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Back to the Archives Index Keynote
Address by Richard Sipe DIGNITY
NATIONAL CONVENTION Theme:
A Voice in the Desert A THEOLOGICAL REFLECTION Or
The Vegas Show Girl,
God/Popeye I consider it a great honor to be here
with you. I do know something about being a 'voice in the desert.' And I know
something about being shunned because of my opinions about sexuality. In 1990 I
published a book that was the product of a 25-year ethnographic study of sex
and celibacy in the Catholic priesthood. Many people in the Church labeled it an
attack, and anti-Catholic. Of course, it is nothing of the sort. I simply
reported what I found. I estimated that at any one time only 50% of priests
practice celibacy and 6% of priests involve themselves sexually with minors.
But I failed to realize just how isolated
I had been until after January 2002 when the Boston Globe began printing its
investigation on sexual abuse. Three of my long time friends called me. Each of
them apologized. They had not believed me, but were afraid to say so until they
read the Globe's accounts of abuse. None of them now thinks I was exaggerating. The isolated spot, the desert, is
historically a place where one can be comfortably out of pace with culture; a
place to be safely ahead of history. The desert provides a time and place to
speak freely. This is a time to
disregard what others think of our experience and judgment. In the ancient
tradition of the early Christian hermits the desert is a place to stand by
convictions, willingly waiting for validation from the Church we treasure. This
is a time and place to speak truth to power. We will give voice to what we know
in order to educate and serve our Church. We cannot help it if we are not heard
beyond the desert. Our job is to say what we know. None of my remarks are political or
militant. I have no agenda. What I have to offer is a theological reflection
about love, grace, and human sexuality. This little drama is my theological
reflection in three acts. I call it THE VEGAS SHOWGIRL, GOD/POPEYE & WHERE
THE CHURCH WENT WRONG.
ACT
ONE: The Vegas Showgirl Setting a large meeting of victims of
sexual abuse, Feb. 2003 Last February I met Sister Julie in
When she introduced herself she said that
she had once been a Well, you're getting Shelly
Winters!" And so we did. Sister Julie was literally kicked out of
her convent in January. Several other sisters left with her to establish
another convent to continue their mission. There was no question about the
quality of her ministry or her dedication. There was no question about her belief in
the Catholic Church or her adherence to all Church laws of faith and morals. Nonetheless the letter came from
Sister Julie, with obvious emotion,
related the story of her life--what led her from her small
One could never guess that Julie was a
shy and awkward youth from the obvious grace, poise, and confident presence she
now commands. But she says that is exactly, in youth, what she
suffered--excruciating timidity and wrenching self-consciousness. In spite of being a good student and
trying her best to fit in with the activities of her local parish and community
she was teased mercilessly for her lack of coordination and her small scrawny
stature. The social rejection and ridicule only made her more determined to fit
in. She joined the Boy Scouts at 12, a group for which she was eligible at the
time. Unfortunately the acceptance she hoped for among kids her own age was not
only absent, she now became a focus for the group--the butt of jokes and
tricks. If it had ended there perhaps it would have been tolerable. But the abuse escalated to a pitch that
culminated in a life-changing trauma. The gang spirit of the group took form in
an exercise that the boys said, "would make a man out of" her. They
trapped her, like a frightened animal and formed a "circle Jerk,"
ejaculating on her. The Scout Master participated. All avenues of social
support seemed severed. If this was masculinity she wanted no part of it. Julie isolated herself, concentrated on
her studies and found a modicum of understanding from priests in counseling and
in the confessional. By chance she had the opportunity to meet Christine
Jorgensen. In her she found a kindred spirit and a path to redemption out of
her personal hell. She consulted her confessor as she began the process of
healing herself. He backed up her decision completely; he comforted, encouraged,
and supported her during every medical and psychological procedure. Both of them could enjoy the triumph of
her being able to qualify as a Vegas dancer. Later they could both rejoice in
her vocation to the convent. The It is no surprise that the
Neither Sr. Julie--nor any one else--can
be stuffed into the waste bin of humanity by some label. In Christ there are no
labels. Neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, neither male nor female counts
any more. We are all one in Christ. And indeed, when Julie is finally judged,
as we all must be, there is not one sexual label, restriction or qualification that
will come into question. (Matt: 25: 31-46) Only what did we do for love? When I
was hungry, thirsty, naked, sick, homeless and lonely or in prison where were
you? Julie has all the right answers. She will stand free of all labels, except
being herself. We all very easily fall into the trap of labeling people,
pigeonholing ourselves, reducing people to an aspect of ourselves (smart or
dumb, beautiful or unattractive) or some external attribute (rich or poor) or
even a moral perception (good or bad). But the wonder and mystery of
humanity--and especially sexuality--is that it is dazzling, energizing,
sanctifying beyond easy categories. Before the divine, all labels fail. And this is my first point. We must fight
the game of labeling others or ourselves. Somehow a myth persists that if we
can name something we know it, control it. This is not true of God, our
humanity or the essence of our sexuality.
