Monday Male Beauty

Meanwhile, the Church Scrapes the Bottom of the Barrel for Priests

Maybe it is because gays no longer need to hide within the priesthood, or maybe it's because more and more young Catholics recognize the hypocrisy, corruption and rot at the heart of the Church's leadership, but whatever the cause, the Roman Catholic Church is desperate for priests and is now importing priests form Africa among other places to fill the void. From my experience growing up Catholic, the vast majority of Catholic priests have no clue whatsoever on issues faced by modern American families or the strains experienced by married couples with families. Instead, they think they have it tough living with a housekeeper, possessing more funds to spend upon themselves than most married men, and having church women kiss their asses and look after them. And that's priests born and raised in the USA. Now, because nearly no one wants to go into the priesthood and because the Church excludes woman, married men and normal gays, the Church has resorted to importing foreign born and raised priests who will be even less competent to counsel their American parishioners. One can only hope that in time this type of idiocy will be the harbinger of further declines in Catholic Church membership - loss of members and money are the only thing that registers with the Vatican. Would that the Episcopal and Lutheran Churches would begin a marketing campaign to disaffected Catholics. Here are highlights from the New York Times on the importation of priests:

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Father Oneko [from Kenya] is part of a wave of Roman Catholic priests from Africa, Asia and Latin America who have been recruited to fill empty pulpits in parishes across America. They arrive knowing how to celebrate Mass, anoint the sick and baptize babies. But few are prepared for the challenges of being a pastor in America.

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Father Oneko, 46, had never counseled parishioners like those he found here at St. Michael the Archangel Catholic Church. . . . . To the volunteers at St. Michael’s, it was clear that Father Oneko was out of his element in many ways.

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In fact, the flow of priests from the developing world to Europe and the United States amounts to a brain drain: most of those developing countries have far fewer priests in proportion to Roman Catholics than the United States does. Father Oneko’s situation in Kenya, serving 12 parishes simultaneously, was not unusual.

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Father Oneko arrived at St. Michael’s on the heels of a Nigerian priest who had been helping out temporarily. Father Oneko said he was unnerved to hear that the Nigerian had not been a resounding success. Parishioners complained that they could not understand his accent.

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He did not tell the parishioners that in Kenya and Jamaica, he had been a charismatic Catholic, participating in faith healings and leading Masses with spirited singing and clapping that lasted for hours.

Pope Continues Anti-Gay Jihad

The Nazi Pope, Benedict XVI (pictured at left saluting Hitler) , is continuing his anti-gay jihad this time working to interfere with the civil laws of Spain which has abandoned the 13th century level of knowledge and Thomist "natural law" so popular with the Pope and the other nasty, bitter old queens within the Roman Catholic Church hierarchy. In my view, if Benedict wants to restrict scientific/medical knowledge of sexual orientation to a 13th century level, he should be consistent and refuse any medical treatments not in vogue at that point in history. With any luck, we'd be rid of the old geezer in no time. I know that I am harsh with the Catholic Church, but I believe that in its current form and with its current leadership, it is in many ways a force for evil in the world today. Here are some highlights from the Washington Post's story on the Catholic Church's latest efforts to deprive segments of Spanish society from civil legal rights:

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Hundreds of thousands of people attended a Mass in central Madrid on Sunday designed to promote traditional family values in a predominantly Roman Catholic country that has legalized gay marriage and made it easier for people to divorce. The service started with a message from Pope Benedict XVI, who urged Spanish Catholics to keep their families strong. . . . . The archbishop of Madrid, Antonio Maria Rouco Varela, added: "the future of humanity depends on the family, the Christian family."

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Spain's Socialist government has angered the church by legalizing gay marriage, making it easy for people to divorce and instituting a public school course in which children learn about homosexuality and same-sex marriages. It is also considering easing Spain's restrictive abortion law.

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A similar Mass and rally were held at this time last year in the same square, and organizers put attendance at well over a million. Then, bishops criticized the Spanish government over its social policies but this time there were no such remarks.

Final Sunday Male Beauty

Lizard Pope

This photo via Pam's House Blend was just too good to pass up. Frequent readers know that I hold Benedict XVI in extremely low regard as both a fraud, hypocrite and one who has utterly failed to punish bishops and cardinals who enabled and/or covered up the sexual abuse of minors. Benedict XVI has no moral standing to pretend to give moral guidance to anyone.

And as Pam noted: The Prada Papa Ratzi opens his trap again, and the homophobia stinks like trash piled up during a NYC garbage strike.

Milk the Movie

A reader wrote "We saw the movie "Milk" on Christmas Day, and we hope that many, many people will see it, especially the young people. Inspiring! It has to help the cause! Did you write about it? I may have missed a post..."

