Michael Voris, through his Church Militant organization and his YouTube channel, 'The Vortex', has recently and uncompromisingly condemned the hierarchical church not only for its failure to stem the tide of sexual abuse in the church, but for its fostering of this criminality. He traces the heinous acts of predatory clergy to a communist plot to plant gay men within seminaries in the Americas. According to Voris, the infiltration of the church began in central America and spread northward. Of course, theories of communist infiltration of the church (to 'destroy it from within') are not new, and seem to have begun in earnest during the approach of Vatican II, and certainly in its aftermath. While it is obvious that Voris has an ax to grind with the gay community ( at least the gay Catholic community, though he might point to an oxymoronic character of that syntagm) and his conspiracy theory quite incredible, his overall analysis of the crisis in the church is quite sound: Power corrupts and no crime is too large to place in its interest. Regardless, it seems that the church does not need a communist plot to undermine its mission; all we need is what we have: a callous structure, power-hungry men, and a seminary system that functions as a magnet for sexual predators.
Recent revelations continue to demonstrate that the crisis in the church is not limited to the Anglophone world; for example, the sad and disturbing news from Germany underscores the systemic metastases of sexual abuse within the body of Christ. It certainly appears that wherever the church is, there are victims of hierarchical horror. For Voris, the matter is simple: homosexuality in se has seeded the church with evil acted out in criminal predation. I am not suggesting here that Voris asserts all gay men are predators and natural-born child abusers and ephebophiles, or even that members of the LGBT community cannot be faithful Catholics; he remains clear that practice, and not nature, is the culprit ( he uses the term "sodomy" more frequently than the term "sodomite").
As a straight male, I have little insight into the gay life-style, with all its attendant issues and struggles; but as an informed Catholic (Voris might challenge that assertion as well), I have a good sense of the Catholic Tradition, and its fundamental teachings. Moreover, as a physician, I am not prepared to say anything more than what good research has already suggested: gay men are no more likely to be sexual predators than straight men, no more likely to be child abusers than straight men. The scientific literature is far less robust in matters of ephebophilia, or sexual harassment---the kind of abuse a cleric might visit upon an adult male seminarian or adolescent male involved in his church. In addition, there is no literature that suggests that gay clergy are more or less inclined to succeed in celibacy than straight clergy. Celibacy is a gift, or it is not, so it appears.
The problem with Michael Voris's posture in the matter of the crisis in the church, then, is not an intellectual one, but perhaps a political one. His critique is sound, but his hermeneutic is suspect. He and I land in much the same place regarding what must happen in the church if it is to survive, but we part company when it comes to LGBT persons and their place in the church, whether in the pews or in the rectory. The matter of sexual orientation becomes irrelevant if celibacy is a real gift, a real expression of human sexuality and personhood. If celibacy is a farce, then we are left with the irreducible teachings of the church on natural law, idolatry, marriage (to name a few). Though readers of this blog already know that I put into question the very idea of 'nature' as it appears in the Magisterium, I continue to wonder how it plays out in the lives of all Catholics, of all Christians. What is not in question, however, is the nature of evil, and evil natures. When the heinous acts of the hierarchy, whether of sexual predation or the cover-up of such acts, are reduced to political terms, ethics, and even morality go out the window. Identity politics, the worst kind of politics, is a construct whose days are numbered, and it has no role in the solution to the crisis.
To paraphrase St. Bernard of Clairvaux, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Michael Voris unfortunately plants the seed of intolerance in his politics. He might argue that a hard teaching is the first act of charity, but I would respond that a hatred of persons is never a disguised act of love. Is there room in the Magisterium for a broader idea of nature, or is that room the workshop of systematic evil? The discussion is a very Catholic one. If we do not meet all of humankind at the church's doors with the blood that issues from the side of Christ, those doors melt away, as the foundation falters, and the church falls, just as it is now falling from the hatred of the other in acts of sexual violence and the love for it on the part of those who want to hide it, call it something else, soften it, and erase its victims.
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