I noted a while ago that there's nothing about celibate partnerships in my book because when I wrote it I didn't know anyone living that vocation. I've been trying to learn more, and one question I gnawed on for a while was the question of what made a celibate partnership different from a devoted and/or vowed friendship. On the one hand I did have the knee-jerk reaction of, "Isn't this the same thing as friendship?", but on the other hand, the celibate partnerships I'd seen did actually look … [Read more...]
“A Few Thoughts on Celibacy and Socioeconomic Status”: A Queer Calling
November 3, 2014 by
opens up a really important area of the conversation: A few weeks ago, I mentioned that I was planning to write a post on celibacy and socioeconomic status. I’ve spent considerable time trying to pull my thoughts together on this topic and have decided that I’d like to explore it in bits and pieces over time. Not much has been written on celibacy and class issues, especially from within the gay Christian blogosphere, so while I see this topic as very important I don’t intend to tackle all of it … [Read more...]
“Gay and Catholic” Book Extra: Bridal Mysticism for the Rest of Us
October 29, 2014 by
One of the biggest gaps in the book is its relative silence about prayer. There's a lot about horizontal relationships with other people--even when prayer is mentioned it's often prayer to saints, which is still a horizontal relationship although maybe a tilted one--but not much about the vertical relationship of the human soul to God.This is why e.g. I was so struck by St Gregory of Nyssa's discussion of virginity: For him the vertical relationship is overwhelming, and horizontal … [Read more...]
“Gays, the Church–and forgotten love”: I’m in the New York Post
October 29, 2014 by
for those who don't immediately claw out their eyeballs upon reading the word "Synod": Is there a place for gay people in the Catholic Church?This month, 253 Catholic leaders, including heads of national bishops’ conferences, heads of the Eastern Catholic churches and lay married couples, met at the Vatican to discuss how the church can better support and guide families.This first meeting of the “Extraordinary Synod on the Family” discussed tough issues like cohabitation and divorce. It … [Read more...]
Three Gay Catholic Links
October 20, 2014 by
EVERYBODY'S DOING IT.First, I'm in Brazil's Gazeta do Povo. If you can read Portuguese you can get my basic shtik in a whole new language!Second, Slate has another thoughtful piece on celibate gay Catholics up, which extensively quotes my friend Ron Belgau:At the end of October, the University of Notre Dame will host a two-day conference bearing a name that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago. “Gay in Christ” will feature Catholic speakers who self-identify as gay and les … [Read more...]
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