immediately and be linked to care so that they can stay as healthy as possible, as long as possible.

In 1987, a drug called AZT became the first approved treatment for HIV disease. Since then, approximately 30 drugs have been approved to treat people living with HIV/AIDS, and more are under development. You may have heard these drugs called many different names, including:

• "The Cocktail"

• Antiretrovirals (ARVs)

• Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy (HAART or ART)

"Class" Action

There are currently five different "classes" of HIV drugs. Each class of drug attacks the virus at different points in its life cycle—so if you are taking HIV meds, you will generally take 3 different antiretroviral drugs from 2 different classes.

This regimen is standard for HIV care—and it’s important. That’s because no drug can cure HIV, and taking a single drug, by itself, won’t stop HIV from harming you. Taking 3 different HIV meds does the best job of controlling the amount of virus in your body and protecting your immune system.

Taking more than one drug also protects you against HIV drug resistance. When HIV reproduces, it can make copies of itself that are imperfect—and these mutations may not respond to the drugs you take to control your HIV. If you follow the 3-drug regimen, the HIV in your body will be less likely to make new copies that don’t respond to your HIV meds.

Each HIV medication is pretty powerful by itself—and the key to treating your HIV disease successfully is to pick the right combination of drugs from the different classes of HIV meds.

Antiretrovirals are separated into different classes by the way an individual drug stops HIV from replicating in your body. The classes include:

Nucleoside/Nucleotide Reverse Transcriptase Inhibitors (NRTIs): Sometimes called "nukes." These drugs work to block a very important step in HIV’s reproduction process. Nukes act as faulty building blocks in production of viral DNA production. This blocks HIV’s ability to use a special type of enzyme (reverse transcriptase) to correctly build new genetic material (DNA) that the virus needs to make copies of itself.

Non-Nucleoside Reverse Transcriptase Inhibitors (NNRTIs): These are called "non-nukes." They work in a very similar way to "nukes." Non-nukes also block the enzyme, reverse transcriptase, and prevent HIV from making copies of its own DNA. But unlike the nukes (which work on the genetic material ), non-nukes act directly on the enzyme itself to prevent it from functioning correctly.

Protease Inhibitors (PIs): When HIV replicates inside your cells, it creates long strands of its own genetic material. These long strands have to be cut into shorter strands in order for HIV to create more copies of itself. The enzyme that acts to cut up these long strands is called protease. Protease inhibitors (stoppers) block this enzyme and prevent those long strands of genetic material from being cut up into functional pieces.

Entry/Fusion Inhibitors: These medications work to block the virus from ever entering your cells in the first place. HIV needs a way to attach and bond to your CD4 cells, and it does that through special structures on cells called receptor sites. Receptor sites are found on both HIV and CD4 cells (they are found on other types of cells too). Fusion inhibitors can target those sites on either HIV or CD4 cells and prevent HIV from "docking" into your healthy cells.

Integrase Inhibitors: HIV uses your cells’ genetic material to make its own DNA (a process called reverse transcription). Once that happens, the virus has to integrate its genetic material into the genetic material of your cells. This is accomplished by an enzyme called integrase. Integrase inhibitors block this enzyme and prevent the virus from adding its DNA into the DNA in your CD4 cells. Preventing this process prevents the virus from replicating and making new viruses.

Fixed-dose combinations: These are not a separate class of HIV medications but combinations of the above classes and a great advancement in HIV medicine. They include antiretrovirals which are combinations of 2 or more medications from one or more different classes. These antiretrovirals are combined into one single pill with specific fixed doses of these medicines.

Your provider will take many things into account when considering which HIV medications to prescribe for you. These will include your preferences (number of pills, once a day versus twice, etc.), the general state of your health (including your CD4 count) possible side effects, your medical and psychiatric history, etc. You should talk with your provider about the choice of medications, including possible side effects and how you should take them.

