Response to the “Big Picture on Catholic Education” has been
extremely positive! We understand the essay is making the rounds across the Boston archdiocesan hierarchy and presbyterate, as well as other dioceses and conservatives across the country. One of the topics covered in the “Big Picture”–false compassion–merits further discussion because unfortunately, you’re going to hear more stories in the coming weeks about the gay agenda advancing in Catholic schools.
ThrowtheBumsOutin2010 cited how several Catholic school teachers at Trinity Catholic in Newton (on the grounds of the same church whose parishioners marched in Boston’s Gay Pride Parade a few years back) along with a gay sex activist are representing “Catholics United,” who is pushing for unconditional admission of children of gay couples in Catholic schools. Further below we will share Cardinal Sean O’Malley’s 2005 statement about false compassion for homosexuals in its entirety, but first we’d like to feature the video referenced in our previous post by the late Archbishop Fulton Sheen, who is on the path to sainthood.
The video is divided into two parts on YouTube. Part I talks about true compassion. Archbishop Sheen says, “Compassion is a sympathy, a pity, an affinity to be wounded when others are wounded…There’s always been a right kind of compassion.”
In Part II, Archbishop Sheen talks about false compassion in a rather hard-hitting way.
False compassion which is gradually growing in this country is a pity that is shown not to the mugged, but to the mugger…There are some judges..some social workers (not all), there are sob sisters, the social slobberers who insist on compassion being shown to the mugger, dope fiend, beatnicks, prostitutes, homosexuals, punks…For that today, the decent man is practically off the reservation. This is a false compassion.”
To be fair, when he says “to the homosexuals,” he might have more appropriately said “to those persons who engage in (and continue to engage in) homosexual acts.”
Here is the Letter from Cardinal Sean O’Malley on Homosexuality, issued November 23, 2005.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
The Church’s efforts to defend the institution of marriage has been interpreted by some as an indication of the Church’s hostility toward homosexual persons. The way that the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts framed the issue is unfavorable to Catholics or others who do not oppose anyone, but rather support an institution which is the cornerstone of society.
Right from the beginning of this controversy I have called on all Catholics to rally behind the cause of marriage. It is encouraging that a number of Catholics who are homosexuals have expressed to me their conviction that marriage between a man and a woman is important for children and therefore for society.
The Church’s position is not based on an animus against people with a homosexual orientation. Each and every member of the Church is called to holiness regardless of their sexual orientation. The Church has often warned against defining people by their sexual orientation in a way that diminishes their humanity. Each person is a mystery, an irreplaceable treasure, precious in God’s eye. We are God’s creatures and in baptism we are His sons and daughters, brothers and sisters to one another.
The extreme individualism of our age is undermining the common good and fractionalizing the community. The Church wishes to call people to unity based on mutual respect and a commitment to the common good. We do not want Catholics who have a homosexual orientation to feel unwelcomed in the Catholic Church. We remind them that they are bound to us by their baptism and are called to live a life of holiness. Many homosexual persons in our Church lead holy lives and make an outstanding contribution to the life of the Church by their service, generosity and the sharing of their spiritual gifts.
We must strive to eradicate prejudices against people with a homosexual orientation. At the same time the Church must minister to all people by challenging them to obey God’s commands, the roadmap for a meaningful human life that allows us to draw near to God and to one another.
In the Gospel when the self-righteous Pharisees bring the adulteress to be stoned, Jesus says let he who is without sin cast the first stone. Then to make sure they got the point Jesus wrote their sins on the ground. The stones fell from their hands and they fled. Jesus said: “Neither do I condemn you”, but He added, “Go and sin no more.”
If we tell people that sex outside of marriage is not a sin, we are deceiving people. If they believe this untruth, a life of virtue becomes all but impossible. Jesus teaches that discipleship implies taking up the cross each day and following Him with love and courage.
It is never easy to deliver a message that calls people to make sacrifices or to do difficult things. Sometimes people want to punish the messenger. For this reason we priests at times find it difficult to articulate the Church’s teaching on sexual morality. We must never deliver the message in a self-righteous way, but rather with compassion and humility. It is important to express the moral teachings of the Church with clarity and fidelity. The Church must be Church. We must teach the truths of the Gospel in season and out of season. These recent times seem to us like it is “out of season”, but for that very reason it is even more urgent to teach the hard words of the Gospel today.
We know that friends and relatives of homosexual Catholics sometimes feel torn between their allegiance to Christ and their concern for their loved ones. I assure them that these goals are not incompatible. As Catholics we profess a firm belief in the dignity of each person and in the eternal destiny to which God calls us. Calling people to embrace the cross of discipleship, to live the commandments and at the same time assuring them that we love them as brothers and sisters can be difficult. Sometimes we are told: “If you do not accept my behavior, you do not love me.” In reality we must communicate the exact opposite: “Because we love you, we cannot accept your behavior.”
God made us to be happy forever. That true and lasting happiness is accessible only by a path of conversion. Each of us has our own struggles in responding to the call to discipleship and holiness. We are not alone. Christ promised to be with us and has given us His Church and Sacraments to help us on the road.