ACT
TWO: God & Popeye
Scene One: a small theological
colloquium, 1978: I promised that I would offer you a
theological reflection on love, grace and human sexuality. I have already
started. To begin our next step lets take a look into the theoretical. Theology
is defined as "the study of God and [the] relation to [humans] and the
world." Some years ago I was invited to
participate in a multi-year colloquium entitled "God on Our Mind." As
one of 15 participants around a table for one week each of 5 successive summers
I listened to what other clergy thought about God. One of the ministers spoke firmly and
frequently in terms "God wills this." "God condemns that." There was
no trace of uncertainty in his voice when he addressed any subject related to
the divine "He", but he was especially clear and forceful when he
spoke of God's ideas about sex.
I finally said in impolite frustration, "You talk as if you have
God in your back pocket." The group did not take kindly to my
confrontation. I was accused of being "just a humanist." I was not
invited back; my antagonist even currently is a frequent visitor to the same
site. [I take a certain pride in being labeled a humanist. According to my
thinking Christ was the preeminent humanist, "Being God, but not
disdaining to take human form."] But, who can show us how to study God?
Moses was a fascinating guy. He approached his study directly. We know
he had a speech impediment along with his remarkable leadership ability. He had
a monumental mission and is immortalized by Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.
But he had his problems.
They walked to safety through the
So under severe social pressure Moses approached the divine presence and
haltingly asked, "Who are you?" And he got an answer. Well, of sorts.
"I Am What Am." (I Am Who Am.) [Ex Theology is also defined as "the
rational interpretation of religious faith, practice and experience." How
must, we approach a study of God, love and human sexuality? Rationally. We are
rational beings and are negligent if we approach God, love or our sexuality in
a less than rational way. And yet what subjects are more vulnerable to myth,
magic, manipulation, distortion, deceit, and delusion? I say none. And
religion, so capable of good has a rich history of imposing every one of those
negative qualities. In my theological search I have always
kept a sharp distinction between discovery and projection. Only spiritual
discovery leads to spiritual growth. Our first reasonable step in the study of
God is a rational discussion of the existence of God, not an assumption or
acquiescence to others' judgments, but a personal search. As good a place as
any to begin discussion is with the reality "I am what I am." because
it is related to the experience of us, and has the possibility of leading to a
discovery of "I Am What Am," the Other.
Scene Two: the Sunday comics, 1985. Some of you long ago guessed how Popeye
fits into my thinking. I choose a cartoon character rather than some hero-like
human example to make my point, because I think that we humans looked at in any
broad perspective, appear pretty laughable. And as an old friend of mine use to
say, "If there is a God, [he] has to have a good sense of humor."
The essence of love and sex is in relationship. And Popeye was all
relationships. Remember his world of stress and strain, good and evil. There
was Olive Oil. She was steady in love and constantly in need of being saved.
But her love seemed to be ever conflicted, ever available, and ever promising.
Wimpy, their good friend was the imperturbable and not very helpful friend;
over-weight and with an inexhaustible appetite for hamburgers; but always
there, dependable. I still cannot figure out where Sweet Pea came from or how
he/she fit into the picture. I chalk it up to some dysfunctional family
dynamic. And then there was Bluto (Brutus) the ever-present threat. Always
scheming and up to no good.
Popeye himself was none too bright, or at least it seems that he was
usually slow to catch on. He had to be at short odds in any fight before he
collected his composure, gathered his strength (partly from a can or two of
spinach) and triumphed in the challenge.
As far as I can tell Popeye was always inspired by love and dependent on
his special grace (spinach) rather than motivated by material gain or over
confidence in his own prowess, no matter how many fights he won. Popeye always
muddled through. His real strength, and to me his great attraction, lies in his
lack of pretense, his disparagement of any labels, his pride and self
confidence expressed in his essential refrain: I Am What I Am, or more accurately,
"I yam what I yam."
