NYC Priest Paid His Sex Master From Collection PLate

[+ FreshFluff]

One of the articles linked to a Change.org petition to remove him. These comments were posted long before the articles about embezzlement. Maybe I shouldn't be shocked, but the level of hypocrisy is unbelievable.

http://s5.postimg.org/c4qzedk6f/Screen_Shot_2015_12_12_at_3_58_32_PM.png

http://s5.postimg.org/8mezhzjaf/Screen_Shot_2015_12_12_at_4_15_29_PM.png

[+ quoththeraven]

One of the articles linked to a Change.org petition to remove him. These comments were posted long before the articles about embezzlement. Maybe I shouldn't be shocked, but the level of hypocrisy is unbelievable.

http://s5.postimg.org/c4qzedk6f/Screen_Shot_2015_12_12_at_3_58_32_PM.png

http://s5.postimg.org/8mezhzjaf/Screen_Shot_2015_12_12_at_4_15_29_PM.png

 

Just as "gay" is not an automatic pejorative, it is not an automatic conferral of sainthood, either. As difficult as it may be to operate in a cloak and dagger way in a church that relies on gay priests but doesn't want them to be sexually active or openly gay and which generally turns a blind eye to violations of the vow of celibacy involving women, that's no excuse for stealing from parishioners or applying differemt rules to them.

 

This time, I actually will quote it: "Judge not that you be not judged. For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get. Why do you see the speck in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye." Matt. 7:1-5, RSV.

 

By that standard, this guy is toast, and deserves to be toast.

[ChrisWydeman]

You say embezzlement and prostitution I say this man is an entrepreneur with a knack for job creation!

[+ quoththeraven]

To be clear, it's the priest I have an issue with, not the escort. I am particularly ticked because he owes a fiduciary duty to his parish with regard to the money and not applying higher standards to them as to himself.

 

Whether the money is ultimately recovered from the escort or not (could well be as he's been unjustly enriched vis-a-vis the people who were the source of the money, leaving aside the whole legal argument over escorting, but that's a legal, not moral, issue), it's ridiculous to expect him to vet the source of his payments. Is he supposed to do that for everyone?

 

Declining to see a client when it's clear he's impoverishing himself to see an escort is a good and praiseworthy thing to do, but outside of that situation, I don't know how someone could engage in escorting and worry about where the money was coming from. By that standard, escorts should refuse clients who are gangsters or who deal drugs. Those are also illegal and have adverse social consequences as well. That starts to look a lot like the moral purity equivalent of restrictions based on appearance or race, which defeats the purpose of escorting to begin with.

 

I hope I didn't just write all that because Chris W. is trolling me.

[mike carey]

A lot of law suits for clerical child abuse involving Catholic priests failed (here at least) because the courts found that there was no legal entity to sue. It would be an exquisite irony if the court in this case ruled that the church was not a legal entity and thus was unable to sue.

[Juan Vancouver]

QTR, I see that we are discussing a subject dear to your heart. I am sorry about that. I cannot mince my words for the sake of protecting your feelings, but I would gladly give you the out. No need to read this if you think you might find it uncomfortable. I would find it impossible, however, not to write it.

 

You must be one of those pious people in the midst of the religious of whom I spoke. No need to give examples, I have known a few. I know it is a reality. However, the exception doesn't define the majority.

 

I'm not sure whether by "Church" you mean Roman Catholicism or Christianity. If you mean Roman Catholicism, while I largely agree with you (that's why we're called Protestants), I am not willing to tar it all or accept that it should not be expected to live up to its supposed ideals. (I was supposed to be raised Roman Catholic and rejected it for myself.)