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Actually, I did see the movie and thought it was wonderful and a "must see" not only for LGBT Americans, but for everyone. I was very moved and will confess that at times I felt myself tearing up. It was at the LGBT Blogger Summit on December 5-7, 2008, that the boyfriend and I had the unique opportunity of seeing a special screening of the movie Milk and then engaging in a panel discussion session where Cleve Jones (one of Harvey Milk's fellow activists), Dustin Lance Black (the screen writer) and Bruce Cohen (the producer) took questions from the audience. The movie is now playing in Norfolk and we intend to see the movie again. As indicated in my post at the time:

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One message that I took away from the whole experience - not to mention specific portions of the movie itself - was that LGBT citizens need to come out of the closet and live openly. The fastest way to dispel the lies put out by our enemies is to allow friends and neighbors to come to realize that we - their doctors, lawyers, fellow business owners, etc. - are just like everyone else save and except who we fall in love with.

More Sunday Male Beauty

A Look Back at Senator John Warner

John Warner - who I got to meet a number of times during my incarnation as a Republican - is leaving the U.S. Senate next month after serving 30 years (he will be replaced by Democrat Mark Warner who is not related to him). Warner is perhaps one of the last Republicans that symbolizes what the GOP used to be about before the lunatic "Christian" Right obtained a strangle hold on the Party. Warner was never loved by the Christianist set, but enjoyed high approval ratings by moderates and independents - the keys to winning elections. Moreover, Warner never bought into the anti-gay wedge issues that have become the hallmark of today's GOP and voted against the Federal Marriage Amendment, albeit on technical issues, to the horror of the Christianists. Warner has also been pro-choice, supported embryonic stem cell research, and on June 15, 2004, was among the minority of his party to vote to expand hate crimes laws to include sexual orientation as a protected category. Here are some highlights from the Virginian Pilot on Warner's career:

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Work and luck and sometimes a dash of bluster have sustained Warner through a political career that spans four decades, the terms of seven presidents, six other Virginia senators and 11 governors. A second-choice nominee after the Republican Party’s original candidate died in a plane crash, Warner won his seat in 1978 by the narrowest margin in Virginia history. But when he retires next month at 81, he will have cast more Senate votes – 10,728 – and received more votes – 5.36 million in five elections – than any other Virginian.

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In 2006, as the Senate headed toward a partisan showdown over judicial appointments, Warner joined a moderate “gang of 14” senators who brokered a deal to secure confirmation of several controversial GOP nominees but preserved the Democrats’ right to use Senate rules to block others.

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Independence has been central to Warner’s own Senate career, sometimes imperiling him. He was personally and politically close to Ronald Reagan, but infuriated Reaganites by refusing in 1987 to back Reagan nominee Robert Bork for the Supreme Court. In 1994, he effectively threw Virginia’s other Senate seat to the Democrats, refusing to back Republican nominee and Iran-Contra figure Oliver North. Incumbent Chuck Robb won the race.

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More recently, Warner showed his independence by backing a package of state tax hikes championed in 2004 by then-Gov. Mark Warner, the man who will succeed him next month. “I remember the day he came to Richmond” to deliver his endorsement, Mark Warner said. “He just said, 'Mark, I think I’m going to come down and say a few things.’ … That was the day he got up, as only John Warner could do, and said: 'Politics be damned. ’ It’s time to put Virginia first.”

Virginia's Split Personality Towards Gays

Living in a state that had a sodomy statue until 2003 and which otherwise has some of the most anti-gay laws in the nation - Arkansas may now be worse with it's new anti-gay adoption law - is often not easy. One finds them self frequently encountering bigotry - even at the hands of some judges who are supposed to be unbiased even in matters of sexual orientation under the Canons of Judicial Conduct. In contrast to this nasty legal reality, one does encounter open and accepting people. My experiences over the holidays to date is a case in point.

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The boyfriend is somewhat the social butterfly and we have been to a number of dinner parties at the homes of his friends - in some cases as the only non-family members - and in every instance we have been accepted as a couple and no one has had a second thought about the fact that we are gay. Last night for instance, I had a wonderful conversation with a member of the House of Delegates who has a progressive track record at a dinner party and the experience was light years away from the hate and homophobia that prevails in the minds of other members of that legislative body.

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What is the defining difference? I believe that one is that all of the people we have encountered are well educated - religious bigotry and anti-gay attitudes correlate with lower education levels. The second is that all of these people know gays socially and/or in the professional realm and know that we are "just like them." The message to be learned? That it is ever so important for gays of all walks of life to be "out" and open about who they are. Being out and living your life openly is our most powerful weapon against those who would seek to marginalize us. Yes, it is scary at times and not without challenges, but it is something that we all need to do to the maximum extent practicable.

Sunday Male Beauty