Should a seminary headline a homosexualist activist as a speaker?

I’ve been made aware that Theological College in Washington DC, for their “Alumni Days” coming up in October, is scheduled to have homosexualist activist Jesuit Fr. James Martin as their speaker. HERE

Theological College is the National Seminary of Catholic University of America.

Does it seem right to you that a seminary should spotlight an open promotor of a homosexualist agenda?

Screenshot…

Screen Shot 2017-09-13 at 09.43.22

I’ll grant you that a speaker might be capable of addressing more issues than just his primary focus.  But there is no way around the fact that, right now at least, when Fr. Martin’s name comes up, the first thing you think is activist for a homosexualist agenda.

I don’t get it.

If I were a bishop or an alumnus of Theological College, I’d have some questions.

What message are they trying to send?

What are they promoting by this move?

What are they teaching those seminarians?

The moderation queue is definitely ON.

About Fr. John Zuhlsdorf

Fr. Z is the guy who runs this blog. o{]:¬)
This entry was posted in Our Catholic Identity, Seminarians and Seminaries, Sin That Cries To Heaven, What are they REALLY saying?, You must be joking! and tagged , , . Bookmark the permalink.

27 Comments

  1. (X)MCCLXIII says:

    No, they should not do this. To invite a controversial speaker to an event like this is implicitly to approve of his views.

  2. catholictrad says:

    “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.” Sun-Tzu

  3. If someone addresses comments to bishops or alumni or administrators connected to TC, these questions might be appropriate:

    – Will Father Martin be telling the seminarians that not only is the Church wrong to deem same-sex attraction “disordered,” but in fact, he affirms the opposite — it is merely “differently ordered”?

    – Will Father Martin expand on that, and explain how he thinks God has positively “ordered” some people to have sexual desire for the same sex?

    – Will Father Martin explain that he deems same-sex acts to be genuine, rather than ersatz, acts of love?

  4. Phil_NL says:

    I’d say the problem is being approach from the wrong angle. As long as the speaker has a Rev. before his name, and an S.J. behind it, it’s hard to make the case stick that he’s so far out of bounds that he cannot possible be a speaker at a Catholic event. Mind you, the wisdom of inviting such a speaker is a completely other matter. But any discussion on the latter will deteriorate till it morphs into a discussion on the first point, doing damage all around.

    The logical order to address the problem is to remove the Rev. and S.J.
    But the precedent on that front is sadly far too minimal.

  5. Benedict Joseph says:

    An element has been emboldened by an episcopate that has conveniently turned a blind eye to that which demands the utmost scrutiny. There is nothing obscure about the message being sent. That is the rude reality we need to acknowledge.
    It is painful indeed.

  6. TonyO says:

    Maybe 30 or 40 years ago the top administrators at such a place might innocently think things like “the event organizers (lower administrators) are trying to do good, seeing that we need to expose our men to wider thinking, even if it has problems”, and as an institution of higher learning they innocently might might have said things like “we need to learn to dialogue even with those in error so that we can shine the light of truth all the better.”

    Ah, those innocent times.

    No more. This is not innocent. We know better now. The top administrators either DO know that this is not in pursuit of better understanding of evil in all its twisty, slimy, ugliness, or their ignorance of our current culture manifestly disqualifies them from holding offices of responsibility.
    This is not “giving all sides a chance to speak”, it is propaganda. It is wrong. Even if Fr. Martin is not going to be speaking directly about his homosexualist agenda, the reason he is being asked to speak is because he has made a name for himself with that promotion of the homosexualist agenda, and inviting him here is aiding and abetting the agenda. Whoever chose him very likely intended it as such.

    But I will make a prediction: the archbishop of Washington will not make one single move to exercise his proper role here. Even if he wanted to, the idiotic old mantra of “freedom of speech” and “academic independence” have been asserted so often that most bishops don’t even imagine themselves calling such institutions on the carpet to explain themselves. More’s the pity – at least, when the bishop himself is sound in his own theology.

  7. Frank says:

    No, such a man should most definitely not be a headline speaker at a seminary. But remember where this is taking place and the track record of the Ordinary of the Archdiocese. I believe it is reasonable to suggest that said Ordinary is not exactly known as a staunch defender of Church teachings on sexual morality. None of us knows what they are teaching in that seminary, but we can guess, and if this is any indication, then it’s not what we would hope. Of course, if the Church were still functioning as it did for the first 1,900 years or so, we wouldn’t be seeing priests, cardinals and popes running around suggesting that a sin isn’t really a sin unless it offends Gaia.

    God bless all here.
    Frank
    @txtradcatholic

  8. robtbrown says:

    There is reason why it has been referred to as Pathological College

    [I hadn’t heard that.]

  9. robtbrown says:

    TonyO says:

    Maybe 30 or 40 years ago the top administrators at such a place might innocently think things like “the event organizers (lower administrators) are trying to do good, seeing that we need to expose our men to wider thinking, even if it has problems”, and as an institution of higher learning they innocently might might have said things like “we need to learn to dialogue even with those in error so that we can shine the light of truth all the better.”

    Ah, those innocent times.

    Having experienced those times 30-40 years ago and some of those places, I can assure you they were not innocent.

    Whew, I could tell some stories . . .

  10. bibi1003 says:

    Yes, it is painful. There’s a well-orchestrated movement at work here. It’s happening in my diocese as well. Our bishop is gung ho for Fr. Martin and his “ministry.”

