In my pulpit

I was born and raised as a Roman Catholic -- baptism, first communion, confirmation, altar boy, thirteen years of Catholic school. My parents were always to the left of center and disagreed with a lot of the rules, but they took us to church every week. Two of my aunts even joined the convent. I've always said I'm still Catholic, even though I haven't been to Mass in a while. This is mostly due to my parents, who always believed in working for change from within, rather than bolting. But the new witch hunt to get gays out of the seminary may be the last straw for me.

There are a thousand reasons why this is wrong, in addition to the fact that IT'S JUST WRONG. But I'm going to limit myself to 3 for now.

1) Beggars can't be choosers. There aren't enough priests as it is, so it's pretty silly to start rejecting groups of people. If you're willing to take a vow of celibacy, why does the gender of the people with whom you're not going to have sex matter? And do you have to have had intercourse with a man to lose your job, or only have thought about it -- as many men who consider themselves "straight" have? Ask a parish that is losing their church for lack of a priest and I doubt they'll care if he kissed another boy once in college. The only reason to reject and eject gay seminarians at this time is that you are trying to respond to the sex scandal (and/or you are a phobe who just got elected pope). Which brings us to point number 2...

2) Homosexuals are NOT pedophiles. This is not just my feeling on the subject. Most studies show that if and when pedophiles have adult relationships, they are with members of the opposite sex. Getting all of the gay men out of the seminary/priesthood is unlikely to help the churches problem with pedophilia. Increasing the culture of secrecy around the clergy, though, could make things worse.

3) "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness" - Genesis 1:26
Whether Anne Coulter and Benedict XVI like it or not, Catholicism says we are ALL made in God's image -- gay, straight, or otherwise. We are also all sinners. For the record, I don't believe in the concept of sinning in your thoughts -- the difference between what you think and what you do is called your conscience. For members of the thought police, it should be noted that sex outside of marriage, in any form, is a sin. So a straight seminarian not acting on heterosexual thoughts is just as guilty (if you believe in that) as a homosexual thinking about men. Regardless, we're talking about people who have confessed any prior acts and promised not to ever have sex again. There is also a bit of a disconnect between bishops playing the pedophile shell game but ejecting celibate men who have thought about having sex with other men.

In short, the only things this new policy will accomplish are:
1) Alienating any remaining homosexual Catholics
2) Worsening the culture of secrecy that spawned a scandal
3) Needlessly destroying the careers of some honorable young men
4) Depleting an already small pool of priests

I find it hard to believe such a useless plan is coming from the Divine. Wherever Pope Benedict's heavenly tuner is (staff, hat, albs), I hope he adjusts it soon.