Edit: No one is being forced to become a priest here. There are rules and as it turns out, there are good reasons for them. In any event, things are being done to deal with this obvious problem. As with the case of David Berger, if you think you're going to get a pass on your behavior because you're witty and know about how to match the tea set with the drapes, you're sadly mistaken. Laughably, the Lutheran Communion is being cited as an example. If you want to fade into irrelevance, the way of multi-Culturalism is the way to go.
Lubeck -- The Catholic Church put a cleric on leave because of "priestly lapse". Critics speak of hypocrisy.[They can't speak about much else besides sex, so it's a slight reprieve]
The Catholic Church in Lubeck removed a homosexual Pastor from further service. [Good.] The 40-year old churchman had made his inclination known in a corresponding internet-forum.
The Masses in the little St. Vecelin Community had been since that point read by Provost Franz Mecklenfeld, because the Church had a personell problem there. Since the summer Matthias T. aged 40 has been absent.. The priest had been put on leave by Archbishop Werner Thissen. The Church does not want to hang its personell issue from the clock tower for everyone to see. The parishoners however are firing the wildest rumours into the air. "No one has been harmed, neither physically nor materially", explained the community spokesman Werner Schroeder. He would not give further information.
Matthias T. is homosexual. [Allegedly] That is in no way punishable in the Catholic Church -- so long as it remained his private affair. [Nor is this true] Homosexuals are not supposed to be priests in any case, as the Vatican has most recently declared. If their inclination, however, is discovered at first, the Church passes it over in silence-- so long as the person concerned isn't "outed". T, however was traveling a corresponding internet-forum [gayromeo.com], and had made his homosexuality known and probably cemented some contacts in the homosexual scene. On the "ultraconservative" site www.kreuz.net the controversy was discussed on the net. Critics spoke of the "prostitution of a cleric".
"It was handled like a priestly lapse", came the monosyllabic reply from the Archdiocese of Hamburg. "Our personell department is occupied with the case," said the Diocesan speaker Manfred Nielen. Since 6. Juli the cleric has been deprived of full faculties. The punitive and relevant proceedings as being speculated by the community, were not weighed against the 40 year old.
The Pastor had left Lubeck in the meantime, because he had to leave his home. Pikant: Matthias T. was employed by the Hamburger Archbishop of Lubeck as a student chaplain. The position is vacant to date. T. was also active in the confession and communion ministry for children.
"We must be responsible", explained Provost Mecklenfeld, Christian Weisner, presiding member of the people's movement "We Are Church", said in contrast: "Increasingly more gays don't want to live a double life any more, are tired of the secrecy". The double standard [sic] of the Catholic Church puts those concerned under tremendous pressure. Many clerics break down. [Lots of jobs out there besides being a priest that are better paying]
Homosexuality remains for the Catholic Church a red hankerchief. In the book just now presented in Rome the Pope is cited as saying this sentence: "It [the homosexuality] remains something, that is against whose nature is placed, what God had originally desired." According to appraisals from "We Are Church" there are at least 20 percent of all Catholic Priests who are homosexual. In the Roman Catholic Church the priests promise an unmarried state (Celibacy).
In the North Elba Evangelical Lutheran Church [NEK] homosexuality is not a hindrance either for ordination or for the carrying out of its spiritual office. Already in 1986 the NEK-Synod had spoken out against the discrimination of homosexual persons. "In the meantime there has been a number of Pastors and Pastorettes who are also living in homosexual partnerships", explained Vice Church Spokesperson, Thomas Kärst [But Lutheranism is effectively dead in Germany anyway, so why does it matter?]
By Curd Tönnemann
Link, here...
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