Bill Cork evacuates from Houston

Former-Lutheran-turned-Catholic blogger Bill Cork has left his home in Houston TX and is now with friends or family in Atlanta, blogging about the latest natural disaster to assault our fellow citizens on the Gulf of Mexico.

A turn for the worse?

According to all the reports, the Vatican is preparing to forbid self-identified homosexuals from studying for or being ordained to the Catholic priesthood, even if they promise to remain celibate.

On the face of it, this is very wrongheaded.

I suppose one could make a prudential argument for serious consideration whether gay men should present themselves for a life where a) they will be living with other men in close quarters for eight years or more and then b) they will be on their own in the parish, with few opportunities for psychosocial intimacy except with members of their family or (surprise surprise) other men, adults or young adults.

But to ban "them" completely flies in the face of common sense, good judgment, and moral decency. First of all, who are "they?" Someone who has a live-in boyfriend, someone who has a wet dream every couple of months, or both?

Granted, there is a huge problem in seminaries everywhere (Protestant as well as Catholic) with a gay subculture. Seminaries, like universities, have become havens for the gay subculture, or even simply a highly charged sexual subculture with no distinctions between gay, straight, or whatever. This story on NPR tells of a man who sued the Jesuits in the late 1980s for sexual harassment after entering a seminary and finding himself receiving sexually suggestive cards, invited to gay parties, etc.

But the Vatican has to be kidding itself if they think that simply making a rule against gay men is going to work out. You have to invite people into a life of discipleship and make it possible. I knew people (faculty as well as seminarians) at seminary who were not living in compliance with Vision and Expectations, and yet there were some who were. It also begs the question: are you going to ban all egotistical, unforgiving people from the ministry as well? Because if you are, then I ought to turn in my collar too.

I'm willing to see how this plays out, but I hope I don't have to. I would rather see seminaries, non Roman Catholic as well as Roman Catholic, forming sinners in a life of obedience rather than banning sinners from the Church. The policy in V/E expecting those who self-identify as homosexuals to abstain from homosexual sexual relationships has to be enough. What it does is offers a standard. Now we need to form people to live according to the standard. That is the hard work.

Gerhard Krodel, R.I.P.

My intern supervisor had only his dissertation to complete on a doctorate of history when he started his seminary studies. His university offered him the opportunity to complete the dissertation and attain to the degree. He discussed it with Dean Krodel and President Steumpfle and said that he didn't think he could keep up with the coursework at Gettysburg AND do the dissertation, so he thought he would decline the opportunity to do the dissertation. Krodel told him:

"You vill not use us as an excuse for your failure!"

He completed the dissertation.