To me this is the spark of the Divine. And this is my second point. We
come close to God by claiming our existence, without apology, without labels,
but with gratitude and humility. We pursue our relationships with respect for the
rational nature given us. "I am what I am." As a community we can
accept the crest of the inhabitants of Garrison Keillor's Lake Woebegone,
Minnesota whose motto is, Sumus quod Sumus, (we are what we are).
ACT
THREE: Where the Church Went Wrong
Scene
One: A How dare we say the church has been
wrong? In 1543 Nicolaus Copernicus published his
De revolutionibus. He dedicated the treatise to the reigning Pope. He
reverently proposed that the sun, not the earth is the center of our universe.
In spite of the fact that he was a canon lawyer, trained in medicine,
mathematics, theology and astronomy he was cautious since most Church men still
held that the earth was the center around which the sun revolved. His writing
was labeled "false" and finally relegated to the Index of Forbidden
Books by the Inquisition. Giordano Bruno was neither as diplomatic
nor so lucky. A priest and scientist he was burned at the stake for heresy (
The heresy trial of Galileo in 1633 found him guilty also on the basis
of his contention that the earth moved, not the sun. He spent the last nine
years of his life under house arrest. (The trial was rigged with a false 1616
document.) And the
That ecclesiastical judgment was, in fact, in effect until 1992 when
Pope John Paul II effectively repudiated it in a roundabout way by praising
Galileo's philosophy. Galileo's famous statement is: the "Book of Nature
is…written in mathematical characters." The Pope belatedly noted how,
"intelligibility, attested to by the marvelous discoveries of science and
technology, leads us, in the last analysis, to that transcendent and primordial
thought imprinted on all things."
It comes as no surprise to the modern world that Galileo was correct in
his judgment. The fundamental fight at the time of Galileo's trial was the
conflict between scripture and science. How can science displace statements in
the bible? Scripture said "the sun raises; the sun sets." It must
move because there were witnesses to fact that "God made the sun stand
still."
Most of us agree that, inspired as it is, the bible is not a textbook of
science. It is not a guide to astronomy, cosmology, or astrophysics.
Quite simply, the bible is not a text on the nature of human sexuality
any more than it is a text on cosmology. There have been excellent scholarly
efforts (notably John McNeill, John Boswell, and Andrew Sullivan, Charles
Curran, Bernard Hering among others) to explain the biblical tradition of
sexuality in a broader and more reasonable context than usually acknowledged by
the Church. Many church scholars, indeed, have moved to a more rational and
scientifically open stance regarding sexuality. But even now many theologians
support the idea that there is "the tradition underlying the Church's
official teaching on sexual ethics, that there is a biblical norm for the
ethical use of sexuality according to God's will…"
I say this as respectfully as I can. The Church's official teaching on
human sexuality does not stand the test of reason or science. They don't have
God in their back pocket on this one either. The Pope's own admission of
mistakes gives us the courage to speak out.
Scene
Two: The This is a stirring 50-page apology for
2000 years of violence and persecution by the Catholic Church. Its conclusion,
"Even men of the church, in the name of faith and morals, have sometimes
used methods not in keeping with the Gospel." (Card. Ratzinger) Today in
the light of the complicity of Cardinals and Bishops in the sexual abuse of minors
this admission is an understatement.
This document is a clear admission that the Church was wrong in its
championing the Crusades, in fostering the Inquisition, in persecuting the
Jews, in killing men and women who disagreed with its teaching, etc.
This admission may seem noble and historic. And it is. But it is
insufficient and ineffective (dare I say a sham) unless it is translated into a
new policy. It is clear that dissenters in the past were excommunicated,
persecuted, and killed. The Pope clearly says the Church was mistaken--history
shows that the Church was wrong. The Pope apologized.
The tragic mistake the Church has made repeatedly was the refusal to
dialogue. It is repeating the same destructive pattern today by refusing to
discuss the whole sexual/celibate agenda clogging up the progress of religion.
The consequences of the Church's intransigence are monumentally destructive.
What of dissenters today, who on solid scientific and rational grounds, with
respect for tradition and legitimate authority say, "I disagree?" Can
the Church of today listen and dialogue?
I do not hesitate to say that the Church's teaching on human sexuality
is not correct. It exists on a pre Copernican level of understanding. Its basis
of biblical revelation and interpretation is insufficient to account for the
realities we already know. I will
discuss only two of its basic misjudgments: on sexual sin and homosexuality.
