Cardinal O'Brien has exposed Vatican dishonesty on celibacy

[malaise]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/andrewbrown/2013/mar/04/cardinal-obrien-vatican-dishonesty-celibacy
<snip>
The fall of Keith O'Brien is more than just the humiliation of a proud and lonely man – a humiliation certain to be prolonged by the apparent dishonesty of his partial confession. It is also a further suggestion that the discipline of celibacy can't much longer be maintained for the vast majority of the Catholic priesthood.

The problem is neither with the doctrine itself, nor with the morals of the surviving world, but in their interplay, which tends to force a kind of fundamentalism on the church – using the definition of Peter Herriot, a retired psychologist at City University. He told a seminar at the British Academy last week that fundamentalists "have a dominant social identity as believers … central to their self-concept, whereas personal identity is peripheral … ensuring that conformity, maintaining strict boundaries and stereotyping outsiders … meet their needs for meaning, self-esteem and affiliation in a threatening world. Fundamentalist leaders use narratives based on powerful traditional symbols and myths which define and reinforce this unique social identity."

There are no official statistics – obviously – on the extent to which this gap has been filled by gay men, nor on how many of those are celibate. But informed Catholic observers agree that the number is high, and that there is a profoundly unhealthy culture of pretence within the priesthood. When the HIV/Aids epidemic first hit the US in the 1980s, the death rate among the Catholic priesthood was three times the national average.

All these facts have been known for years to anyone who cares to think about the problem. It is the great misfortune of the Catholic church that it contains powerful men who are determined not to think about the problem, and who seem to believe, in fact, that their own sanity depends on refusing to admit reality. That cannot end well. In the case of O'Brien, it has already ended badly.

[RC]

1. Our sex drive is a strong one. To deny it, to push it down out of sight, is to corrupt it.

It will emerge in many different ways, usually perverted and harmful to all concerned.

There is really no real logical reason why priests cannot and should not be able to marry. The same applies to nuns.

[Bluenorthwest]

2. Dishonesty is such a kind word for aggressive dulicity delivered with hate filled hypocrisy.

O'Brien attacked LGBT people so viciously just last year he was Stonewall UK's 'Bigot of the Year'. Meanwhile, he's putting the moves on his male students.
Of course they told him not to vote in the conclave but Mahoney is going in spite of his horrific actions still coming to light. More duplicity and hypocrisy.