Archbishop Charles Chaput also stated that gay Catholics should also ‘live chastely’ in new rules issued after Pope Francis urged more acceptance of others
Charles Chaput, the Philadelphia archbishop, is known as one of the staunchest conservative leaders in the US Catholic church.
Catholics in Philadelphia who are divorced and civilly remarried will be welcome to accept Holy Communion – as long as they abstain from sex and live out their relationships like “brother and sister”.
New guidelines published by the conservative archbishop of Philadelphia this month also called on priests within the archdiocese to help Catholics who are attracted to people of the same sex and “find chastity very difficult”, saying such individuals should be advised to frequently seek penance. Because same-sex attraction takes “diverse forms”, the archdiocese also said that some people can still live out a vocation of heterosexual marriage with children, notwithstanding “some degree of same-sex attraction”.
The guidelines, which took effect on 1 July, come three months after Pope Francis urged bishops to be more accepting of Catholics who lived outside of the church’s social teaching and doctrine, including people who have divorced and remarried, and people in same-sex relationships. The pope’s views were published in April in a document titled Amoris Laetitia (Joy of Love), which was hailed as potentially groundbreaking. Because the document called on bishops to show greater mercy and flexibility to bring Catholics back to the church, while also calling on bishops not to veer from church doctrine, it was seen as giving both traditional and more progressively minded bishops the chance to interpret the document as they saw fit.
The Philadelphia archbishop, Charles Chaput, is known as one of the staunchest conservative leaders in the US Catholic church, a view that is reflected in the rules the archdiocese published.
John Allen, a veteran Vatican journalist, said he believed Philadelphia was among the first archdiocese to publish such rules based on its interpretation of Amoris Laetitia.
“My suspicion is that those who are inclined to a more progressive reading [of Amoris Laetitia] are not going to put out documents to say so. It will quietly be made clear to priests that it is OK under certain circumstances, for example, to allow some people to quietly come back to communion,” Allen told the Guardian. “My suspicion is that the more traditional line [adopted by some bishops] will be more public.”
Allen said that he did not think Pope Francis would be surprised by Chaput’s reading of the papal document, since he is likely aware of traditional interpretations of his document.
In its examination of homosexuality, the Philadelphia guidelines state that two people in an “active, public same-sex relationship, no matter how sincere, offer a serious counter-witness to Catholic belief, which can only produce moral confusion in the community.
“Those with predominant same-sex attractions are therefore called to struggle to live chastely for the kingdom of God. In this endeavor they have need of support, friendship and understanding if they fail,” the rules state.
But the greatest attention in the guidelines are focused on couples who are divorced and civilly remarried who have not obtained an annulment of their first marriage.
While divorced and remarried couples should be welcomed by the Catholic community, and not be seen as outside the church, the archdiocese said they are required by church teaching to refrain from all sexual intimacy.
“This applies even if they must (for the care of their children) continue to live under one roof. Undertaking to live as brother and sister is necessary for the divorced and civilly-remarried to receive reconciliation in the Sacrament of Penance, which could then open the way to the Eucharist,” the archdiocese said.
Priests are also directed to consider Catholic couples who are living together but are not married, including whether the couple have had children born in these “irregular unions”. If a priest senses that one person in the couple is reluctant to take the plunge, the archdiocese recommended trying to break up the pair.
“Often cohabiting couples refrain from making final commitments because one or both persons is seriously lacking in maturity or has other significant obstacles to entering a valid union. Here, prudence plays a vital role. Where one or another person is not capable of, or is not willing to commit to, a marriage, the pastor should urge them to separate,” the guidelines state.
If the cohabitating couple seems ready to tie the knot but is just a bit slow, the priest should encourage them to practice chastity.
“They will find this challenging, but again, with the help of grace, mastering the self is possible – and this fasting from physical intimacy is a strong element of spiritual preparation for an enduring life together,” it said.
Brian Gergely (right) was sexually abused by his priest for years. Gergely, 46, took his own life on Friday. He is pictured here with Kevin Hoover in 2003 after filing a lawsuit against the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese.
He was 10 years old, the product of a devout Catholic family that worshipped at Holy Name Catholic Church in Ebensburg.
An altar boy, Brian Gergely should have been preoccupied with the task of assisting his priest with the rites of Mass. Instead, he was consumed with the idea of escaping the monster behind the black robe who sexually abused him in the sacristy and the confessional.
“I was standing in the sacristy and he pinned me to the desk. I was just a little guy,” Gergely said during an interview in March with The Guardian, recounting the violent abuse at the hands of Monsignor Francis McCaa.
“My parents were patrons,” Gergely said. “They were going door to door raising money for the church. The community put Monsignor McCaa on a pedestal.”
