A chara, - According to Fr Peter O'Callaghan (August 17th), "the traditional Catholic moral evaluation of homosexual acts is based on sacred scripture and constant tradition and does not depend on any of the diverse psychological theories of homosexuality." Oh dear! Here we go again. Catholicism turning its back on science and deciding that it knows best. Like when it said the world was flat. Or that the sun revolves around the earth. Or when it rejected democracy in favour of the divine right of kings. Or when early 19th-century popes insisted that slavery was justified in the bible. Or when it thought that women were men's inferior, a wife in effect her husband's property.
That blinkered perspective let the Church destroy the lives of countless people - Jews, Cathars, Protestants murdered in inquisitions. (Not that Protestants were any better, as St Oliver Plunkett found out!) It even produced the bizarre mass murder of tens of thousands (some historians think perhaps hundreds of thousands) of women, many midwives, in the middle ages because a couple of clerical nutcases (some later canonised) thought that the world was being overrun by "incubi" (devils with 12-inch, icicle-shaped penises who were scurrying around Europe supposedly impregnating women and producing devils' children). For almost 2,000 years, by choosing to sideline other independent sources of information and relying solely on "sacred scripture and constant tradition" the Church has continually managed to make a complete ass of itself.
To his credit, the current Holy Father has publicly apologised for the Church's treatment of Jews and women. No doubt in 50 or 100 years another pope will find himself apologising for the Church's treatment of homosexuals, including many in its own priesthood. Some years ago, a senior church figure told me that he reckoned 40 per cent of all Irish priests are homosexual. Even one recent pope was widely rumoured within the Church to be a homosexual. He had to publicly deny it.
"Sacred scripture and tradition" have been wrong countless times. They aren't even constant. Scripture is regularly reinterpreted in the light of new discoveries; thanks to science discovering everything from the shape of the earth to evolution, Genesis is interpreted in a new light. St Paul's views of a woman's role vis-a-vis her husband are rarely quoted in marriage ceremonies any more. No Catholic is required to obey the bible's dietary rules on pork or shellfish. Or modes of dress. And, as academic studies have shown, both Catholicism and the Orthodox churches tolerated same-sex-unions blessed in churches for centuries.
Catholicism has a choice. It can keep driving down its narrow-minded cul de sac on homosexuality, alongside Rev Ian Paisley and American fundamentalist Christians, some of whom regard Jews, Blacks and we Catholics as just as "inferior" or "immoral" as homosexuals. Or, like it did on the flat earth, slavery and the divine right of kings, it can realise eventually that other God-created humans may be able to give a better insight into the workings of God's creation than mere Church-interpreted scripture and tradition alone. As that senior churchman told me, "the Church is usually a generation or two behind. But we get there in the end, don't we?" Here's hoping! - Is mise,
Jim Duffy, Old County Road, Crumlin, Dublin 12.