@CatholicCincy repudiates @JamesMartinSJ et al. homosexualist event

Vibrant Fr. Z Kudos™ to His Excellency Most Rev. Dennis M. Schurr, Archbishop of Cincinatti.

The Archbishop. sent out a note distancing the Church from an upcoming homosexualist event featuring homosexualist activists Jesuit James Martin, Sr. Jeannine Gramick (silenced by the Holy See and by her own congregation) and Jamie Manson (open lesbian writer for the Fishwrap with a coveted MDiv, tutored by the dreadful Margaret Farley).

Archbp. Schnurr wrote:

March 9, 2018

Dear Fathers and Deacons,

You may hear from some parishioners about an upcoming event at the University of Cincinnati subtitled, “A Dialogue on Faith, Catholicism, and the LGBTQ Community.” To be very clear, despite its billing, the event is in no way sponsored by, sanctioned by, or associated with the Catholic Church. In fact, one of the scheduled speakers has been ordered to not speak on behalf of the Catholic Church in the United States due to the grave error of her teaching. [Gramick] The Code of Canon Law (Can. 216) states in part that “no undertaking shall assume the name Catholic unless the consent of the competent ecclesiastical authority is given.” My permission was not sought in this case, nor would it have been given.

If you receive any media inquiries regarding this event, please direct them without comment to our Communications Department: […]
Fraternally in Christ,
Archbishop Schnurr

I think it is pretty underhanded of the organizers and the speakers at this event to do this end around of the Archdiocese.  That tells you a great deal about them, and their contempt for the Church.

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43 Comments

  1. ajf1984 says:

    When reading this post, I could not help being reminded of the conclusion of yesterday’s (O.F.) Holy Gospel: “For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come toward the light,
    so that his works might not be exposed. But whoever lives the truth comes to the light, so that his works may be clearly seen as done in God.” (John 3: 20-21).

    I would say that His Excellency has shone some Gospel Light onto this event, and the event is clearly not “done in God”!

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  3. Benedict Joseph says:

    Father I totally concur with the Archbishop’s and your estimation of this situation, but given James Martin’s hyperbolic enthusiasm for homosexualism, his unchallenged good standing within the Jesuits and his relatively recent appointment as a Vatican communication consultant does this not neutralize the well-deserved canonical rebuke Jeannine Gramick sports as a war decoration? She is certainly no less an enthusiast for immorality and perversion than the Jesuit. Why is he denied the role of social justice martyr and Gramick get all the counterintuitive accolade?
    One wonders why she was not excommunicated decades ago. Why isn’t a priest who is boldly endorsing mortal sin not expelled from the Jesuits, defrocked and excommunicated?
    Are not those who allow these individuals to continue in this obstreperous and contrarian behavior as guilty of scandal as they are?
    God reward Archbishop Schurr.

  4. Atra Dicenda, Rubra Agenda says:

    God bless this bishop, and may God protect and strengthen the backbone he has shown in this public statement.

  5. rcg says:

    Archbishop Schnurr allowed the re-opening of Holy Family Parish in Dayton as a TLM parish by the FSSP. You also know it as the home of SPORCH. For that reason alone he is always in my prayers of gratitude.

    “My permission was not sought in this case, nor would it have been given.”

    For these acts and that quote Archbishop Schnurr is hereby awarded LIKE A BOSS, with one oakleaf cluster.

  6. tamranthor says:

    God bless that fine gentleman. It is certainly refreshing when one of our prelates appears with spine intact.

    It is clear that these heretics need to label their heretical nonsense “Catholic” is because without that label, they have no platform. The non-Catholic world long ago surpassed their degeneracy, so to that world they are nothing special. What they don’t see is that they need the term “Catholic” much more than anyone in the Church needs them, and I find it sad that they persist and consider it badge of honor to be told to sit down and shut up.

    I should have thought the call to the priesthood or sisterhood would have engendered a certain amount of humility, but apparently this was not the case for these folks. They do not make it easy for us to pray for their souls.