As an adult, Gergely shared his story of abuse with others — from his high school biology class, where he first broke the news of his abuse, to national and international media covering the worldwide clergy sex abuse scandal.
On Friday, Gergely, 46, took his own life. He hanged himself. His father found him.
His friends, other survivors of sexual abuse and victims advocates point to the fact that his death comes just days after the state Senate voted in favor of a bill that reforms the state’s child sex crimes law.
Last week, the Senate stripped House Bill 1947 — by a 49-0 vote — of a measure that would have allowed victims of past abuse whose legal rights had expired to seek justice in the courts.
“It’s a very hopeless feeling when you are floundering and you want to have someone believe you, someone external,” said Kevin Hoover, who along with Gergely and scores of other boys at Holy Name, was abused by McCaa.
“You want to be able to go to the legal system and say this happened, help me bring these people to justice. To have those doors slam in your face when your trust has already been shattered by another system — that’s a devastating and hopeless and helpless feeling.”
In March, a grand jury report on an investigation into systemic child sex abuse of children by priests from the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese called McCaa a “monster.” Investigators found he sexually abused 15 victims between 1961 and 1985.
Gergely’s abuse began when he was 10. The abuse was still going on when he was attending Bishop Carroll High School.
“It’s the physical death of the spiritual death that was done to us,” Hoover said of his former classmate’s death. “They have environment that allow these heinous acts to occur rather than dealing with it. It leaves these damaged souls in their wake.”
House Bill 1947, which returned to the House this week for a vote of concurrence before making its way to Gov. Tom Wolf’s desk, would widely reforms the statute of limitations. It would eliminate all criminal statute of limitations for such crimes in the future and widen the civil time limits on civil actions.
But the bill no longer offers a “look-back” measure that would have allowed past victims to sue their perpetrators.
Former friend and school mate at Bishop Carroll Michele Gonsman said Gergely was certain to have looked at the measure as a last hope for other victims. Gonsman described him as a “tormented soul,” who in spite of going public with his abuse, never found peace and struggled throughout the years with drug and alcohol abuse.
“All he wanted was justice,” said Gonsman, herself a survivor of child sex abuse by a neighbor. “They decimated the bill and he struggled and struggled, and he killed himself.”
Judith Weiss Collins, a survivor of clergy sex abuse out of Allentown Diocese, said the defeat of the retroactive measure in the bill “took away all hope” for victims.
“It’s the losing the hope that is so devastating,” said Collins, who at 64, would not have benefitted from the look-back measure in the bill. “That was a hit. That was a huge blow to me.”
Collins, who was abused for seven years as a child, and again as an adult, said that while she has never been suicidal, the idea consumes the mind of most survivors.
“Talk to anyone who has been abused and the suicidal idealization is always there,” she said. “It’s just wretched … but loss of hope that is it … knowing you can’t do anything. That we can’t do anything to gain back anything that was lost.”
Gergely’s attorney, Richard Serbin, said his client had been vocal and public about his advocacy on behalf of victims. Serbin on Sunday said that while Gergely would not have personally benefitted from the retroactive measure he was motivated by a desire to help others.
“People don’t appreciate that every time a victim loses the opportunity to file a claim, you lose the opportunity to stop a child predator,” he said. “Every time a sex abuse victim loses the opportunity to remove a predator from their access to children, when we take that right away, we take away the opportunity to identify a molester. It sends the wrong message.”
Serbin said he last spoke with Gergely about 10 days ago. An Altoona-based attorney who has represented more than 300 victims of child sex abuse, said that for victims almost anything can trigger powerful memories and emotions, from a television program to a wedding at a church.
“Those triggering events can bring back the demons, the dark thoughts that they try to forget,” he said.
In the wake of the clergy sex abuse scandal out of the Boston Archdiocese, Hoover, Gergely and several others in 2005 settled a civil suit against the Altoona-Johnstown Diocese, Bishop Joseph Adamec, and former Bishop Joseph Hogan. The suit claimed the church should have known about the abuse and was negligent. Gergely and the others won their suit, but filed a release waiving future rights to claim. The retroactive measure would not have allowed him to file another claim. Hoover said it would have accomplished something else.
“We won but that doesn’t make the issues go away,” Hoover said. “It helps reduce the amount of self blame.”
Rep. Mark Rozzi, D-Berks, who spearheaded child sex crime laws reform legislation in the House, said he was heartbroken over the news about Gergely.
“This is why I’m so passionate about my legislation,” said Rozzi, himself a survivor of clergy sex abuse. “Victims of childhood sexual abuse continue to endure immeasurable pain daily. Brian’s suicide is just one example of how victims deal with their everyday struggle. Some are barely hanging on.”
Rozzi, who in the House, had pushed for retroactivity in the reform legislation, said the defeat of the retroactive measure in the bill for victims “dashed their hopes of ever having their voices heard in a court of law.”