 

I am very familiar with the Catholic Church and all of its trespasses. Sadly, Christianity in general doesn't fare well either even after a cursory review. Ever since Constantine validated Catholicism and allowed it to become the huge power drunk business that it has been for 17 centuries, the organized religions, even the schismatic ones, have at the heart of their philosophies principles that that are inhumane, unethical and humanly impossible to uphold. Demanding a human being to live without physical intimacy for the rest of their lives, demanding them to give up all their possessions to the church and live lives of simplicity and renunciation when the high ranking priests live in outrageous opulence are just some of those. Aggressively proselytizing their beliefs, even if in doing so they force an entire continent to go furiously homophobic, making the AIDS crisis unmanageable because of their stubborn and medieval unwillingness to put people before mythologies, refusing to teach sex ed to teenagers and then shaming them for getting pregnant and forcing them to give birth, suggesting pregnancies from rape can't actually happen (Because the female body secretes a magic elixir) or when the rape victim does get pregnant, demanding she keeps the baby. It was mainly protestants who went spread the word to Micronesia, for example, creating such chaos in the region that still to this day people are killing each other mercilessly. I know I am conflating many different faces of organized catholic religion, but the truth of the matter is that their evil comes from the same place.

 

You cannot create an ethics-controlling organization that is based on ideas the members of the organization can't and won't follow. Once you have to keep an eye shut to the priest having a girlfriend while violently preaching against hypocrisy from the pulpit, absolutely none of the tenets that institution uphold have any validity. This is horribly true when it is the institution itself, the people in high places who spend a lot of time and resources covering up (enabling) all sorts of crimes, child abuse, rape, abuse of trust, embezzlement, political abuse, you name it.

 

Mendacity can't be the vehicle for Truth.

 

The teachings compiled in what we know as the new testament, however apocryphal they might be, are all lovely, valid, important ideas. Honesty, reliability, responsibility, respect, love, care, compassion. These alone are an infallible moral compass for anyone who will follow them. All these lofty goals have been sacrificed in the pursuit of political power and wealth.

 

If you mean Christianity, my response is that human beings and institutions are by nature imperfect and subject to corruption. The logical extreme of that view is to mistrust every institution because they all are imperfect or corrupt to some extent. If you want to do without laws and government and other social institutions, fine, but (respectfully) I don't trust my fellow human beings as individuals enough for that to work for me.

 

Even you must see how jumping to the conclusion that I want to do without laws and government judging by what I wrote is a complete fabrication, or at best, a gargantuan misunderstanding.

 

Even though I sincerely believe that given the right education and environment we would all be able to effectively self-determine our actions in an ethical, humane way, I understand that neither of those elements are in place and we do need government and laws. I refuse, however, to give any credence to laws based on a made up mythology by an institution that at large doesn't follow any of them.

 

Institutions are corruptible. That is true. That is no excuse to continue patronizing and empowering one that blatantly and shamelessly finds itself on the erring side.

 

But those "live and let live" views about femmes and others who don't confirm to majority preferences that you applauded in another thread? Those are views I got from Jesus's words. Those are views that are lived and modeled in the churches I've been in way more than in the outside world, this one included. Those churches believe in examining scripture in historical context and adjusting one's understanding accordingly. They ordain women (hell, I was on an ordination committee; if you allow women to be gatekeepers, you can't consistently turn around and argue against ordaining them). Some ordain gays and lesbians.

 

I have to disagree. If anything, churches have carefully used Jesus' teachings as an example of what NOT to do. Judge, criticize, condemn, segregate, hate, disconnect, violate, those are all the behaviours churches actively practise.

 

There may be specific parishes in which love and respect might be the goal, but I assure you, that is not the norm. All you have to do is turn on the news. religion is violently blandished as a weapon by most.

 

Maybe it helps that I'm aware of the deficiencies of institutional Christianity and that I use other traditions and philosophies like Taoism, Zen Buddhism, and Judaism (which has no particular problem with m/f sex or sex work) to fill in those blanks.

 

I ache every time I meet someone that is religious and gay, or a prostitute, or a client, or a divorcee, or... the list keeps going. I definitely do not know the facts in this specific case, but I would be very curious to hear what your priest, if you belong to a parish, thinks about you hiring homosexual prostitutes.

 

I KNOW my work can be performed in a loving, ethical, healing, fulfilling, highly spiritual way. This can be a deeply ethical thing to do. I might be getting ahead of myself, but I would imagine 99.9 percent of priests, enlightened or not would see me and you with distaste, at best.

 

All this, while they, themselves are more than willing to break each one of their own rules.

 

I celebrate your right to practice whatever philosophy you want to subscribe to. I, myself, have absolutely no use of a hateful, hypocritical institution telling me how to live my life.