  7. Three cheers for Archbishop Schnurr!

  8. Kevin says:

    I don’t understand why fr. Martin (small f) hasn’t been disciplined by his superior or by others. He is causing scandal.

    We need more men like Archbishop Schnurr (and Bishop Paprocki).

  9. Joy65 says:

    AMEN AMEN Archbishop. God Bless you for doing this.

  10. As a former Cincinnatian myself with close ties to the region, I’m surprised they didn’t try to have this “dialogue” at Xavier University. Then again, maybe they finally met their match in an Archbishop. He’s also pushed very hard for more vocations, and the seminary is building a new wing. Good news all around, and good for him!

  11. NBW says:

    Thanks Be to God that Archbishop Schnurr has made this public statement!!!! May the Holy Spirit inspire more bishops and cardinals to speak up against Martin the heretic.

  12. Eugene says:

    God bless the good Bishop.
    Can someone more in the know than me please tell me by what authority this errant Jesuit and apostate nun are allowed to continue to do what they do?

  13. frjim4321 says:

    Newsflash Number 1: Number of people expecting to attending the event that will alter their plans as a result of the letter of repudiation: Zero. [So what?]

    Newsflash Number 2: Other organizations who claim to be Catholic while having no official relationship to the church? ETWN and CM. [So what?]

    Newsflash Number 3: Number of people leaving the Church because of its failure to minister effectively to persons within the LGBTQetc spectrum: Almost all millenials. [Who have never been catechized because of an older generation of priests.]

  14. JustaSinner says:

    I must commend you Father, your website is AWESOME! I did not know that it was possible to put SMELLS through the internet; put you must have! Every time you mention the Three “Jay” Amigos, (Fr. Jesse, Sr. Jeanine and that Jamie writer), I swear I smell sulfur, offal, and brimstone! You must stop the humility shtick about your web skills, they are LEGION!

  15. Orlando says:

    @frjim4321…
    respectfully, news flash…
    Romans 12:2 And be not conformed to this world: but be reformed in the newness of your mind, that you may prove what is the good and the acceptable and the perfect will of God.

  16. maternalView says:

    Would you please cite your source for newsflash #3? Almost all millennials is a large number. I’m curious to read how that survey breaks out.

  17. ChrisP says:

    frjim4321

    Newsflash 4: Number of souls in your number 1 who are perilously close to perdition. Probably all.
    Newsflash 5: Number of organisations in your number 2 that ARE Catholic. All (just ask non-Catholics).
    Newsflash 6: Your number 3 is rubbish. It’s mainly mid-age crises, WASPs who’ve always had a secret thing for the Episcopalians or Uniting Church.

    The thing I can’t figure out about Fr James Martin is that he’s obviously SSA. Why doesn’t he own it publicly – he’s asking everyone else to! Be honest man!

  18. frjim4321 says:

    “The thing I can’t figure out about Fr James Martin is that he’s obviously SSA. Why doesn’t he own it publicly – he’s asking everyone else to! Be honest man!” – ChrisP

    We don’t know Father Martin’s sexuality, because he’s being obedient to his superior who has asked him not to address it publicly. So where he falls on the LGBTQetc spectrum is unknown.

    That said, the “SSA” (sic) nomenclature is depersonalizing and dehumanizing.[To give you more abbreviations: B as in B, S as in S. It is no different than the LGBTQ BS that you yourself prefer.] Do we call straight people “OSA” sufferers? The pathology frame isn’t in any way helpful for understanding human sexual experience and expression.

  19. JonPatrick says:

    frjim4321 says that most millennials are leaving the Church because we don’t cater to LGBTQetc’s.[Which is absurd. And it is insulting to millennials… that he thinks that they are that shallow and stupid.] Interesting that the mainline Protestant denominations are losing members especially millenials in even larger numbers proportionately in spite of their catering to the LGBTQ community.