Sometimes your HIV medications may be only a part of the whole package of meds you may take. If you are at risk for opportunistic infections, your healthcare provider may also put you on daily or weekly medications to prevent your getting sick with a specific kind of infection. This type of treatment is known as prophylaxis.

In addition, you may take other medications to prevent side-effects. These can include meds to prevent diarrhea, nausea, or pain. If you have other health problems (like high blood pressure or diabetes), you may also need to take medications to treat those conditions. All of these medications work together to keep you as healthy as possible while complementing your treatment for HIV.

CONCLUSION:

1. While HIV not treated can lead to AIDS - HIV IS NOT AIDS.

2. Do not refer to people with HIV as having AIDS. The two words are NOT interchangeable. Don't be ignorant.

3. HIV when diagnosed and treated well need never become AIDS.

4. People with HIV are now living normal, full length lives into their 70s and 80's. HIV is no longer, if detected and treated early, a TERMINAL ILLNESS. It is often just a CHRONIC ILLNESS.

5. HIV sufferers, with proper medical care will more likely die of cancer, heart attack or stroke.

6. People with terminal cancer have told me that they would prefer to have HIV.

7. If you or your partner (s) have behaved riskily with sex or injected drugs make sure to get a HIV test.

8. Do not be one of the 25% of people walking around with HIV and not knowing - the earlier detection the earlier the successful treatment.

THE LIFE AND DEATH OF TOM O'GORMAN

THE LIFE AND DEATH OF TOM O'GORMAN

TOM O'GORMAN AND HIS LARGE HOME IN DUBLIN

Tom O'Gorman, the Irish right wing Roman Catholic activist was buried yesterday in Castleknowck, Dublin.

Mr O'Gorman was murdered a couple of weeks ago by his Italian "lodger" Savario Bellente. 

SAVERIO BELLENTE

The more disturbing reports at the time of the murder spoke of the crime taking place during the playing of a chess game and of Bellente eating some of Mr O'Gorman's organs. Bellente is now in the care of the doctors at Dublin's central criminal hospital and his future is in the hands of those doctors and the Irish courts.

All in all is was a dreadful and shocking tragedy.  

I had never heard of Tom O'Gorman until this terrible incident. Researching him since he was obviously a very right wing Irish Roman Catholic who wrote and campaigned against issues like Gay Marriage, gay parents being allowed to adopt children etc etc.

In my experience I have often found that fanatical and right wing Roman Catholics often have private lives that do not accord with their public utterances.

For instance there was Father Michael Cleary - a columnist with the newspaper THE IRISH CATHOLIC who preached conservative Roman Catholicism but who had a secret wife and children in the background.

CLEARY, PARTNER AND ONE CHILD

The Irish Catholic itself has some interesting skeletons in its cupboard which I will deal with on another occasion

There was Bishop Eamon Casey who was a pillar of the Irish Catholic Hierarchy who had engaged in a passionate affair with Annie Murphy and had a son called Peter who he chose to ignore for many years.

CASEY

We have all the scandals of the sexual abuse of children by priests and Christians and Brothers and the scandals of the Magdalen laundries.

We have had the international cover ups of all these scandals by popes, cardinals and bishops.

We have had Cardinal Keith O Brien of Scotland campaigning against gay rights in Scotland and latterly being exposed as actively gay himself.

O'BRIEN

Sometimes in the Roman Catholic Church those who "protest" the most have the most "interesting" of private lives.

I am sure that Tom O'Gorman (RIP) is now with Jesus in Heaven. But there are many journalists and ordinary people thinking that there is more behind the O'Gorman story than has yet been revealed.

I think that they are right - and in the world we live in today that hidden background is going to be revealed sooner or later.

In the Ireland of today the Catholic Church and the Catholic Right can no longer keep its secrets and scandals under wraps.

Bishop Pat Buckley
25.1.2014

NUNS HAVE SEX LIFE TOO!

NUNS HAVE SEX LIVES TOO!

