A bishop has called for the ouster of
gay priests following a report claiming that the Roman Catholic
Church covered up child abuse by some 300 priests in Pennsylvania.
The grand jury report found that more
than 1,000 children were abused by more than 300 “predator
priests.”
“Priests were raping little boys and
girls, and the men of God who were responsible for them not only did
nothing; they hid it all,” the grand jury report states. “For
decades, Monsignors, auxiliary bishops, bishops, archbishops,
cardinals have mostly been protected; many, including some named in
this report, have been promoted.”
The report details clergy sexual abuse
dating back to 1947 in six dioceses of Pennsylvania. While most of
the instances of abuse were too old to be prosecuted, two priests are
facing charges.
Robert Morlino, the 71-year-old bishop
of the Diocese of Madison, Wisconsin responded to the grand jury's
finding by calling for the ouster of gay priests.
“There has been a great deal of
effort to keep separate acts which fall under the category of
now-culturally-acceptable acts of homosexuality from the
publicly-deplorable acts of paedophilia,” Morlino said in a letter
published in the Madison Catholic Herald.
“It is time to admit that there is a
homosexual subculture within the hierarchy of the Catholic Church
that is wreaking great devastation in the vineyard of the Lord. The
Church’s teaching is clear that the homosexual inclination is not
in itself sinful, but it is intrinsically disordered in a way that
renders any man stably afflicted by it unfit to be a priest. And the
decision to act upon this disordered inclination is a sin so grave
that it cries out to heaven for vengeance, especially when it
involves preying upon the young or the vulnerable,” he
added.