Word: priesting
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...William Hart McNichols is gay. He is also a Roman Catholic priest in Taos, N.M. There is no paradox there, according to church teachings. Technically, it is homosexual activity--not the orientation--that is considered sinful. Nevertheless, McNichols will surely get hate mail and risk losing his ability to minister by stating his sexuality in the pages of this magazine. He has said it publicly before, so he knows. "Talking to you," he told me last week, "is just as scary as the first time I came out to anyone. But you can't go through life hiding...
McNichols, 52, sounds weary when he says this, not righteous. After 23 years as a Jesuit priest, he remains deeply loyal to the church. He is a painter, among the most famous creators of Christian iconic images in the world. He has a parish that he speaks about with so much awe, it strains the imagination. And he is enraged by the notion of priests preying on children. But he says he cannot stay silent while all gay priests are blamed for such crimes. "This is an extremely dangerous moment," he says quietly...
...setback for victims came on Friday when the Boston Archdiocese rejected a $20 million to $30 million settlement it had reached in March with victims of defrocked priest John Geoghan. Courts had not yet approved the deal, which would have awarded 86 victims up to $300,000 each. This marked the first time the archdiocese's finance council had gone against the professed wishes of Bernard Cardinal Law. Even if the plaintiffs go on to sue and win in civil court, Massachusetts law restricts the maximum payout from a nonprofit organization to $20,000 per victim. If the archdiocese...
Tuesday, Cardinal Bernard F. Law ’53 began a civil deposition in Suffolk County courthouse regarding, among other things, a settlement that his Financial Council refused to accept between several church officals, including Law, and 86 victims of priest John J. Geoghan. This disturbing refusal completely disregards the archdiocese’s responsibility to compensate those who were sexually abused by Geoghan—especially after Law reassigned him to parishes several times after he was a known child molester. While it is impossible to replace these victims’ damaged childhoods, a financial settlement both acknowledges...
...frank discussion of sexual morality, celibacy, women priests or homosexuality, it's not likely to happen anytime soon. The usual diversions designed to avoid these subjects were thrown about with abandon. This is a purely American problem, some church spokesmen argued, as if scandals weren't exploding elsewhere: an ABC News report charged the Vatican itself with covering up abuse claims against a priest previously praised by the Pope. Then there was the scapegoating of gays. Equating homosexuality with child abuse is one of the oldest slanders there is--but this church didn't hesitate to invoke it to deflect...