Don't Ask, Don't Tell

Headline in the rag -- "Vatican says sexually active homosexuals not welcome in priesthood."

Whereas sexually active heterosexuals are?

The AP writer reports -- "The Vatican says homosexuals who are sexually active or support "gay culture" are unwelcome in the priesthood unless they have overcome their homosexual tendencies for at least three years."

Excuse me?

Aren’t priest supposed to be abstinent from all sexual relations once they take the vows? The logic of the latest policy would require straights to “renounce sexual activity and support of straight culture" and to "have overcome their heterosexual tendencies for at least three years” too. Wouldn’t it?

On the issue of sex and the clergy, the Roman Catholic Church is about as silly as the Clinton administration was on its policy toward gays in the military. Remember, “Don’t ask, don’t tell”? That was precisely the policy the church had when it was (while it is?) shuffling deviant priests around instead of defrocking and prosecuting them for crimes as well as sin. And that was for pedophilia, not consensual sex among adults.

I think the problem could be, by and large, resolved if “the Vatican” (Pope Benedict XVI the dictator and his hierarchy of men who are presumably holier than the Catholic laity throughout the entire world) could accept monogamous, sexually active men and women as priests, regardless of sexual orientation. Drop the celibacy idiocy, as well as the ban against women and homosexuals in the priesthood.

Why? Because there is no more revelatory, logical, or scriptural support for limiting the priesthood to celibate, heterosexual men than there is for requiring incense, candles, statues, and vestments (let alone an algorithm for donning them). Tradition and superstition are the only impediments to moving on. Jesus (remember Him?), while telling us not to judge, said that we will know the wrong in policies and practices by the results they bring. The pedophilia scandal (did you know that girls were molested too?) was the result of the absurd, pigheaded policy in place now.