Whenever people hate or demonize one minority group, they almost invariably hate or demonize one or more other minority groups. This seeming fact of life is no less true among homophobic clergy than it is among other homophobic professing Christians and non-Christians.
The Roman Catholic Church certainly has no monopoly among haters in so much of the institutional Church as many people know, some from very painful personal experiences. And, to add insult to injury, this hate is almost always characterized as "Godly," as whenever anyone hates any group of people they almost invariably appeal to virtue. And what is viewed by many as more virtuous than any utterance concerning what God ostensibly wants for everyone based upon the perceptions (and often the actual prejudices) of those who speak from assorted pulpits throughout the world?
The following quotes and video clip are taken from GayAgenda.com, and can be found on its page located here.
Bishop Richard Williamson, who was recently ex-excommunicated by Pope Benedict XVl, had this to say concerning Gay people:
“God did not wait for the founding of the Catholic Church to instill in men the horror of this sin, but he implanted in the human nature of all of us, unless or until we corrupt it, an instinct of violent repugnance for this particular sin, comparable to our instinctive repugnance for other misuses of our human frame, such as coprophagy.”
And also, to help show that the basis of much anti-Gay discrimination and hateful rhetoric directed against Gay people largely rests upon misogyny, Bishop Williamson had the following to say about women:
“Women should not wear trousers” and “almost no girl should go to any university” as it contributes to the “the unwomaning of woman.”
Again, when someone is prejudiced against any one minority group, he/she is very likely to be prejudiced against one or more other minority groups.
And for any professing Christian to feel or express hate or discrimination against any of God's children automatically disqualifies him/her from being taken seriously as a Christian!
One can be an atheist and be a good and decent person of good will. But every single Christian is a good and decent person of good will or he/she is not a Christian, whether or not he/she wears clerical vestments!
Although this post is focusing on Bishop Richard Williamson, it would be a mistake to single him out as the only example of the religious haters among us, some of whom populate some of the highest places in the institutional Church world. Unfortunately, he is only one of very many such haters who spew their discriminatory rhetoric in the name of God and, tragically, they are taken so seriously by so many people that many lives and families are ruined or destroyed by their mere rhetoric.
And they certainly don't deserve any of the credibility afforded them by anyone who considers him/herself to be an intelligent, decent person; certainly not by any Christian worthy of the name!
Please watch the following brief video clip that says far more than anything I can say or add to the thesis of this post. Here is what Bishop Williamson says about the Holocaust:
If you are a Christian, do you want such clergy and professing Christians like him teaching you and your children about the Gospel?
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