    Newsflash #6: of the masses I attend the only one with a significant number of millenials in the congregation is the Sunday morning TLM where I don’t recall any homilies catering to LGBTQ issues instead just solid catholic teaching.

  20. acardnal says:

    RE frjim4321’s second newsflash point: The fact that EWTN may not have an “official relationship to the church” doesn’t seem to bother the bishops at all – except maybe the liberal ones. The bishops appear to LOVE having EWTN broadcast episcopal ordinations and installations, masses at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, the USCCB annual meetings and so on.
    The USCCB established their own network but it failed – Deo gratias.

  21. teomatteo says:

    From Fr Jim’s post above: “…Number of people leaving the Church because of its failure to minister effectively to persons of… ” That s funny because the ones in my immediate family just want to be left alone and NOT catered to- especially not by their priest. Maybe “SSA” should be replaced with: SOD (Sexual Orientation Disorder)?

  22. Discerning Altar Boy says:

    Millennials in the Church, myself included, are the most orthodox generation in decades. I’d argue for most well catechized as well, thanks to clergy such as Bishop Barron and Father Mike Schmitz who do great work in the digital age and organizations like FOCUS. We are the generation that will save the Church and the world, and we’ll do it even as our parents shrug and our grandparents condemn the “bad old days”.

  23. Southern Catholic says:

    I’m a millennial, and I can attest that I am not leaving the church over “LGBTQ and whatever other letter” issues. I have had the great pleasure of meeting Fr. Check on a couple of occasions, and I fully support Courage and their efforts.

    Also, the bishop of the Diocese of Birmingham is on the board of directors for EWTN. I believe Archbishop Chaput also served on the board of directors as well.

  24. Antonin says:

    WWSTAD? (what would St. Thomas Aquinas do?)

    Aquinas held that argument from authority is the weakest. The way to effectively engage was through the art of disputatio -we would call that dialogue today. Disputatio seems to be a lost art in our world today but if we engaged in it we could arrive at reasonable consensus

    Aquinas believed in reason – we should as well and not fear those, especially within our Church, who ask important questions around human sexuality

  25. johnnys says:

    Antonin…..no fear at all…..the questions have already been answered through Scripture and Tradition. No matter how many times you ask the question and in no matter how many ways the answer is always going to be the same. God does not change.

  26. Fr. Reader says:

    I wonder if this frjim4311 in reality is just a friend of Fr Z that has been invited to this blog to make it more interesting and to make the readers react. He does it very well.

  27. Gabriel Syme says:

    Kevin,

    I don’t understand why fr. Martin (small f) hasn’t been disciplined by his superior or by others. He is causing scandal.

    Jim Martin’s (SJ) boss is the Jesuit Superior General. I forget his name, but he is the guy who said we cant be sure of what Jesus taught because nobody recorded Him on a tape recorder. The Jesuit Superior General’s boss is the current Pope Francis, Jorge Bergoglio (SJ).

    They are all Jesuits and all similarly unfaithful to what Christ taught. It’s a chain of scandal from top to bottom.

    When I returned to the Church after years away, it was (by chance) to a Jesuit run Church. At the time,. I was quite taken by them and their (former) reputation “God’s Marines” etc.

    They still live off this former reputation and gravitas, but today largely represent a malign influence which works to undermine or confuse Church teaching.

    One might say the Jesuit Order has gone “Full Vatican II”.

  28. frjim4321 says:

    Fr. Reader, I like to think of myself as a “friend,” but I am not a “plant.”

  29. Carrie says:

    Fr. Martin has not discussed his “same/other sexual attraction,” nor is this typical for most priests. But, IF he is a homosexual (which we do not know for a fact, nor is he obliged to share), AND he is being faithful to his vow of celibacy–why does his gender attraction matter? The Church teaches that being homosexual is not a sin (and does not prevent a man or woman from serving the Church), just that being in a homosexual relationship is a sin. [A lot of people, and I include myself, think that it does matter. Since same-sex attraction is disordered, having such an attraction, if strong, raises questions about the priest’s relationship as a priest with the Church.]

