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Gerard Manley Hopkins was "Gay"...

And Other Stunning Revelations at Catholic Homosexual Conference

BY NICHOLAS OWEN

"At Work in the Vineyard -- Planting, Nurturing, Harvesting" was the theme of this year's conference of the National Association of Catholic Diocesan Lesbian and Gay Ministries, held September 22-25. Participants of the conference, held at the San Jose Hilton, were "out and proud,"with priests admitting their homosexuality and attendees railing against upcoming seminary visits and the approval by Pope Benedict XVI of a document that, some reports have said, would ban homosexuals from the priesthood. San Jose' s Bishop Patrick McGrath gave a welcoming speech on the opening night of the conference.

Although the Hilton ballroom was set up to accommodate 200 people, most tables were only about half full during the Friday and Saturday morning plenary sessions, and seminar attendance in second-floor conference rooms was sparse. Most attendees were middle-aged to elderly, with only a few young adults. At the front of the ballroom was a speaker's podium draped in muted rainbow plaid fabric. A "meditation room," without the Blessed Sacrament, was set up on the second floor where the seminars were held.

Display tables were similarly meager. In addition to the National Association, other organizations had displays or offered literature. Copies of OutNow, a Bay Area homosexual newsmagazine containing advertise ments for bath houses and XXX "gay" videos, were free for the taking at the registration table. A small conference "bookstore" offered an icon of "St. Harvey Milk," San Francisco's first openly "gay" supervisor, who was gunned down in 1978, as well as books titled, Transgendered Theology, Ministry and Communities of Faith; How the Homosexuals Saved Civilization; The Invention of Sodomy in Christian Theology; and Religion is a Queer Thing.

The events of Friday, September 23 commenced with opening prayers and brief remarks by Father James Schexnayder. Schexnayder, who co-founded the National Association in 1994 and was a principal author of the U.S. bishops' document, Always Our Children, is known nationally for promoting "ministries with" (not to or for) homosexuals in Catholic chanc eries, parishes, and schools. The speaker for the plenary session was John Coleman, a Jesuit priest who is the Charles Casassa Professor of Social Values at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles.

Dressed in business attire, Coleman began his speech by stating bluntly, "I am, simultaneously, a gay man, a professional sociologist, and an ordained priest of the Roman Catholic Church. Not surprisingly, these different, even conflicting roles and their expectations sometimes cause me to experience intense cognitive dissonance."

"Cognitive dissonance," explained Coleman, "is a term that social psychol ogists and sociologists use to refer to role, norm, and expectation conflicts because of holding different and competing, and sometimes somewhat conflicting, statuses and roles." As examples, he cited "a multimillionaire African-American Republican" and "a Mexican-American immigration official."

Coleman said his talk would examine evidence of cognitive dissonance among Church members, "including straight church members," resulting from the "universal love and outreach of Jesus to all, even sinners, versus a sense that homosexuality, if practiced, is against the teachings of Christianity."

Coleman addressed ways people deal with cognitive dissonance between homosexual practice and religion. These include homosexuals denying their orientation; in this context, Coleman mentioned Courage, a Catholic group founded by Father John Harvey that helps homosexuals live chastely according to the teachings of the Church. Such groups, according to Coleman, try to convert homosexuals or deny evidence by saying homosexuality is a choice; it is not genetic but comes from bad influences, even Satan. Coleman said another way people deal with their cognitive dissonance is by integrating their identities. "This," said Coleman, "will lead to something new [and] for some, an oxymoron: a GLBT practicing Christian [and] practicing homosexual or, for straights in the church, new, often disturbing, inner church questions: Can you ordain them? Can you have holy union ceremonies?"

The majority of Coleman's speech examined various sociological studies. For a complete text of his talk and study citations, see www.nacdlgm.org/0905coleman.pdf.

Coleman advised listeners to support same-sex support groups which re-affirm "positive identities" and move quietly but firmly forward in building de-facto homosexual-affirming congregations, adding, "the data on Catholics show they could be receptive to a strategy of gay-affirming congregations," he said.

"And lastly, personalize," said Coleman. "The Church is personal, so the solution must also be."

Coleman entertained questions from the audience. In response to a question from an attendee who asked how to deal with cognitive dissonance in pastoral ministers who do not affirm homosexual behavior, Coleman advised, "push them not to be in denial. So, okay, put it off in a bracket here, whether homosexual behavior is acceptable ... put a bracket there. What are you doing as part of your universal outreach to everyone? And is your behavior in any way showing pastoral concern?"

Coleman said that he had heard that the Jesuit superiors of the California province had been meeting the previous day (September 22) to discuss a "general housecleaning strategy." The Jesuits' policy, he said, is not don't ask, don't tell, but rather do ask and do tell. "You're not going to have integrated, mature sexuality, unless you process it -- and, therefore, yes ask, yes tell, yes process. Do it through with a spiritual director. Do it, if necessary, through therapy."