    A partial quote from Orwell’s “1984”:

    “…Men are women, sanity is insanity, lies are truth.”

  11. Sacred1 says:

    I once stayed at a Cistercian monastery where the monks read Fr. Martin’s works during the meal periods.

  12. ChesterFrank says:

    Doesn’t the gospel mention something about salt that looses its flavor?

  13. ChesterFrank says:

    or, lobbyist’s certainly know their craft well.

  14. mercy2013 says:

    I hope the Cardinal Newman Society is watching so that they can remove the CUA from their recommended colleges list.

  15. amg910 says:

    @mercy2013: Theological College (founded as ?Sulpician Seminary in 1917), while on the campus of The Catholic University of America, is owned and administered by priests of the Society of Saint-Sulpice (the Sulpicians). The Catholic University of America was founded by the U.S. Catholic bishops in 1887. The archbishop of Washington, DC serves as the university’s chancellor. The rector of Theological College, however, must be approved by both the president of The Catholic University of America and the archbishop of Washington.

  16. Joseph-Mary says:

    Wow, that Jesuit has one main topic to discuss and we all know what it is.

  17. Bthompson says:

    Mercy2013, just a clarification: Catholic University of America is a distinct entity from the seminary. Despite the issues way back in the day, CUA is presently very solid and, while not perfect, has been getting more and more solid since Mr Garvey took over as president (and Bishop O’Connell was no slouch himself).

    TC is a different animal entirely, run by the SS (Sulpicians that is, not Schutzstaffel). I thoroughly enjoyed and felt well equipped for priestly service by the university back when I was there; the seminary was benign neglect at best and a emotionally destructive guessing game as to what they wanted at worst.

    As for Fr Martin, even if his talk is not on his, let’s say, novel approach to morality as such, I think it is still a very poor choice to bring in someone so inherently divisive for an internal conference; were this a lecture at the University, that’s a different situation (though I’d probably still not invite him then). This is like the interview with the former TC rector that America published last year (and a classmate so eloquently rebutted): an (intended or not) slap in the face of a certain portion of the alumni and a signal to the US Church about the seminary’s intentions.

  18. amenamen says:

    Don’t worry. The Jesuit will only be commenting on liturgy.

  19. hwriggles4 says:

    I would pay money to see Fr. Martin have a debate with Daniel Mattson, Damon Owens, and a good priest who moderates a Courage chapter.

    I would think a debate like this could be done in a charitable and respectful way, and I would hope the outcome would be a wake up call for Fr. Martin.

  20. Pingback: THVRSDAY CATHOLICA EDITION | Big Pulpit

  21. KateD says:

    In a word: No.

  22. Girolamo says:

    Even if Fr. Martin doesn’t mention his favorite topic, the topic he is speaking on (“Encountering Christ”) might itself be suspect. Those seminarians might be exposed to some pretty low/pseudo-heretical Christology.

    https://christianrenaissancemovement.com/2017/09/09/the-very-bad-christology-of-fr-james-martin-s-j/

  23. PadreInProgress says:

    Dear all,
    I’m a seminarian currently studying at Theological College. I wanted to chime in to clarify a few things from the perspective of someone on the ground (from the best of my knowledge).

    First, as is typically the case when booking a well-known speaker, Fr. Martin’s appearance was planned years in advance – significantly before all the controversy developed around his recent writings, and based primarily on his reputation as a widely read author. Until recently, I believe the seminary’s hope was that since his talk dealt with a different topic, it would be best to continue as originally planned. As you may have seen, that talk has since been canceled.

    For our part, the seminarians are all well aware of everyone’s concerns about Fr. Martin. (We’re not living in a bubble!) Believe it or not, our faculty are doing an impressive job of trying to be charitable to everyone involved (including Fr. Martin) despite the amount of vitriol being tossed at them from both sides of the issue, and gratefully they’re being quite open about what’s going on.

    I know a lot of you are concerned that we get a good formation in preparation for the priesthood. Thank you for that; your prayers and support count for a great deal. Please remember that these situations are more complicated on the ground than they might appear, and that the best thing you can do for all of us is pray for our vocations and our fidelity to the Church, and – when in doubt – be charitable to everyone involved.

  24. Pingback: Theologican College (seminary) asks Jesuit Fr. James Martin to not speak at event | Fr. Z's Blog

  25. Kathleen10 says:

    Do these men realize they are emptying the church with this kind of promotion of homosexuality? When I do discuss why someone does not attend Mass anymore, this is often the reason, the child abuse scandals and this. They may not say it blatantly, but the takeaway is obviously there, people are put off by the church being overrun with homosexuals, and they aren’t going to support it. The more the church incorporates this diabolical fixation into the church, the fewer attendees they are going to have in the pews. People may talk a good PC game, but on Sunday, they aren’t going to bother to go to Mass to see the mess they can see any time they put on the TV.
    It is an outrage to have this man speak at a seminary!
    And thinking about Robtbrown’s comment, I do not know how a good and faithful seminarian gets through, or how a good and faithful priest continues. We all know now you are surrounded by these horrible men. It can’t be easy. God bless our faithful priests. Our Lady, please protect and help your sons.

  26. alansides says:

    Fr. Z.

    Have you read his book?

  27. Pingback: Asesor de la Vaticueva contraataca; critica a “ultraconservadores homofobos” de USA | FORO CATÓLICO

Comments are closed.