The Catholic nun who gave birth without realising she was pregnant will live in sheltered housing with her baby, it was reported today.New mother Roxana Rodriguez will have to leave the order she is part of, known as the Little Disciples of Jesus, and the Italian convent she has lived in since she took her vow of chastity.The 33-year-old remains in hospital near Rome under a security lockdown, amid reports that the nun, from El Salvador, has been overwhelmed by the level of media attention in her case.

Roxana Rodriguez, a nun with the order of the Little Disciples of Jesus, stunned her mother superior and local church chiefs after giving birth last week to a baby boy

She stunned her mother superior and local church chiefs after giving birth last week to a baby boy which she has called Francis, in honour of the current Pope.Sister Roxana initially claimed to have no idea that she was pregnant and thought her labour pains were 'stomach cramps' when an ambulance rushed her to hospital in severe pain after being called by fellow nuns when she collapsed at her nunnery.Her picture was published in the Italian daily newspaper Corriere Della Sera, who have carried out an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the birth of 9lb Francis and have spoken to the the social worker in the case.

It shows Sister Roxana, who is currently in the first floor maternity unit at the San Camillo de Lellis hospital in Rieti, 50 miles north of Rome, as she took her vows and became a nun in the order last September.She told her social worker Anna Fontanella: 'I am so happy. I feel more of a mother than a nun, I think that's obvious. I decided to call him Francis in honour of our wonderful south American Pope. I do not feel of guilt. I will be keeping him and bringing him up.'He is a gift from God. I am little worried about all the publicity, not only in Italy but in El Salvador and all over the world. Everyone is talking about this and I don't think I will be able to return to my home country, let alone Rieti.'Sister Roxana has written a letter of apology to the order's mother superior general Elvira Petaraca - the woman who in September she solemnly promised to follow her vows of 'chastity, poverty and obedience', the three main pillars of the Little Disciples of Jesus Order.
The nun stunned her mother superior and local church chiefs after giving birth last week to a baby boy which she has called Francis, in honour of the current Pope
The nun had only arrived in Italy last summer at the nunnery in Rieti and has told officials that the father is a man from her native El Salvador but she has so far not named him.Father Benedetto Falcetti, priest at the nearby St Michael's church in Rieti, said: 'It all happened last spring, around March or April time when she was back in El Salvador to get her passport renewed.'She has not said who the father is but I understand he is an, shall we say, old flame of hers from when she was younger. At some stage I expect she will tell the father that he has a son and they will be reunited but I don't know when that will be.'However, not all sure Father Falcetti's delight at the birth, apart from the anger of her superiors, sister Roxana has also upset her fellow nuns at the convent in Campomoro. One nun who answered the telephone at the convent and who asked not to be named said:'No we must certainly not be going to visit her. What she has done is not right at all. She has betrayed her vows. She will not be coming back here.'Since news of the birth was announced the hospital has been flooded with gifts for the nun and her new baby including nappies, clothes and money.Hospital director Pasquale Carducci said:'We have had to put extra security on the maternity wing because of all the interest. Like any new mum she is delighted but obviously this has created a great deal of clamour because she is a nun.'There have been calls and gifts from dozens of well wishers and she has passed on her thanks to all these people. Medically she and the baby are doing well and I expect them to be discharged by Tuesday at the latest.'Massimo Casciani, spokesman for the local bishop of Rieti, monsignor Delio Lucarelli, said: 'At some point the bishop will visit the nun but at the moment he has not yet seen here.
'We shall be investigating the circumstances behind - the child could be the fruit of a consensual rapport but it could also have been as a result of violence. That's why we need to investigate properly.'

BISHOP PAT SAYS:

What ever made people think that ALL nuns kept their vows of chastity and never fell in love or never had sex?

In my 38 years in the priesthood I have met nuns who were in love with priests and who had sex with them.

I have even had two nuns who had the "hots" for me and stalked me. 

I knew an Irish nun who had a very passionate affair on the missions with an Irish Christian Brother.

I have met nuns who were lesbians who had sexual affairs with each other in the convent. A few years ago two of them appeared on Gay Byrne's Late Late Show on RTE Television. 