    I think the hostile and un-Christian comments about Fr. Martin that I read here are more sinful, honestly. He is regarded with such a lack of basic human respect (forget about Christian love) that it’s shocking at times.

    And to the millennial readers of this blog–of course you have not left the Church. You’re here! I don’t think it’s just the LBGTQ issue that’s impacted them, however–there could be a number of reasons, including upbringing, [lack of good] catechesis, confusion (the Catholic right vs. left spin on Church teaching), lack of integrity, lack of relevance for them. Or, perhaps, rather than blaming the Church, family, or culture for a person’s departure, we might consider that God could have another spiritual path for him/her. [Outside the Church? Nope.]

  30. tamranthor says:

    “frjim4321 says”

    Did you do as Father asked, and think before you posted? I doubt it.

    The millenials who attend the Dominican TLM at my parish are the ones with all the little kids in tow. They are outbreeding and out-praying any whom you think are leaving because the Church refuses to tell homosexuals that their particular sin is A-Okay with Jesus. They have found the Truth and are sticking with Him.

    Don’t know where you think you got the numbers to dispute that. I’d say there is a mighty difference between wishful thinking on your part, and the actual, honest truth.

    May I suggest what Father often does? Go to confession. It really helps. And He will meet you there.

  31. maternalView says:

    Carrie,
    I too think it matters. True the Church today is emphasizing that SSA is in itself not a sin. Just as the temptation to overindulge alcohol or bed another’s wife is not a sin. But what is missing today is the next step which is the active effort to avoid or work to overcome even that temptation or desire. Instead we have an atmosphere being promoted that basically says “hey, you’re ok just the way you are. You don’t have to strive to overcome your inclinations.” Even to the point of saying you can’t. That is what it appears Fr. Martin is doing–he’s not challenging people to be holy. He’s confirming people in their disordered inclinations. It allows people to lust in their hearts.

    I know SSA people who think they’re ok vis-a-vis the church because they’re not actively having homosexual “sex”. They point to Fr. Martin as proof that they’re ok the way they are. But they actively promote the SSA agenda and steep themselves in the culture. Are they any different than people who do the same for abortion but never actually have an abortion?

  32. Kathleen10 says:

    @carrie, can I offer a consideration of your question, what does it matter if a priest is SSA?
    The priesthood is a spiritual fatherhood, and despite the protestations of all normalcy, it is not “normal” for a man to be sexually attracted to his own sex, nor for woman. There are often coexisting psychological realities for men and women with SSA, such as increased rates of depression, drug and alcohol use, domestic violence, etc. The suicide (or attempt rate) rate for transgender individuals, confused souls who believe they are born into the wrong sex, is 40 times greater than the average. This has remained high despite the greater acceptance and even cheerleading many SSA people experience in the culture now. Read some of what the courageous Joseph Sciambra has to say about the realities of the homosexual experience, and how it is not all as it is often portrayed, people just “loving each other”. It is often a debasing and violent experience which includes behaviors so grotesque, they are impossible to allude to here, and as described it is a bit of an obsession, for lack of a better term. The John Jay College study demonstrated that 81% of the victims of sexual abuse across decades in the church has been against adolescent and post-adolescent MALES, aged about 11 to 17. This means it is what the church refused to acknowledge, a homosexual predator priest problem, not one of “pedophilia”. There continues to be a great deal of verbal dodging on this issue, but those are the FACTS. As a Roman Catholic who loves the church, I would say it continues to be shameful how this fact has not yet been properly addressed, despite the many, many boys and young men who will suffer for a lifetime after being sexually abused by their Catholic priest or bishop, if they haven’t committed suicide, which some of them did. This makes James Martin et al all the more egregious and hard to tolerate.
    Given the accompanying realities, perhaps you can begin to see why this is totally incompatible for a religious, a priest, a bishop, a Cardinal, a pope, to be SSA.