Manuel Fimbres, a conference speakerand member of the San Jose diocese pastoral resources committee, asked Coleman how a homosexual support group can be prevented from being seen as a proximate occasion of sin.

Coleman replied, "I suspect John Harvey would say that Courage is a support group for gays and lesbians who are celibate. Clearly, the evidence of sociology about same-sex Christian support groups tends to draw people who [do not practice celibacy] and therefore, if I was a conservative, I would say never offer them."

Coleman said that during Dignity's tenure, "there may have been some modest cruising that happened there, but I suspect that most of the people were there for other things.... But that's going to be an objection to those who say, well, the acting out, this is sinful. Then you say, 'well, if you don't find a place, in what ways do you show pastor al outreach?' And if then they go, 'silence, silence, silence,' you say, 'you're not really doing what you' re called to do.' So push the cognitive dissonance backontheir side and see what happens."

Anna Marie Franco, a marriage and family therapist from Oakland, referring to the Instrumentum on seminary visitations and the Vatican ban on even celibate "gay" priests, called them "highly insulting to our priests ... these men who've served us so well." She added that she was feeling "very rebellious" about it.

Coleman responded, "when I get cynical, I say, 'well, let's disinter Cardi nal Newman, and let's not let people read the poetry of Gerard Manley Hop kins, and let's out some of our saints.'"

Friday afternoon's seminars kicked off with one titled, "What the Laity Can Add to Magisterial Teaching on Homo sexuality," led by Dr. Jean Ponder Soto, PhD., a religious studies professor at Jesuit-run Santa Clara University.

In her talk, Ponder Soto explained that the Church has evolved from its traditional understanding of the ends of marriage -- childbearing and rearing -- to a contemporary understand ing of sexuality as an integral component of the human person. Within the context of sexual relationships, said Ponder Soto, both heterosexual and homosexual couples can progress toward spiritual perfection.

Ponder Soto discussed the concepts of "horizontal finality" and "vertical finality." Horizontal finality, wrote Ponder Soto in her seminar handout, "refers to the thing's end or purpose apart from its relationship to other things," whereas "vertical finality concerns the thrust toward greater development and growth."

"For ages," her handout continued, "sex and sexual experience was consid ered within the limited horizon of horizontal finality. The result was an under standing that the purpose of sex was for procreation, and other use that was not for this primary purpose was considered wrong, even sinful. An acknow ledgement of the vertical ends of sexual intimacy was indicated when the 'unitive' purpose of sex was recognized. For many religious traditions, this purpose of sex -- to show love and unite the couple --has become important, if not the most important factor in understanding the purpose of sex." In her talk, Ponder Soto said that the traditional notion of complementarity as masculinity and femininity is "just not really a sound reason for saying that people shouldn't be in sexually intimate homosexual relationships."

Approximately 30 people attended a Friday afternoon talk given by Father Kevin Joyce, the director of the San Jose diocese's Catholic spirituality center, SpiritSite (SpiritSite.org), titled, "Christian Mysticism for a Healthy Life."

Dressed in clerical garb, Father Joyce opened his talk by praying in Jesus' name to "help us understand more deeply your will for our lives and our ministry to gay and lesbian people." Father Joyce discussed a variety of spiritual practices, quoting early Church fathers such as Saint Irenaeus and Church doctors such as Saint Augustine. He drew heavily upon Carmelite Saint Teresa of Avila's teaching about "interior castles." In the course of his talk, Joyce said, "when homosexual persons come to us for pastoral counseling, I find that they are usually looking, above all, for guidance in integrating their sexuality with their spirituality."

Father Jim Schexnayder, a priest of the diocese of Oakland, opened Satur day morning's plenary with a plug for the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies in Religion and Ministry at the Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley. He then described a television interview he had given the previous day to San Jose's CBS TV affiliate, KPIX. When the station first aired the interview at 6:00 p.m., the newscast apparently described Schexnayder as a "gay priest" but omitted that description during the broadcast's 11:00 p.m. airing after he complained.

The priest drew laughs from conference goers as he described the circumstances of the interview. "Perhaps you might have seen the 6 [o'clock] or the 11 [o'clock] news last night on Channel 5, KPIX, who interviewed me earlier yesterday. And it might have seemed strange, what you saw. It might have seemed like, Jim Schexnayder, out at six, back in the closet at 11:00."

Schexnayder explained that by discussing the National Association's conference, as well as seminary and ordination issues, "they [the station] assumed that therefore I must be gay and announced that at 6:00 as the lead-in: a gay priest. And so I contacted them to make a point, [that] I didn't actually say that.

"Not that I'm going to get fired but that it could be very difficult for some people that they had done something that's inappropriate. So anyway, they offered to make then the clarification that I didn't actually say that, and that it was at this point that it is up to us, not the media, to decide ... if you want to come out. So, I have no problem being known as a gay man; the issue was, I'll tell people, please don't [you]."

Schexnayder then introduced a Na tional Association board member, the Melkite Greek pastor of Saint Elias the Prophet parish in San Jose, Father James Graham, who in turn introduced the morning plenary session, titled, "A Multi-Cultural Panel on the Intersec tions of Culture, Religion and Sexuality."