At every Mass we pray that beautiful prayer before the sign of peace: “Lord…look not on our sins, but on the faith of your Church and grant us the peace and unity of your kingdom.” May God grant us that grace of peace and unity.
Devotedly yours in Christ,
Seán P. O’Malley
Archbishop of Boston
False compassion–as demonstrated in the Hingham school situation by Fr. Bryan Hehir, superintendent of schools Mary Grassa O’Neill, Jack Connors, Michael Reardon and others–fails to challenge people to obey God’s commands and embrace the cross of discipleship, and it also sends a message that the lifestyle and behavior of the gay couple is to be respected and esteemed by the Catholic Church. Instead as Cardinal O’Malley wrote, we need to say, “Because we love you, we cannot accept your behavior.”
Finally, the Vatican’s own “Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions Between Homosexual Persons” authored by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in 2003 under Pope John Paul II, also cautioned about recognizing homosexual unions and making them a model in society.
11. The Church teaches that respect for homosexual persons cannot lead in any way to approval of homosexual behaviour or to legal recognition of homosexual unions. The common good requires that laws recognize, promote and protect marriage as the basis of the family, the primary unit of society. Legal recognition of homosexual unions or placing them on the same level as marriage would mean not only the approval of deviant behaviour, with the consequence of making it a model in present-day society, but would also obscure basic values which belong to the common inheritance of humanity. The Church cannot fail to defend these values, for the good of men and women and for the good of society itself.
Readers, this issue will not be going away. Everyone will need to be armed with tools and the right theological arguments to counter school principals, administrators, gay activists, as well as bishops and cardinals. If you haven’t yet read the “Big Picture” please do check it out and pass it along to your local priest, local Catholic school, and to Cardinal O’Malley via our Take Action page.
The battle is not nearly over on this issue, and is in fact just beginning.
Hopefully Cardinal O’Malley will recommend that Mary Grassa O’Neil, Jack Connors, Michael Reardon, and especially, Fr. Bryan Hehir, attend the 2010 Courage Conference to be held at the Univ. of St. Mary of the Lake,Mundelein,IL from July 29 to Aug.1.
Two years ago,Cardinal O’Malley welcomed the Courage Conference attendees when it was held at the Marian(Betania) Center in Medway,MA. The Pilot reported this event as vital to the understanding of how the Catholic Church has successfully reached out to “help homosexual persons to live in accordance with the laws of God and the teaching of His Church”(Holy See Endorses Courage). This year ,Cardinal George welcomes Courage to Mundelein,Illinois. It would be wonderful if next year the Courage Conference could be held at Boston College but this would be impossible at present because of the tremendous animosity shown to the way of Courage by the Lesbian and Gay Faculty,Staff and Administration Association at Boston College (LGGFSAA) led by the very powerful B.C.Professor of Theology,John McDargh, who developed this very influential program at Boston College as described in the Bay Windows article by Laura Kiritsy: “BC faculty band together to promote change: Out instructors seek to translate good will into policy”,June 3,2004. This organization was a follow-up to the recognition of the Allies of Boston College, as reported in Bay Windows by Laura Kiritsy:”Determined BC students get gay group recognized”,Apr. 24,2003, which states:”Boston College President Rev, William J. Leahy took a historic step April 15 by giving formal recognition to a campus gay/straight alliance(GSA). The group will be called “Alliance of Boston College.”
While John McDargh and his associates have been successful in getting support from interested leaders at Boston College, when members of Courage asked the B.C. Events Committee for approval to hold the Courage Conference on the campus of Boston College in the mid ’90s, they were told that Boston College already had an outreach program and it wasn’t Courage. Therefore, they could not have the conference on the campus. When I wrote to Fr. Leahy, as an alumna of B.C.(M.Ed. and D.ED.’89), to ask why Courage was rejected, he responded to say that there was nothing in writing to prove that. Then when I wrote and asked him if he would give approval to a Courage Conference at B.C. in writing, Fr. Leahy never answered my letter.
It would take a miracle to have a change in attitude at Boston College now that Professor of Theology at B.C., John McDargh is so firmly entrenched with his Lesbian and Gay Faculty, Staff, and Administration at Boston College. Is it possible that the influence of this organization has effected the thinking of
some of the influential people who are now advising Cardinal O’Malley on these issues? This includes the effect of the 2 practicing and promoting lesbians who are intent upon influencing the policy of the Catholic elementary schools in the Boston Archdiocese and using the press to express their anger when they can’t get their way when they are determined to put the child they have adopted into a situation that they themselves have scorned,namely, the beliefs of the Catholic Church which are supposed to be nourished in a Catholic education from the elementary level right up through the university level.
Thank you for your hard work. As a side note, the church’s position on homosexual actions is well described and defended in this article by the archbishop in charge of military chaplains:
http://www.calcatholic.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?id=aaad4553-d97b-4438-a3b9-f5abd8357486
The same sound reasoning should be employed and taught by chaplains at schools and colleges.
[...] year ago almost to the day we posted about the problem of false compassion to homosexuals. Here’s a little bit of what Cardinal Sean O’Malley said in a letter on [...]