Jesuit Gay Mafia
Dear Toby
I want to say a bit about "the gay cabal" in the Jesuits.
In polite society we never talked about being gay. In the Church we never talked about sex.
We never talked about HIV, yet just among men that I knew in Seminary. I was just reviewing the number of men who died before the advent of protease inhibitors. There are more than a few, and the cause of their deaths will remain hidden to the world.
My late dear friend and former Jesuit, Frank Munns, once dared me to relate my experience with the “Jesuit Gay Lobby,” so in honor of Frank, here goes. I am sure that I will be treading into murky, and for some, yukky waters. I am also going to be talking in a general way about men whom you might know, or have known, or recognize, but as they say on TV crime shows, any allusion to real people or situations will be vigorously denied.
I am going to allow myself to be more vulnerable here than in the pretty forceful way that I usually address the topic of sexuality and spirituality. Maybe some might say, see, that’s why he won’t let go of the topic. But in the end I don’t think that my leaving, my struggle with sexuality and religious values is that much different from any of the other stories that emerge in conversations with other former religious and priests. It just has a different set of circumstances than most, though there will be elements that are shared across the board.
It’s an open secret that there are lots of gay men and women in the institutional church, religious orders, and hierarchy. But I find the word “lobby” very misleading. It connotes a recognized voice in the body politic, and certainly that’s the way I think of the gay democratic clubs that I’ve belonged to here in San Francisco, or groups like Marriage Equality, or the Human Rights Campaign that I actively support. However, in an organization that frowns upon same sex relationships, except perhaps the most platonic of affections, but even then numquam duo, any homosexual lobby is just a collection of people who dare not say their names. Secrecy, especially coupled with hiding, withholding information, even lies and acting out, has real consequences.
If the Gay Lobby in the Vatican or the Society has a real platform or an agenda, it has been a miserable failure. There was a rather infamous case in a Jesuit formation establishment where a gay scholastic sued the Society for harassment by some gay priests. I think they were called a “Gay Mafia.” “Traforare cosa nostra” might work better than gay lobby.
I followed the case of the gay scholastic with interest, mainly because my own experience was not very different from his. I didn’t even think of suing, nor did I receive salacious notes tucked in cards with pictures of naked men, but my treatment by the gay men with whom I shared my religious life was shoddy. And that impression remained with me over many years and through thousands of hours of “working it through”--an exploration that cost me dearly, both in failed relationships and mulla which I paid for both out of my own pocket and with my life.
.
I want to say a bit about "the gay cabal" in the Jesuits.
In polite society we never talked about being gay. In the Church we never talked about sex.
We never talked about HIV, yet just among men that I knew in Seminary. I was just reviewing the number of men who died before the advent of protease inhibitors. There are more than a few, and the cause of their deaths will remain hidden to the world.
My late dear friend and former Jesuit, Frank Munns, once dared me to relate my experience with the “Jesuit Gay Lobby,” so in honor of Frank, here goes. I am sure that I will be treading into murky, and for some, yukky waters. I am also going to be talking in a general way about men whom you might know, or have known, or recognize, but as they say on TV crime shows, any allusion to real people or situations will be vigorously denied.
I am going to allow myself to be more vulnerable here than in the pretty forceful way that I usually address the topic of sexuality and spirituality. Maybe some might say, see, that’s why he won’t let go of the topic. But in the end I don’t think that my leaving, my struggle with sexuality and religious values is that much different from any of the other stories that emerge in conversations with other former religious and priests. It just has a different set of circumstances than most, though there will be elements that are shared across the board.
It’s an open secret that there are lots of gay men and women in the institutional church, religious orders, and hierarchy. But I find the word “lobby” very misleading. It connotes a recognized voice in the body politic, and certainly that’s the way I think of the gay democratic clubs that I’ve belonged to here in San Francisco, or groups like Marriage Equality, or the Human Rights Campaign that I actively support. However, in an organization that frowns upon same sex relationships, except perhaps the most platonic of affections, but even then numquam duo, any homosexual lobby is just a collection of people who dare not say their names. Secrecy, especially coupled with hiding, withholding information, even lies and acting out, has real consequences.
If the Gay Lobby in the Vatican or the Society has a real platform or an agenda, it has been a miserable failure. There was a rather infamous case in a Jesuit formation establishment where a gay scholastic sued the Society for harassment by some gay priests. I think they were called a “Gay Mafia.” “Traforare cosa nostra” might work better than gay lobby.
I followed the case of the gay scholastic with interest, mainly because my own experience was not very different from his. I didn’t even think of suing, nor did I receive salacious notes tucked in cards with pictures of naked men, but my treatment by the gay men with whom I shared my religious life was shoddy. And that impression remained with me over many years and through thousands of hours of “working it through”--an exploration that cost me dearly, both in failed relationships and mulla which I paid for both out of my own pocket and with my life.
.
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