In fact perhaps the better nuns were in touch with their humanity and sexual feelings. The one's that were in denial about their sexuality were the ones who beat us all in school and abused children and the young women in the Magdalen laundries.

Many nuns would preferred to have been priests and married priests at that. They were forced into secondary and inferior roles by a  Church that was anti women and anti sex.

Nuns are now a dying breed - Thank God. In future a reformed Catholic Church will allow women to be priests, mothers and wives.

BISHOP BUCKLEY'S CREED

BISHOP BUCKLEY'S CREED

By: The Reverend Dr Martin Pulbrook

Minister - Unitarian Church - Blackpool, England.

Sermon - Sunday 12th Janauary 2014

If I had been given a thousand pounds for every time I have heard or read that Unitarianism did not have creeds - in other words that it was a non-credal religion - I should be a very welcome man. And I wish to spend some time today investigating this commonplace assertion, which I hope to show to be an over simplification, and a misleading over-simplification at that, or a rather more complex situation. 

I am a proud Unitarian. But that is not my only religious affiliation. I am also very honoured to be a member of The Oratory Society, holding since 1999, membership card number 16.

The Oratory Society is the religious organisation of Bishop Pat Buckley in Larne, the liberal and dissident Catholic cleric. Let me read you his "Credo", which was published in the booklet setting out the founding Constitution of The Oratory Society. I have on occasion used this "Credo" as a reading at Services, and I imagine that there is very little in it that any Unitarian will have difficulty with. It is a truly remarkable statement for a Catholic priest to have made - if only the Catholic Church as a whole held similar views:

I believe in this world it is impossible to understand God.

I believe that God made this wonderful universe and all that exists.

I can find God in nature, in animals, in birds and in the enviornment.

I believe that God made all men and women.

That he made them all equal.

And that he loves and cherishes them all equally.

I believe that the whole human race is the family of God.

I believe that there may be intelligent life on other planets.

And if so they too are part of God's family.

I hold that religion and faith are two different things.

That religion can be both good and bad.

And that it is spirituality that counts.

For me your religion is an accident of your birth.

Or a gift of God's great providential diversity.

There is no one true church.

All churches and all religions contain aspects of the truth.

But only God is Truth.

No man is infallible.

A Buddhist or a good atheist is as acceptable to God as a good Catholic.

I believe in people, especially suffering people.

I believe in the power of weakness.

I believe that all men and women will be saved.

I believe in a packed heaven and an empty hell.

And even Satan might get another chance.

I believe in the freedom of God's sons and daughters.

I believe that dogma is often evil.

I believe that life is a journey towards God.

And that no one has the right to insist you go a certain road.

I believe that God and reality are too big for my poor words.

I believe therefore that I am only at a beginning.

Only knocking at a door.

And I believe that the best is yet to come.

Do you either agree generally with the sentiments of this "Credo" - as I do - or perhaps (which might be true of some, perhaps a tiny minority) dislike it and disagree with it? We are a free and non-compulsive religion grouping, and so of course you are perfectly at liberty to reject this "Credo" if that is your preference. But those of us who can go along with it have already, from first principles, disapproved the contention that Unitarians are against all Creeds. Against specific Creeds, yes; but against Creeds uniformly and in the abstract, no. So a greater selectivity of definition is required.

Just before this address we sang the famous anonymous hymn WE BELIEVE IN HUMAN KINDNESS. The origins of this hymn are obscure, and it it is not mentioned at all in Julian's Dictionary of Hymnnology (1892) - which is strange. But it is included in the Essex Hall Hymnal (1896), and was most probably written at some stage in Victorian times. But that is by the way. The same issue, precisely, arises with the humn as with Pat Buckley's "Credo". If we can go along with the hymn, we are clearly not, as Unitarians, "against all Creeds". 

