06 January 2008

Not Your Average Scripture Study

If you were thinking that maybe the dissenters at St. Cronan's might have learned something from their Advent Vespers fiasco, think again.

From their website:

Monday, 1/7-- Scripture Study from LGBT perspectives

In case you don't know, LGBT means Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered.

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6 comments:

Anonymous said...

From the LGBT perspective? What exactly does that mean?

Does that mean when discussing the woman at the well in John 4:7 one is to ask if it was really a woman or was it a transgendered samaritan?

Or does it mean that they are looking to Holy Scripture to find ways to overcome tendencies to be LGB or T?

Or does it mean that they are searching Holy Scripture for passages that can be radically re-interpreted to justify identifying as LGB or T?

P.S. Dear blogger, since you use comment moderation, you can turn off the spam-resistant word verification to help your faithful readers.

06 January, 2008 23:49
Anonymous said...

I'd like to know how your diocese plans on dealing with issues such as these that tend to keep coming up over there
at St. Cronan's parish.

What you've written about here is similar to something that occurred in the Phoenix diocese a few years back;
when several priests affixed their
names to something called the 'Phoenix
Declaration', which "affirmed the
right of gay men, lesbians and others
to participate in Christian churches."

Here's a link to a newspaper article
on the Phoenix issue:

http://72.14.205.104/search?q=cache:AP65PCBBKHIJ:www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/local/articles/0117priest0117.html+phoenix+diocese,+gay+outreach&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=2&gl=us

The Phoenix diocese saw several priests
resign their positions over this
affair, and watched a few others go on
leave from their responsibilities.
I'm not familiar with the particulars
of what exactly was written in the
'Phoenix Declaration', and what might
have been said by these priests to
Bishop Olmstead; but one could fairly
surmise that they went far beyond
a mere "[affirmation of] the right[s]
of gay men, lesbians and others to
participate in Christian churches."

As every Catholic knows, homosexuals
are welcome in the Catholic Church;
but their sin is not. In my opinion,
99% of the problems with homosexuals
in the Catholic Church arises not
from the mere fact of their sexual sin
(we all sin in one way or another);
but from the fact that many homosexuals
bring privately-interpreted theologies
and a militant 'gay-rights' agenda
with them that are directly at odds
with the theology and Catechism of the
Catholic Church. St. Cronan's, by
holding what appears to be a morally-
skewed session on an 'interpretation
of Scripture' from a gay-rights angle,
appears to be promoting a similar 'gay-
rights' agenda within their diocese.

So, one of the more telling things to
come out of the affair in Phoenix was
this: Chris Carpenter (one of the
priests who resigned during this
affair), appears to have tried to make
some sort of link between the issues
of 'gay rights' and 'gay outreach'
within the Catholic Church, and the
trad-movement. From the Arizona
Republic website, one may find these
following two quotations from him:

"The enforcement of church doctrine
and liturgical practice are taking
a step backward to the pre-Vatican
II era," he said, referring to the
1960s council on adapting the church
to the modern world."

"Attempting to turn back the clock
and re-create a time when the
Catholic Church enjoyed greater
authority and respect culturally is
not a realistic way to deal with
current problems and challenges."

So in this former-priest's view,
traditional liturgy and theology is
unsuitable for dealing with "current
problems and challenges." And that's
a shamefully uneducated point of view
for any priest to have, in my opinion.

But there's one more thing that came
out of all this: Alonso Saenz, one of
the seven Roman Catholic priests who
signed the 'Phoenix Declaration',
and subsequently took an extended
leave of absence from the diocese,
was given the opportunity to fill-in
for Father Fryar at the Mater
Misericordiae Mission for about a week
while he was on vacation, and offer
the Tridentine Latin Mass for our
traditional community. So in other
words, the Mater Misericordiae Mission
aggressively 'de-linked' the issue of
homosexuals within the Catholic Church
and the TLM and traditional theology;
and showed that the traditional Church
is not 'against' homosexual's mere
presence within the Roman Catholic
Church.

So, perhaps something similar can
happen within your diocese -- and trads
could perhaps invite the St. Cronan
crowd to a Tridentine Latin Mass, and
perhaps start a dialogue with them on
how the Catholic Church interprets Holy
Scripture.

It would be interesting to see if any
of the St. Cronan's crowd would
respectfully attend one of your
diocese's TLMs; and perhaps prove to
your Bishop that their main issue is
merely one of a need for a feeling of
acceptance of homosexuals within the
Catholic Church; and not one of a
anti-Catholic 'gay-rights' agenda.

Would anyone out there from St.
Cronan's like to comment?




Erick

07 January, 2008 02:11
thetimman said...

Anonymous,
the spam mail word verification keeps my email from getting robot spam; so I still find the word verification helpful. Sorry!

07 January, 2008 15:41
cmziall said...

Okay, how do we get an update on this church as far as the Archdiocese goes? I know you said Archbishop Burke had sent them a letter regarding the Advent prayer "thing" and now this! How can they be listed in the Arch. of St. Louis as a "Catholic Church" when they offer things that aren't approved by the Archbishop? Do we need to send a letter/email? ? ?

07 January, 2008 19:56
thetimman said...

I have confidence in the Archbishop to handle situations like these. I don't think there is anything wrong with a concerned Catholic advising him of his or her concerns.

07 January, 2008 21:12
Anonymous said...

Earlier, I wrote:

"But there's one more thing that came
out of all this: Alonso Saenz, one of
the seven Roman Catholic priests who
signed the 'Phoenix Declaration',
and subsequently took an extended
leave of absence from the diocese,
was given the opportunity to fill-in
for Father Fryar at the Mater
Misericordiae Mission for about a week
while he was on vacation, and offer
the Tridentine Latin Mass for our
traditional community"


This is incorrect -- there is no
evidence whatsoever that Father Alonso
Saenz ever signed the 'Phoenix Declaration', or that his taking of leave from the Phoenix Diocese was related to this issue.

The Arizona Republic newspaper wrote a
misleading article where they implied
that Father Saenz's leave was
associated with this so-called 'gay
rights' declaration. Father Saenz (along with one or two other priests)
merely happened to be taking leave at
the same time that the 'Phoenix
Declaration' problem was happening in
our diocese.

The blame and the responsibility for
misreading this article is all mine,
however, as I wasn't careful enough
to read between the lines.

My apologies to Father Saenz, the owner
of this blog, and this blog's readers!


Erick

13 January, 2008 01:05

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