Tag: nuns

The Church Is A Lady

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Mary Valle: Paul Vitello reports in the New York Times about the new, invasive screening of prospective priests, which is aimed at sorting out the pedophiles and those who identify as homosexual people. The reason for rejection of possible mature, celibate (but homosexual) candidates? The church’s view of marriage. While sisters become Brides of Christ (their silver wedding rings were always an object of great fascination to Catholic schoolchildren), priests on the other hand, marry the church. The church is a lady. Therefore, all celibate priests must be heterosexual, or at least good at pretending that they are. The would-be priests are also quizzed on their fondness for “cold showers” and “long runs.” Vitello notes that one of the most successful vocation directors in the country has only three to five seminarians a year, a number that will surely decline with the new guidelines. If numbers of the faithful decline accordingly, perhaps this story could be used as a litmus test to identify possible new members of the Mystical Body. “Does this article turn you on?” Continue Reading →

Virgins and Whores

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Mary Valle: Nick Kristof continues his “nuns rock!” crusade to convince everyone that it’s not all Catholics that are like that. Just some. Point taken, Mr. Krisof, but this good Catholics/bad Catholics line of thinking is a little worrisome. It’s like “No, you’re not a slut, you’re a real woman,” or “There are black people, and there are niggers,” or “You can be gay as long as you’re not, like, flamboyant.” I agree with him: there are a lot of great people truly doing the Lord’s work under the huge tent that is the Roman Catholic Church. And not everyone’s molesting kids and lying about it. But I think he might be glossing over some stuff in his zeal to prop up the “little ladies” as examples of the “right” kinds of Catholics, an effort which, in itself, is a bit patronizing. Continue Reading →