Homosexuality and the clergy

I have been stimulated to quite a bit of thought by recent events and the fall of Cardinal O'Brien. What follows below in no way purports to describe him. It's written from my own imagination, but also from my long-ago experience as a Church of England clergyman, and I think it contains some truth. I have seen a lot of harsh things written about clergymen who fail in their vocation. Many of those have been written from ignorant and simplistic viewpoints, so I want to stress the other, human, side of a man struggling against himself. Everything below refers to adults - candidates for ordination and older. No excuses are offered here for those who abuse children.


Okay, so you're a gay man, probably deeply in denial, who thinks he has a vocation to the Roman Catholic priesthood. The fact that the Roman clergy are not allowed any sex, let alone gay sex, is part of the attraction because it promises to curb the unwelcome urges you are experiencing, urges you believe to be sinful.

All goes well. At seminary you meet and make friends with other young men and strong bonds are formed. These powerful attractions can be described in terms of clerical fraternity, and their sexual undercurrent can be pushed away and denied.

Ordination means that you're living with other men, or alone. Some of the men you meet are attractive. Some of these attractive young men come to confess that they are having sinful, homosexual, urges and they want your guidance and help. How can you help them when you can't help yourself? But you allow friendships to develop and keep trying to push the sexuality away. It's of the Devil! You teach and preach against it – as much for your own benefit as that of your parishioners.

But the more you push it away the more the pressure grows – and you put your arm round, perhaps embrace, an attractive young man who is then overwhelmed, frightened and disgusted by the powerful sexuality conveyed in your touch.

You withdraw, you beat yourself up emotionally for having given way. Your teaching about sexuality becomes ever more vicious, aimed at yourself and your evil urges which somehow you cannot control. This vocation was supposed to help you defeat the Devil, but in fact it has got worse with the years. As you get older, and more senior, the young men you are brought into contact with by the church get younger and more attractive.

You give way again, and put your hand on one young man's knee, and he recoils in horror. So do you,  revolted by what you've done. Once more you beat yourself up – never, ever, again.

But of course it doesn't stop, and as you get more prominent and more senior, so the fears grow that it might perhaps one day come out. And you hate yourself more for what you've done, for the evil feelings you think you shouldn't have.

And in the end, a complaint, public humiliation and disaster.

Frankly my view is that the church, hung up on sexuality, has done more to wound young gay men and women than almost anyone else. It is no surprise that working with such intense pressures some clergy fail to keep their vows. That doesn't make it right, nor excuse it, but it is at least understandable.