“The removal of the retroactive statute was a devastating blow to many of these past victims,” he said. “The Senators used constitutionality as the guise for the removal of that language. That decision should be left to the PA Supreme Court to make, not Senators pretending to be justices.”
House GOP spokesman Steve Miskin said Gergely’s death was a “tragedy and terribly unspeakable that it came to that.”
“Obviously with the retroactivity there were those who believe it was unconstitutional,” he said. “That’s where we have been for a number of years. But the fact remains that the Supreme Court has never specifically decided on these cases on retroactivity. The feeling was in the House let’s get this done. Let’s give the the victims a chance. Let’s let the courts decide. The Senate obviously felt differently.”
Miskin said he could not anticipate what the House will do with the amended bill.
Marci Hamilton, a Distinguished Scholar in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania and the founder of CHILD USA, pointed out the scientific evidence that the incidence of suicide among survivors of child sex abuse is significantly higher than the general population.
“One of the most difficult aspects of dealing with the stress of statute of limitations reform in the state legislatures is the fragility and vulnerability of some of the survivors who bravely come forward,” Hamilton said. “This is heartbreaking and a warning to society that there is much at stake in denying survivors justice.”
Hamilton said the amended HB1947 “froze out” a generation of victims.
“They were informed repeatedly about the studies showing that these victims have a higher rate of suicide, PTSD, depression, and addiction,” she said. “Those are irrefutable facts. The horrific part is that the Senators did it for greedy insurance lobbyists and the corrupt bishops who covered up for all of the Brians in Pennsylvania. Worse, he is not the only survivor struggling to keep his head above water after ten years of Pennsylvania lawmakers dithering and obfuscating.”
The retroactive measure in the bill was widely defeated under the argument that reviving expired statutes of limitations violated the state’s Constitution. That argument was made several times by a handful of expert witnesses at hearings, including state Solicitor General Bruce Castor, as well as Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati, R‑Jefferson County, who introduced the amendments to the bill, including the elimination of retroactivity
Opposition to the retroactive measure was mounted largely by the Pennsylvania Catholic Conference, the insurance industry and several business lobby groups – all of which argued that the measure would be detrimental to their interests and singled them out unfairly.
Scarnati on Sunday said: “We empathize with all victims of child-sex abuse — young and old — and their families. We continue to work to provide an effective and permanent law that offers another important tool for prosecutors and protections for survivors of abuse and future victims.”
He noted that under his amendment, HB 1947 expands the criminal and civil statue of limitations for child-sex abuse survivors. The bill provides those who have been abused in the past for whom the statute of limitations has not expired the ability to sue organizations until they turn 50. Those who are abused on or after the effective date of the bill will have until age 50 to sue organizations, and beyond that time will be able to sue individuals. Survivors will also be able to sue governmental defendants, if applicable, by lowering the standard from “gross negligence” to “negligence,” meaning it is easier for survivors to seek recourse.
In a written statement, Amy Hill, spokeswoman for the conference said: “Words cannot express the sorrow that comes with the tragic loss of Brian Gergely. Brian and his family are in our prayers. We stress that help is available to all survivors of childhood sexual abuse. All 10 Pennsylvania dioceses financially cover the expenses of counseling or treatment services offered through local resources not affiliated with the Church. Anyone who is abused should immediately contact law enforcement and anyone who is struggling should contact their county’s crime victim support services office, or a group like www.MaleSurvivor.org, www.1in6.org, www.rainn.org, and others.”
Hill reiterated the details of the assistance provided by the church to sexual abuse survivors. The assistance that survivors receive through the dioceses, Hill noted, is directed by counselors and professionals independent of the church.
“We will pay for these services no matter how long ago the crime was committed and for as long as necessary,” she said.
Hamilton urged lawmakers to make reform of the statute of limitations a “non-controversial pathway to healing and justice.”
She urged the House to restore a retroactivity measure to HB1947.
More than three dozen states across the country have installed similar reforms.
“The sky has never fallen in a state that took this important step, and it won’t in Pennsylvania either,” Hamilton said.
Gonsman said she fears other victims like Gergely will succumb to the feelings of hopelessness.
“You have victims who are very fragile,” she said. “A lot of them have been following the statute of limitations reform and hanging on every word, every hearing. I know they have to be devastated.”
Hoover said he had a message for the General Assembly with regards to the reform legislation and the abuse of children: “This is terrorism. We have been terrorized and they are terrorists. They need to get strong on the church and do what is right and expand the ability for people to have a sense of justice. It’s not going to solve emotional elements but you will have sense of justice….and it’s on the record that someone believes us.”