AN EMAIL FROM THE VATICAN - POPE FRANCIS

AN EMAIL FROM THE VATICAN - POPE FRANCIS

This morning before my 12 Noon Mass I had the message below from a senior English priest which a network of connections in Rome and The Vatican:

Dear Pat

New Year Greetings. You have been much in my mind recently and I hope you keep well and that things are settling after your recent sufferings. I hope that 2014 brings you renewed strength and joy.

All is well here and we are busy looking after the rich and famous, the poor and not so famous and everyone in between. It is our busiest time of the year.

Thank you for reproducing the piece on Mary Mac Alese"s challenge to Keith Patrick to redeem himself and share his story as a gay man who tried to live in dysfunctional holy mother church.

Unlike Mary I have no hope that the church is capable of redeeming itself, and am growing deeply disillusioned by the current pope, not that i was ever really illusion-ed by the superstar performance if i'm honest. Too much self will and Jesuit pride.

JESUITS

This past week Francis has:

got his jesuit spokesman (Lombabrdi) to publicly trash the story of the swiss guard who revealed that he had been propositioned on numerous occasions by cardinals, archbishops, bishops, monsignors, including a close clerical collaborator of JPII.

refused to extradite the polish papal nuncio and his gay priest secretary from the Vatican to Poland for criminal trial for numerous charges of child molestation.

GAY NUNCIO

given an audience to the Papal Gentlemen and Throne Bearers telling them how vital they are to his ministry - "they" are notoriously full of old italian queens who touch up anything in trousers, providing he is good looking.

just said a major public mass ad orientem, with his back to the people, as he doesn't wish to upset his queenly precious MC Marini.

That's just in one week. No change here then. Just spin, smoke and mirrors, a more dangerous pontificate even that JPII's as this man can do what he likes, and will. It is all centered on him.

Maybe you could post a blog on this? I have all this from a dear friend in the Vatican where Francis is far from loved, in fact he is feared.

Much love,

BISHOP PAT RESPONDS:

Dear

Thank you for your email. I am putting it on the Blog as you requested.

I had been reserving judgement on Francis - hoping against hope :-(

It is beginning to look like there is no hope.

On the Jesuit thing - a deceased Jesuit friend of mine used to quote the following verse to me:

"The join the Jesuits without knowing each other;

They live together without loving each other.

They die together without mourning each other"

It looks as if we must all now understand that the CHURCH OF ROME is beyond redemption.

Pat

PRESIDENT MC ALEESE CHALLENGES CATHOLIC CHURCH ON GAYS

Former Irish president Mary McAleese, who has urged a Scottish cardinal forced to stand down last year to admit publicly that he is gay, has said “a very large number” of Catholic priests are homosexuals.

The Catholic Church has been in denial over homosexuality for decades, particularly since many priests are gay, she said. “It isn’t so much the elephant in the room but a herd of elephants.

“I don’t like my church’s attitude to gay people. I don’t like ‘love the sinner, hate the sin’. If you are the so-called sinner, who likes to be called that? We also know that within the priesthood a very large number of priests are gay.”

“Nowadays, it is not something that is perceived as something that is intrinsically disordered. Homosexual conduct is not seen as evil,” said Mrs McAleese.She also criticised words attributed to the previous Pope on this subject as being contradictory. “Things written by [Pope] Benedict, for example, were completely contradictory to modern science and to modern understanding, and to the understanding of most Catholics nowadays in relation to homosexuality.

Her remarks were made in Edinburgh to the Glasgow-based Herald newspaper last month, but only published yesterday. She made them before she spoke last month to the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

The former president, who has become increasingly outspoken about the church’s attitude to gays, compared the church’s stand to the “Christ killer” charge levelled against Jews for 2,000 years.

“I would have thought Cardinal Keith O’Brien, in telling the story of his life – if he was willing to do that – could have been of great assistance to gay people, not just in the church but elsewhere, who felt over many, many years constrained to pretend to be heterosexual while ... acting a different life.”