  33. @ maternal View, very good point. There is no way a person can actively support a sin, let alone a grave, intrinsic evil and say they have no part in that sin. Oh, and doing nothing to oppose these evils is support in one degree or another. We have no time to be cowards or cave to human respect. Souls are being lost eternally and being deprived of the beaitifc vision for eternity! An eternity without God, spent in hatred and the torture of the loss of Him in His beauty, forever………God is being mocked. For what? What! It is one thing for those in the world who do not know Him, it is an awful terrifying thought for those that do, that have been charged with caring for souls and upholding truth and if you are a catholic, that is exactly what you are charged to do to one degree or another.

    May God have mercy on us. Only, I tremble at the thought of how His mercy with will be visited upon us.

  34. robtbrown says:

    Antonin says:

    The way to effectively engage was through the art of disputatio -we would call that dialogue today.

    Disputatio refers to formal debates at a medieval university. There were two kinds: Quaestiones Disputatae and Quaestiones Quodlibetales. The former refers to topics given to profs beforehand thus with prepared responses, the latter to spontaneous topics from the students.

    And the medieval quaestio is not the same as the contemporary word question. The Quaestio is a puzzle or enigma based not in skepticism but rather in wonder: How can such and such be true in light of . . . ?

  35. robtbrown says:

    Addendum: The form used in articles found in the Summa Theologiae is based on the form used in medieval disputations.

  36. robtbrown says:

    frjim4321 says:

    Newsflash Number 2: Other organizations who claim to be Catholic while having no official relationship to the church? ETWN and CM. 

    What do you mean by “official”?

    If it means juridical, then the movement of priest-perverts from one parish to another was official.

    If it refers to fidelity to Catholic doctrine, then anyone who professes Catholic doctrine has an official relationship with the Church. On the other hand, those (incl bishops and priests) who do not profess it are deficient in an official relationship.

    Newsflash Number 3: Number of people leaving the Church because of its failure to minister effectively to persons within the LGBTQetc spectrum: Almost all millenials.

    Myopic.

    You seem to have ignored those millenials joining, e.g., the East Coast Dominicans (25 in one novitiate) and the FSSP (25 entering every year).

  37. The Masked Chicken says:

    Discerning Altar Boy wrote:

    “Millennials in the Church, myself included, are the most orthodox generation in decades. I’d argue for most well catechized as well, thanks to clergy such as Bishop Barron and Father Mike Schmitz who do great work in the digital age and organizations like FOCUS. We are the generation that will save the Church and the world, and we’ll do it even as our parents shrug and our grandparents condemn the “bad old days”.”

    Sigh. A little condescending, don’t you think?

    I have noticed a tendency among some Millennials to blame many of the problems of the Church, today, on Baby Boomers. Not all Baby Boomers were drug-addled free-sex hippies. Not all Gen-Xers were corporates climbing Yuppies.

    Not a single Baby Boomer was involved in Vatican II. Many were the unwitting victims of trusting in what they were told was the Church’s new direction by priests they trusted.

    The new orthodoxy of which you claim your generation is leading the way was not started by Millennials, but, rather started by the new wave American Catholic Apologetic movement started in the late 1980’s by Baby Boomers and Gen-Xers, including many converts.

    Indeed, the mess we are in, today, is exactly because of the Millennial generation – of 1900. Without going into the complicated history, let’s just say that these were the men most involved in Vatican II and its post-implementation.

    Some Millennials think that history began in their lifetime. They should study some of the original source material to really get to see how history unfolded in the late Nineteenth and Twentieth-century Catholicism. It may make them less likely to blame a whole generation and more likely to put blame on the individuals to whom they belong.