 

I know that politely disagreeing on religion is almost impossible. That is sad, because I often enjoy what you read.

 

I send you a big hug. This is not a criticism of you. At heart, I wholeheartedly embrace the real teachings. I suspect we do have that in common.

[+ FreshFluff]

Juan,

I am very familiar with the Catholic Church and all of its trespasses. Sadly, Christianity in general doesn't fare well either even after a cursory review. Ever since Constantine validated Catholicism and allowed it to become the huge power drunk business that it has been for 17 centuries, the organized religions, even the schismatic ones, have at the heart of their philosophies principles that that are inhumane, unethical and humanly impossible to uphold. Demanding a human being to live without physical intimacy for the rest of their lives, demanding them to give up all their possessions to the church and live lives of simplicity and renunciation when the high ranking priests live in outrageous opulence are just some of those. Aggressively proselytizing their beliefs, even if in doing so they force an entire continent to go furiously homophobic, making the AIDS crisis unmanageable because of their stubborn and medieval unwillingness to put people before mythologies, refusing to teach sex ed to teenagers and then shaming them for getting pregnant and forcing them to give birth, suggesting pregnancies from rape can't actually happen (Because the female body secretes a magic elixir) or when the rape victim does get pregnant, demanding she keeps the baby. It was mainly protestants who went spread the word to Micronesia, for example, creating such chaos in the region that still to this day people are killing each other mercilessly. I know I am conflating many different faces of organized catholic religion, but the truth of the matter is that their evil comes from the same place.

 

You cannot create an ethics-controlling organization that is based on ideas the members of the organization can't and won't follow. Once you have to keep an eye shut to the priest having a girlfriend while violently preaching against hypocrisy from the pulpit, absolutely none of the tenets that institution uphold have any validity. This is horribly true when it is the institution itself, the people in high places who spend a lot of time and resources covering up (enabling) all sorts of crimes, child abuse, rape, abuse of trust, embezzlement, political abuse, you name it.

 

Mendacity can't be the vehicle for Truth.

 

The teachings compiled in what we know as the new testament, however apocryphal they might be, are all lovely, valid, important ideas. Honesty, reliability, responsibility, respect, love, care, compassion. These alone are an infallible moral compass for anyone who will follow them. All these lofty goals have been sacrificed in the pursuit of political power and wealth.

 

 

 

Even you must see how jumping to the conclusion that I want to do without laws and government judging by what I wrote is a complete fabrication, or at best, a gargantuan misunderstanding.

 

Even though I sincerely believe that given the right education and environment we would all be able to effectively self-determine our actions in an ethical, humane way, I understand that neither of those elements are in place and we do need government and laws. I refuse, however, to give any credence to laws based on a made up mythology by an institution that at large doesn't follow any of them.

 

Institutions are corruptible. That is true. That is no excuse to continue patronizing and empowering one that blatantly and shamelessly finds itself on the erring side.

 

I have to disagree. If anything, churches have carefully used Jesus' teachings as an example of what NOT to do. Judge, criticize, condemn, segregate, hate, disconnect, violate, those are all the behaviours churches actively practise.

 

There may be specific parishes in which love and respect might be the goal, but I assure you, that is not the norm. All you have to do is turn on the news. religion is violently blandished as a weapon by most.

 

Juan, many of your arguments against Christianity are specific to the RC church or Protestant Evangelical churches. I doubt that's what QTR is talking about.

 

 

I have to disagree. If anything, churches have carefully used Jesus' teachings as an example of what NOT to do. Judge, criticize, condemn, segregate, hate, disconnect, violate, those are all the behaviours churches actively practise.

 

Some churches are like this, while others are not.

 

QTR said that she rejected the RC church. As a result, she doesn't have a priest (unless she's an Episcopalian) or a parish. I assume that she belongs to UCC or some other liberal denomination--maybe the Episcopalian chur. The UCC has a story about a TG person's transition on their website:

http://www.ucc.org/lgbt_callmemalcolm

 

So is she is indeed UCC, I doubt her pastor would care much about her sex life. To a lesser extent, the same goes if she's Episcopalian.