The Scottish cardinal had to resign last year as an archbishop when it emerged that he had had a homosexual relationship with a young priest.Last night, the Catholic Church in Scotland said it was up to Mrs McAleese to “raise these matters”, while it is “an entirely personal matter” for Cardinal O’Brien to decide on his future actions, a spokesman told The Irish Times.

Spokesman for the church in Ireland Martin Long said: “The Catholic Communications Office does not respond to reported comments of individuals ... the Catholic Church clearly teaches that people who are homosexual must always be treated with sensitivity, compassion and respect.”

Gay Men Will Marry Your Girlfriends

DEATH OF FATHER ROBERT NUGENT

DEATH OF FATHER ROBERT NUGENT

FATHER BOB

Father Robert Nugent, a Roman Catholic priest whose support of gays and lesbians in the church brought the Vatican's censure, ending his public role as an advocate for reconciling church doctrines with the realities of gay life, died Wednesday in Milwaukee. He was 76.

The cause was cancer, said Sister Jeannine Gramick, the nun with whom he founded New Ways Ministry in 1977 to educate the church about gay and lesbian Catholics and advocate for their acceptance.

For more than two decades, Nugent traveled the country with Gramick to counsel gay Catholics, give workshops for Catholic clergy and lay people, and write books on gays in the church. But their Maryland-based organization quickly brought challenges from American Catholic authorities and the church hierarchy in Rome.

In 1984, Archbishop James A. Hickey of Washington ordered Nugent and Gramick out of the diocese and forced their resignations from New Ways Ministry.

They continued to speak and write about gays in the church, however, spurring the creation of a commission headed by Cardinal Adam Maida of Detroit to examine whether Nugent and Gramick were undermining church teachings on homosexuality.

That investigation was transferred in 1995 to the powerful Vatican office headed by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger,, the conservative prelate who would become Pope Benedict XVI. His office concluded in 1999 that the American priest and nun had shown "ambiguities and errors" in their public statements about church doctrine regarding homosexuality. They were ordered to end their ministry and barred from holding office within their religious orders.

BENEDICT 

Nugent, who said he thought of himself as "a typical Irish Catholic priest," accepted the silencing.

"He was really persecuted for the role he took," said Marianne Duddy-Burke, executive director of the national advocacy group for gay Catholics, DignityUSA. "He believed strongly in a bridge-building ministry and felt church officials would learn so much if they would only listen and be open to the lives and stories of gay and lesbian people. He was a pivotal figure in our work."

In the nearly four decades since Nugent and Gramick began ministering to gay and lesbian Catholics, attitudes have changed dramatically. Polls show a majority of American Catholics are open-minded about gay rights and same-sex marriage. According to New Ways Ministry, there are more than 200 gay-friendly parishes in the United States. In 1977, Gramick said in an interview, "there were none."

Gramick had begun reaching out to gay Catholics in 1971 when she was a nun studying for a doctorate in mathematics at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Nugent was working with the homeless in Philadelphia when he read a newspaper article about her work.

He wrote her a letter that ended with a casual offer of help.

"I didn't mean it, and I've never said that again," he told Associated Press in 1999, "because my life was changed radically."

A few days after receiving Nugent's letter, Gramick invited him to a meeting with gay Catholics. He found "people who loved the church very much," he recalled. "But they felt like the church didn't want them."

SISTER JEANNINE GRAMMICK

He began working with Gramick even though he knew it could bring dire consequences. "We knew it was risky," he told the St. Petersburg Times in 1999, "because Catholics weren't talking and writing about sexuality."

Among the books he wrote with Gramick were "Building Bridges: Gay and Lesbian Reality and the Catholic Church" (1992) and "Voices of Hope: A Collection of Positive Catholic Writings on Gay and Lesbian Issues" (1995), both published while they were under investigation by Catholic authorities.

When the inquiry passed to the Vatican, he and Gramick were asked several times to clarify their views in writing, but their responses were unsatisfying. In July 1999 they were summoned to Rome. Ratzinger reported that Gramick "simply refused to express any assent whatsoever to the teachings of the church on homosexuality" while Nugent was "responsive, but not unequivocal."