    Sadly, I wonder if Millennial Catholics have been polled about their opinions on SSA. If I recall, the recent PEW study showed that 67% of Catholics favored same-sex unions. I wonder what the percentage among Millennials is? Surely, if they are the most orthodox, this should be low, no? Guess what, a 2017 PEW study found the following breakdown of acceptance by generation: Silent (1928-1945): 41%; Baby Boom: 56%; Gen-X: 65%; Millennial: 74%. These figures are for the generations as a whole. Still, I would bet that Millennial Catholics are, by-and-large, following suit. So, I don’t believe that Millennials are, as a group, more orthodox than prior generations. They do have access to more easily obtainable Catholic material, but social media is, to a large extent, an echo chamber where personal beliefs are reinforced, not challenged.

    To claim that a larger percentage of Millennials are orthodox compared to prior generations, when the evidence is to the contrary with regards to the generation as a whole (the percentage of those claiming to be atheists is the largest, ever) seems to be a manifestation of the Dunning-Kruger Effect.

    The Chicken

  38. robtbrown says:

    MC says,

    Indeed, the mess we are in, today, is exactly because of the Millennial generation – of 1900. Without going into the complicated history, let’s just say that these were the men most involved in Vatican II and its post-implementation.

    I agree with that, but let’s amplify it. It was the way those men reacted to the end of the by the numbers Counter Reformation Church. The orders that have had the most problems are those founded during the Counter Reformation and those areas that were most affected by Protestantism

  39. Semper Gumby says:

    Discerning Altar Boy: Good response to frjim4321. Though there is an element of overconfidence in your assertion that “We are the generation that will save the Church and the world.” No doubt you would agree that it is difficult to know the details of God’s will in this matter.

    No worries, there is something to be said for youthful exuberance.

    In his Catholic novel “Eclipse of the Sun” Michael O’Brien wrote of the complementarity of the generations. From the elderly Fr. Andre to the young boy Arrow, the men and women in this novel brought to the dramatic events of the day their own levels of faith, fortitude, and world-weariness. By the grace of God, though they sometimes had to act alone, together they achieved something remarkable.

    p.s. On a lighter note, this may help your Lenten observance:

    https://youtube.com/watch?v=Lml0D8VPf6g

  40. The Masked Chicken says:

    I think I was a little hard (even condescending) with Discerning Altar Boy. I apologize. I, too, admire his enthusiasm. I just wanted to caution a bit about making blanket statements about the older generations and I got carried away.

    The Chicken

  41. Discerning Altar Boy says:

    Sorry. I should have said that we are the generation that will restore Tradition to it’s rightful place. I think part of the issue is that millennials are the first full generation to recognize that things aren’t alright and that change is crucial.

  42. Discerning Altar Boy says:

    I should clarify what I hoped to entail the first time. Those millennials who do practice the Faith are the most orthodox and traditionally-minded subset of the Church. I’m talking about capital C CATHOLIC. I’ll concede that the New Evangelisation was created by Boomers, but there’s a reason that those good Boomers (who obviously exist in large number) looked to the youth for the future and not their malformed peers. I assure you there’s no arrogance on our end. We recognize the enormous responsibility we have in the salvation of the world. I can tell you that groups like FOCUS who use millennials to spread the Gospel trust us to recover what was lost.

  43. @ The Chicken, God love you, really. Your comments are always quite informative and helpful. While I cannot pretend it wasn’t painful to read your original reply, I bet the Discerning Altar Boy in his obvious enthusiasm and love for the Church is aware of the kindness in the correction. Your usually tempered enthusiasm is quite apparent as well.

    I am always putting my foot in my mouth and embarrassing mysef and having to correct it and apologize. If only I could do it as eloquently as you. Oh dear, that would just give me something else to be proud of…nevermind. ;) I feel your pain.

    @ discerning altar boy…if only! I hope your generation does in fact help to save us all from ourselves! Your enthusiasm brings a smile to my face.

    Anyhow, good to see Bishops calling out grave errors and standing up for truth! Keep praying!

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