by Datechguy | January 15th, 2012
Next thing you know they might start having mass and communion:
On Tuesday, the archdiocese announced it was launching a local chapter of a national ministry called Courage “to support men and women who struggle with homosexual tendencies and to motivate them to live chaste and fruitful lives in accordance with Catholic Church teachings.”
This is fully consistent with Catholic beliefs and teaching which unlike protestant teaching states that it is the act rather than the attraction that is sinful.
As you might guess the idea that Gay Catholics might actually take Catholic seriously has some up in arms.
Linda Estabrook, executive director of the Hartford Gay & Lesbian Health Collective, took offense.
as has others
Sharon Groves, director of the religion and faith program at the Human Rights Campaign, the gay rights advocacy group in Washington, D.C., also criticized the Courage ministry for “calling on people to be inauthentic. … God did not ask us to have to lie about who we are.”
So if you have an inclination toward any sin; Lust, envy, greed, sloth, dishonesty remember by resisting that sin you are being “inauthentic”.
Bottom line, if folks want to reject Christianity that’s on them, but if you accept the Catholic Faith as truth then attempting to resist sin, any sin, is not only in your interest, it’s part of what Christ calls us to do. Nobody is being forced to join this ministry and if believing Catholics choose to be a part of this ministry that’s their business.
And if the world hates us for it, calls us bigots for it and attacks us in the media for it, that’s not only part of the job description:
If the world hates you, realize that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, the world would love its own; but because you do not belong to the world, and I have chosen you out of the world, the world hates you. Remember the word I spoke to you, ‘No slave is greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours. And they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they do not know the one who sent me. If I had not come and spoken to them, they would have no sin; but as it is they have no excuse for their sin. Whoever hates me also hates my Father. If I had not done works among them that no one else ever did, they would not have sin; but as it is, they have seen and hated both me and my Father. John 15:18-24
but comes with promised rewards
Blessed are they who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when they insult you and persecute you and utter every kind of evil against you (falsely) because of me. Rejoice and be glad, for your reward will be great in heaven. Thus they persecuted the prophets who were before you. Matthew 5:10-12
That’s what it comes down to. If you don’t believe that promise means nothing, if you believe that promise means everything.
It’s your call.
Update: Some are upset that Bishops insist that priests keep their vows too:
If you want to commit adultery, and the Church tells you not to, are you being “inauthentic” by keeping your marriage vows? If Jesus tells you to minister to the sick and the imprisoned, but they either gross you out or scare you, is it “inauthentic” to do so anyway?
Liberalism is predicated on the notions that easy things are never bad for you, and that growing up is somehow selling out. Grown-ups understand that they do not always get everything they want, that they are often called upon to do hard things and sorry, life doesn’t always work out how you want it to.
That said, this (in some ways) is a sin that is easy for me to avoid, or rather hard to understand, and that probably makes me a very poor person to discuss it. At least in theory, I can find someone to whom I am naturally attracted and get married with the full blessing of almost any church and every state in this country, so it’s somewhat frivolous to just say, “Why yes, we all struggle with sin, this is your cross to bear.” But – if gay Catholics want to join up and live their lives according to Catholic teachings, more power to them.
Wait, which archdiocese did this? Whoop whoop! The other quotations kinda make me want to hide my face and pretend I don’t live here.