Gergely was the son of Esther and Jerry Gergely Sr. His sister, Brenda, and brothers, Jerry Jr. and Mark, are all of Ebensburg
Gergely graduated in 1988 from Bishop Carroll High School, where he was a star running back. He received a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice from Edinboro University in 1992. He also is a graduate of the Applied Behavioral Analysis Institute of Pennsylvania and went on to pursue a career in the mental health field.
He was an advocate for victims of sexual abuse within the church, and wrote a book, “The Last Altar Boy: A Memoir,” which was in the process of being published.
Openly gay Rev. Benjamin Hutchison was forced to resign from his position in the United Methodist Church in 2015.
THE NOMINATION OF THREE OPENLY GAY MINISTERS GOES AGAINST THE UNITED METHODIST CHURCH’S RULES ON HOMOSEXUALITY.
Three ministers of United Methodist Church, Rev. Karen Oliveto, Rev. David Meredith and Rev. Frank Wulf- have been nominated for Bishop posts in the church. All three are openly gay. This development has escalated the ongoing debate taking place in the denomination over the LGBT issues. It also directly challenges the official prohibition concerning homosexuality.
The three ministers were nominated in early June as candidates for the UMC Bishop position in two dissimilar Methodist jurisdictions. This happened even as UMC’s Book of Discipline condemns homosexuality. It also bans any ordination of any self-avowed practicing homosexuals. The three gay ministers are among 54 candidates in the competition to fill 15 vacant positions as bishops. The inclusion on the ballots will be done through a number of jurisdictional elections held all over the US in the week of July 13. This is not the first instance where a gay candidate has enjoyed nomination. Wulf himself was nominated once before, as per the Executive Director of Reconciling Ministries, Matt Berryman. There is no doubt about the progressive momentum this time following the Portland-held General Conference of the United Methodist Church.
The three ministers were nominated in early June as candidates for the UMC Bishop position in two dissimilar Methodist jurisdictions. This happened even as UMC’s Book of Discipline condemns homosexuality. It also bans any ordination of any self-avowed practicing homosexuals. The three gay ministers are among 54 candidates in the competition to fill 15 vacant positions as bishops. The inclusion on the ballots will be done through a number of jurisdictional elections held all over the US in the week of July 13. This is not the first instance where a gay candidate has enjoyed nomination. Wulf himself was nominated once before, as per the Executive Director of Reconciling Ministries, Matt Berryman. There is no doubt about the progressive momentum this time following the Portland-held General Conference of the United Methodist Church.
According to Berryman, an increasing number of annual conferences are declining to comply with Book of Discipline, and open ordination to LGBT people and also the passing of resolutions which affirm God’s image in transgender people. The actions build on the pivot which was implemented at the General Conference. In the United States, the United Methodist Bishops get elected by the five jurisdictional conferences of the denomination. Similar to the international General Conference, the jurisdictional conferences usually meet at intervals of four years. Many LGBT rights advocates hold the belief that it is the ideal time- and the first time ever- that conditions are right for an LGBT candidate to be a bishop. There is an excellent chance that an LGBT bishop will be installed in the North Central Jurisdiction or the Western Jurisdiction of the church. The situation was extremely unlike even a few years ago. Even though a substantial portion of American Methodists are supportive of same-sex marriages, a conservative delegate coalition from the US and other countries have repeatedly blocked the required votes at the denominational meetings. This action stops the formalization of this sentiment in the doctrine of the church. Candidates, for their part, can nominate themselves. Many of them are nominated by other groups before the jurisdictional conferences.
Archbishop Emeritus of the Kumasi Arch Diocese Most Reverend Peter Akwasi Sarpong has taken a swipe at persons accusing the clergy especially priests of the Catholic Church of engaging in sexual intercourse indicating that it is not the worse form of sin.
In accordance with the doctrines of the church, ordained priests of the universal church are not supposed to engage in sexual acts as this could amount to flouting their vows of chastity and celibacy.
“Of course it is against their vows and it is inimical to the growth of the church. Obviously, how do you ask such a question, if it’s true would you like your priest to engage in such acts? My dear friends know that this is sinful and the priests who are doing it know that it is sinful it’s not approved by the church”, he revealed.
According to him, stealing money, oppressing people especially the poor and committing murder considered as sins of malice are worse than sexual sin which is regarded as sin of weakness.
He explained that catholic priests are human beings and are subject to any form of temptation but the focus over time has been directed at priests engaging in sex to the detriment of the others which is why it has gained prominence.
“I know that it’s not the only sin in the world, if you steal money it’s sinful, if you oppress people it’s worse than having sex. If you steal the people’s money it is worse than having sex. But there’s something about sexual abuse that attracts people and then they talk about the priest doing this the priest doing that. The priest is a human being, Judas was a priest he went and sold Jesus”