The panel featured moderator Manuel Fimbres, professor emeritus of San Jose State University's College of Social work and a member of the San Jose diocese's Pastoral Resources Committee for Ministry with Gays and Lesbians; Ron Estioko, a San Jose State University graduate who works with the developmentally disabled; Mark Massoud, an Arab who belongs to Father Graham's Melkite Greek church; and Chris Nunez of Holy Cross parish in Santa Cruz, a Latina who "is completing her MA in Theology [from the University of San Francisco] and plans to continue with the M.Div. program at Jesuit School of Theology in Berkeley, focusing on development of a lesbian and gay ecclesiology."

Mark Massoud declared that "there have been a lot of positive changes in the Church" during Pope John Paul II's pontificate, as evidenced by a greater grassroots acceptance of gays and lesbians in the Church. He cited statistics to buttress his point, such as a Pew Forum study that showed only 30 percent of Catholics agree that sexual orientation can be changed.

Massoud advised the audience to "seek out role models for gay youth in your parishes. Seek out role models ... who are in committed relationships, who are involved in gay and lesbian ministries. Find them out. Seek them, and learn from those people."

On Saturday afternoon, Father Jon Pedigo, pastor of Saint Julie Billiart parish in San Jose, led two sessions on youth ministry. The first, titled, "Are We Answering Questions That No One is Asking?" offered "practical ways in which individual youth and Catholic schools can talk about sexuality 'sans guilt and shame.'"

Father Pedigo began the first seminar by asking anyone who might be with the Wanderer, San Francisco Faith, or Los Angeles Mission to identify themselves. He asked that no recording devices be used because of the "current climate." (Conference organizers had posted a warning to journalists "to identify themselves and the media outlet(s) they are representing at the time of registration.... Failure to disclose media affiliation may result in violation of libel laws.")

During a workshop, participants split up into two camps and engaged in a role-play exercise simulating a youth group in order to learn how to "surface" hidden concerns or issues youth might have about homosexuality. In one group, the role-play scenario centered on a fictional 16-year-old Latino named Rafael who liked girls and displayed a "macho" demeanor, but who was still a virgin and "conflicted" about his own sexuality. According to the scenario, Rafael was molested several times by older male family members. In the other group, a woman was chosen to play the role of an 18-year-old girl who had a lesbian relative; however, the role itself was not homosexual.

In each group, the person with the "special youth" role was required to answer the questions according to the scenario given them by Father Pedigo; however, the other participants were not told the role details at the time. At the conclusion of the exercise, Father Pedigo asked if other members of each group were able to tell anything about gay issues from the answers given by the youths. In both cases, no one was able to discern the "gay connection" was with their roles. Father then revealed the details of the special roles.

The reason for the exercise, he explained, was to demonstrate that it is necessary to create opportunities for "encounter" in order to "surface" gay and lesbian issues that may be lurking beneath the surface and to provide a venue where trust is created and hospitality is present so that "stories can be honored and surfaced."

Father Pedigo also talked about what kind of church we want to be. "Do we want to be a welcoming church or a church of purification?" Mimicking Pope Benedict XVI, he quipped, "I get nervous when I hear that German accent talk about purification issues."

Kathy Michals, a teacher from the diocese of Sacramento, talked about how conservative her diocese is and wondered how to introduce homosexual subjects to her classes. One participant recalled that at Sacred Heart in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, he used "national holidays like Harvey Milk Day" to watch a video and incorporate such topics into parish life. Father Pedigo chimed in, "you could have a Cosmas and Damian Day or a Saint Sebastian Day for the S&M [sadomasochist] community."

Kevin Dincher, a member of the San Jose diocese's pastoral resources committee for ministry with gays and lesbians, led a Saturday-afternoon session, "Good Witch, Bad Witch -- When Friends of Dorothy Drop In." Approximately 14 people attended.

The thesis of Dincher's talk was that the God of Jesus Christ is not a God of scarcity, but a God of abundance, and that the Church is at its best when it is proclaiming and revealing and celebrating this abundance. One source of scarcity, according to Dincher, is the setting up of parameters which exclude people, as when someone says homosexual men should not be ordained; this causes "a scarcity of the grace of ordination. There's only so much grace of ordination to go around here ... and the good witches are the ones who fit within the parameters." One of the ways people deal with spiritual scarcity and those who are outside the parameters, said Dincher, is by telling people what their stories should be. "For instance, Courage is a ministry that says, 'okay, here is the parameter. Now, in order to be inside here, this is what your story needs to look like.'" Another way to deal with it is to push on the parameters, push on the border, and keep trying to expand them to let more people in, so that folks who were previously on the outside can now be on the inside.

"I've done quite a number of presentations for youth groups in the diocese, and they all want to know what the Church means when they say that we are 'unnatural,'" said Dincher. "So what I have to do is I have to try to push that definition of 'unnatural' as far I can so that it includes as many people as possible."

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