Andrew Sullivan on Being Gay and Catholic

[BridgeTheGap]

Responding to a post by conservative Catholic Rod Dreher at Beliefnet, who asks why gay Catholics don't leave the church, Atlantic writer and blogger Andrew Sullivan engages Dreher in that rarest of acts: a nuanced discussion of the Catholic experience:

I wore an ACT-UP t-shirt to communion once, but that was the limit of my daring. I am not a gay Catholic at Mass. I am a Catholic. The issue of eros is trivial in the face of consecration, prayer and meditation.

I write about it because I feel a need to bear witness as a gay Christian in a painful time, but mainly because I want to argue for a civil change in civil society. But it is in no ways central to my faith. It is peripheral to the Gospels, is unmentioned in the mass, and I try to focus on the liturgy and prayer and to take in as much of the sermon as is safe for my intellectual composure.

http://www.utne.com/Spirituality/Andrew-Sullivan-on-Being-Gay-and-Catholic.aspx?utm_content=11.17.09+Spirituality&utm_campaign=Spirituality&utm_source=iPost&utm_medium=email

[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[LeftHander]

2. wow less than 6 minutes and the post attacked....

Maybe a post on CONTENT....rather than a personal attack on the source and author.

[closeupready]

6. Ignore is your friend.

:hi: :D

[La Lioness Priyanka]

8. the source and the author are salient to the comment

andrew sullivan has sold the gay community down the drain many a time and it woudl be foolish for us to think of him as one of our leaders.

he lacks honest introspection as does his writing

[joeybee12]

10. +1,000

Why anyone listens or reads the drivel this self-loathing hypocrite has to say/write is beyond me.

[rurallib]

3. Calling Bishop Tobin: Excomminicate Andrew Sullivan

[Mimosa]

25. LOL!!!!

I have no problem with the Catholic church's stances on anything they decide FOR THEMSELVES. I'm totally for freedom of religion or freedom from religion. I actually don't care what religion Andy thinks he is. Doesn't he sort of 'ick up' anything he touches?

Long ago before he had a blog he used to visit a board I was on. He was friendly with this macho but gay Clint Eastwood type MD (who later started the board I help administer). For at least 2 years when Andy started blogging he used to borrow phrases and ideas from my friend Vince. He borrowed fron Vince's original signature motto, he borrowed Vince's ideas and stances on gay issues all the time. It annoyed Vince so much he quit being pals-y with Andy. After about a year or so Andy seemed to have developed his own posting style. Which is very confused and flaky from one week to the next.

[Smarmie Doofus]

4. Why I, OTOH, am not a Catholic:

(With apologies to Bertrand Russell... though i think he'd agree with me.)

When we enshrine the irrational... we open the door to a whole host of social horrors, homophobia being only one of many ( human sacrifice, animal sacrifice, anti-science, creationism, and racism topping a very long list.)

Only reason... and it's great-grandchild, science can protect us from them.

".....not all the prayers to your god in all the years you've got left to live." ( Boys in the Band, of all places.)

I'll grant that hope, as the old adage says, may be "a better companion than fear". But reason, Andrew, is more powerful..... and and a better "companion" than belief.


And your "faith" scares me, frankly.

[JohnnyLib2]

5. Thanks for posting this.

Nuance has been lost in the latest orgy of Catholic bashing, it seems.

[closeupready]

7. I can't stand Sullivan. Do not forget he was a HUGE pro-Bush warmonger.

And I hate his "I am not a gay Cahtholic at Mass. I am a Catholic." Translation: I am a characterless zombie, and I check my mind at the door when I enter church. :eyes: Who gives a shit. Anyone looking for a principled, intelligent defense of being gay AND Catholic can try reading Sullivan's thoughts, but will need to continue looking, IMO.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

9. with sullivan it is NEVER principled, its endless justifications of endless selfishnesh

like barebacking.

[closeupready]

15. And you hit the bullseye yet again, Lionness. I forget, too, he's a Republican.

:mad:

[La Lioness Priyanka]

17. mostly what he is, is a man who wishes to be famous and wealthy

and its easier to do it from an unusual perspective (like conservative gay) then from a usual perspective (liberal gay)

the fact that he will totally sell us to be famous and wealthy is something we should not forget

[closeupready]

19. Also, it strikes me he is the male couterpart to Camille Paglia - see, for example,

the way he loves to 'hear' himself using complicated ways to state the simple: "the issue of eros" as a substitute for 'sexual orientation' or 'sexuality'. Pretentious, stuffy, narcissistic. Yup. Sounds like Paglia and he would hit it right off.

[Mimosa]

20. Amen, Lioness

Sullivan is a conceited clown. I also find his attacks on Palin (whom I don't care for) misogynist. I wish he'd go back to the UK and be a plague on them. LOL!

[QC]

21. Is there any chance we could get him deported as an undesirable alien? n/t

[Jamastiene]

22. Off-topic:

Is that a Frida Kahlo painting in your avatar? It sure looks like it. I love her paintings.

[Mimosa]

24. Its Frida.

I do like Frida. The movie "Frida" was good, too. ;)

Re: Andy: he's a sad mixed up fellow who desperately wants to be influential. I want to emphasise that I truly do not like Palin or her stands. But Sullivan crosses all the lines with his attacks. People who do that will build her a sympathy bank.

[Jamastiene]

23. On-topic:

I agree. Sullivan is an ass. And as much as I find Palin's policies and views to be reprehensible on so many levels, there are plenty of valid points that can be made without mysoginistic attacks on her. Thank you for bringing that up.

[Prism]

11. Andrew Sullivan's opinions are always to Andrew Sullivan's benefit

He milked his gay, conservative Catholic credentials forever and used them as a bludgeon against our community for years. Authentic LGBT voices in the MSM were pushed aside for over a decade as Sullivan presented a "It's ok, I hate those promiscuous, hedonistic gays, too!" facade for the general consumption of a still bigoted society and the establishment media.

Even pushing aside his war-mongering support for Bush right up until the Federal Marriage Amendment, Sullivan has never had any issue with changing his opinions to fit trends. When Bush was going down, Sullivan jumped ship. When President Obama was ascendant, Sullivan latched on while simultaneously hammering away at Hillary Clinton with a misogyny that was unparalleled even by internet standards.

I can't even read his endless, deranged Sarah Palin entries. As much as I detest her politics and her current media celebrity, his every word drips with disdain for women in general with Palin as a convenient vehicle for an unhinged, anti-woman attitude he has nursed for decades.

I cannot abide him and I don't find anything he says authentic or thought-provoking in the least. He is genuinely talented in crafting prose, but his ideas and ideals are rarely long-lasting. Wait awhile, his tune will change. It always does, depending on whether or not it makes him, as a media personality, more salable.

[joeybee12]

12. I want to K&R your response and not the OP!!!!!!! n/t

[La Lioness Priyanka]

14. me too

[La Lioness Priyanka]

13. thank you prism for a extremely intelligent analysis of the crap that is sullivan

[closeupready]

16. Yeah, I honestly think this captures it perfectly.

Nothing more to add, except well-done. :)

[QC]

18. +1. sully is one of the most vile people in American public life.

He is our age's Roy Cohn.

[mitchtv]

26. I disagree

anything he says. I am just as Irish and had as much Catholicism. He is full of shit