*Correction, April 20, 2017: This post originally mischaracterized the Church’s policy around permanent deacons and marriage. But as an entry in Human Sexuality in the Catholic Tradition points out, “Christian faith proclaims its deepest truth in paradoxes.” The contemporary church’s greatest paradox may be that its positions of authority continue to be heavily represented by people it declares “ objectively disordered.” And it certainly is baffling for the gay priests who battle cognitive dissonance. “They live in a church with a very hardline policy on homosexuals, yet they realize they’re drawing from that population well beyond its presence in society, by default.”Ī paradox of this magnitude seems baffling. “Bishops are caught in the middle and running scared,” priest-theologian Richard McBrien told reporter Jason Berry in his book Lead Us Not Into Temptation. In doing so, the hierarchy has contributed to a phenomenon it would rather have people ignore: Rigid policies on homosexuality and clerical celibacy have inadvertently driven many gay men toward the priesthood. The church also continues to rely on clerical structures that were influenced by social and economic conditions from the Middle Ages.
For the most part, the church continues to downplay shifting cultural contexts in favor of adhering to sexual renunciation laws developed by ancient eschatological communities and desert ascetics responding to an uncertain world. Rather, the gaying of the priesthood denotes a complex phenomenon that makes many people uncomfortable, an example of sexual regulations producing unintended consequences. And most Catholic priests are psychologically well-adjusted and satisfied with their lives and occupation.
Though other denominations have shown that women, married men, and sexually-active LGBTQ people can be entirely competent as pastors, for centuries the Catholic Church’s model of relying on single, sexually-abstinent men has generally served the institution well. A large percentage of priests being gay doesn’t automatically equate to a crisis or indicate that church teaching should change. Because the church denounces all gay sex, some devout gay men pursue the celibate priesthood as a self-incentive to avoid sex with men, which can help them circumvent perceived damnation.īut just because some church officials would like to see fewer gay priests doesn’t mean that a change in discipline would benefit the institution.
By continuing to disqualify women and married men, the priesthood attracts men who desire to forgo sex for the rest of their lives in an attempt to get closer to God.
While doing research for my book The Sex Effect, I came across many scholars who suggested that preventing priests from marrying altered the makeup of the priesthood over time, unintentionally providing a shelter for some devout gay men to hide their sexual orientation. But the speculators ignored one interesting point: Opening the priesthood to married men would probably reduce the high percentage of priests who are gay. Since there’s no evidence that church practice will actually change, reactions to Francis’ comments were premature. Adapted from The Sex Effect: Baring Our Complicated Relationship With Sex, out now from Sourcebooks.īack in March, Pope Francis sparked a wave of headlines when he hinted at the possibility of ordaining married men as priests.