Concluding that they had strayed from church teaching that all voluntary homosexual acts are "an intrinsic moral evil" and "gravely disordered," the Vatican ordered them to cease their ministry to gay Catholics and their families. The following year, fed up with the criticism of its actions aired in the secular media, it ordered the two to stop discussing homosexuality in public and withdraw their support from a letter-writing campaign protesting their punishment.

Gramick ultimately chose not to comply and has continued to be a vocal advocate for gays in the church.

Nugent took a different approach. "Father Bob," as he was known in his longtime parish at St. John the Baptist in New Freedom, Pa., counseled gay and lesbian Catholics privately and advised theologians and scholars working on issues of homosexuality. "He never gave up his commitment to lesbian and gay Catholics, although he had to give up his public work with them," said Francis De Bernardo, executive director of New Ways Ministry.

When Nugent did speak publicly, his topic was silence.

He gave talks about "silent witnesses" such as Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, the Jesuit paleontologist who challenged church teachings on original sin and creation, and Thomas Merton, the Trappist monk who opposed the nuclear arms race as immoral and un-Christian. Both obeyed orders by their religious superiors to stop publicly discussing their unorthodox views but were eventually vindicated. Nugent wrote a 2011 book about them called "Silence Speaks."

Gramick said Nugent prayed the Vatican would one day recognize the value of their ministry. Although that has not happened, he told her he was glad he would die under the papacy of Pope Francis, who has expressed a more welcoming stance toward gays in the church. "I think that gave Bob great consolation," Gramick said.

Some in the gay community criticized him for staying in the church that so harshly rebuked him, but Nugent saw it differently.

"In order to have an effect on the house," he told a college group in 2000, "you must live in it."

Born in Norristown, Pa., in 1937, Nugent attended St. Charles Borromeo Seminary in Philadelphia. He earned master's degrees in library science at Villanova University and in theology from Yale Divinity School.

A longtime cigar smoker, he was diagnosed with lung cancer shortly after retiring in June and moved to a healthcare facility in Milwaukee.

BISHOP PAT SAYS:

We should be grateful to Father Bob for all his ministry and especially his ministry to God's gay and lesbian children.

Personally I would not have let Benedict & Co silence me. However I respect Father Bob's conscience on that one.

But I admire Sister Jeannine more for not letting them silence her.

How can the Vatican really condemn gay and lesbians anyway. Many of the clergy there, including probably Benedict and his mate Georgeous George are secretly gay anyway.

CHRISTMAS AT THE ORATORY, LARNE.

CHRISTMAS AT THE ORATORY LARNE

Rev. Dr. Martin Pulbrook

Christmas Day 2013

2.50pm

My dear Pat,

It's 2.50pm., and we have just finished our Christmas dinner. Before I go and fall asleep by the fire I just wanted to pen these few words to you.

I left this morning at 7 a.m, without in the end having breakfast. Everyone else seemed sound asleep, and I didn't want to risk waking anyone up by moving around in the kitchen. I stopped briefly at 8.30 at the Castlebellingham Service Area and got a coffee and a roll.

I find it difficult to put adequately into words the effect on me of the two Masses at The Oratory on the 22nd and 24th. So often in the mainstream the performance of ceremonies is formalaic and wooden, i.e non-spontaneous. But exactly the reverse is true in what you have managed to bring into effect at The Oratory: there is immediacy, complete sincerity, and spontaneity, and the result is simply overwhelming. Thank you for allowing me to be part of something that will be with me for the rest of my life.

I am greatly saddened by the fact that these massive positives that you have brought to things spiritual should be unfairly weighed down and counterbalanced by the inevitable negatives flowing from the recent case. 

It is time the public in general heard good things about you for a change, rather than bad and appalling things.

As a British citizen I am ashamed of my country's justice system.

As ever,

Dr Martin Pulbrook

Lecturer in Latin and Greek (Rtd)

Co. Westmeath