The official teaching of the Church on sexuality, known to every
Catholic schoolchild is: "every sexual thought, word, desire and action
outside of marriage is mortally sinful and there can be no paucity of
matter."
This criterion is not credible or livable. I believe that it is a
standard established and acceptable for an adult choice of a religious celibate
existence. Even that group of Christians however, only rarely achieves it. I do
not understand why there is not more dialogue about a teaching that is so
patently incredible.
Human growth and healthy sexual development is dependent on measured
experience and reasonable, responsible experimentation. (This is one reason why
the sexual abuse of a minor by an adult is so devastating. It disrupts and
often destroys the healthy process of sexual development.)
Although to say so surely 'rankles the hackles' (it really does rankle
and raise the hackles) of many self-righteous souls, it is true that
masturbation is a normal and necessary activity for humans, boys and girls,
women and men. The psychological roots of good object relationships are laid
down with the ability of the infant to self-comfort. The psychological sciences
are as certain of this as Galileo was about the disposition of the skies.
Likewise, sufficient sexual experimentation with another human being is needed
to establish one's identity and capacity for love. It is against reason to
presume that sexual life and development is divided into two segments: one from
infancy to marriage when no sexual activity is tolerated and the second in
marriage where sex is good, glorious, and holy. (Of course only if the couple
does not use contraception, which relegates sex back to the realm of sin.)
The fundamental fallacy is the assumption that the Church's teaching
about sex is based on "natural law." It simply is not so. The book of
nature is neither written in biblical terms, nor in the philosophical terms of
that the Church uses in its apologetics. (This takes nothing away from the
glory and meanings of scripture.)
The Catholic Church currently has a specific sexual problem. The Church
names the problem homosexuality. But the real problem is named
"church." I know of no expert within the Church that would argue with
the statement that "there is a larger proportion of homosexually oriented
men in the priesthood than in the general population." This has always
been so. The history of the Catholic priesthood is studded with saints,
scholars, cardinals, and popes as well as scoundrels and sinners who clearly
had what we today call a homosexual orientation. (Don't forget that that label
has a history of only a few more that 100 years.)
But the Church is incorrect in its 1986 statement that holds that people
with a homosexual orientation have an "objective disorder" or that
the expression of their love is an "intrinsic" malady of some sort.
At base sexual orientation is genetically
determined. Same sex orientation is just as natural (and valuable in its own
way to the preservation of the species) as heterosexual orientation. (Cf.
Richard
Many people forget just how natural same sex orientation is. There is a
stage of development that each of us passes through, where same sex association
is natural and necessary for adult relationships. Some psychologists use the
fact that this experience is universal, and heterosexuals move beyond it and
incorporate it into their sexual adjustment, to see gay adjustment as arrested
development. This is not so. Gay psychosexual development is just different.
That does not make it inferior or defective. Gays too move beyond the
"gang age" to develop adult, mature, loving, stable relationships.
And I hold that gays can achieve this maturity in equal proportions to
straights only with greater social obstacles to overcome in the process. Also
the division between "heterosexual" and "homosexual" is a
semi-permeable membrane that can be transcended by circumstance and temporal
pressures. (The experience of many military men, prisoners, and priests among
others give ample testimony to this reality.)
The Church disdains (condemns) honest, open, responsible, sexual
relationships between men or between women, at the same that it countenances
liaisons that are secret and clerical. This is the witness of one
In some A lesbian friend of mine, a lawyer who
has done landmark work in holding the Church accountable for its duplicity said
to me: "The priesthood promotes a demented form of homosexuality. They
give homosexuals a bad name." This hypocrisy and duplicity is exactly what
she had in mind: the
The Church condemns same-sex love in the
context of an open, stable, loving and dedicated relationship as if it were
against nature and a threat to the stability of marriage and the family. Not
so! A theologian once claimed that masturbation had to be a mortal sin
"otherwise who would get married?" This exact distorted thinking is
at the base of the Church's inadequate understanding of sexuality, love, and
human relationships. This is my third point: reason is the final arbitrator of truth in sexual matters. We say this with great reverence for the divinely inspired institution that has nurtured us. The book of nature is basic to the Bible, not the other way round. The clear reading of the book of nature is necessary for a sound theology.
Scene
Three: Here and Now We make our contribution to the theology
of sexuality by refusing the constrictions and misrepresentations of labels, by
claiming our God-likeness in our being, and by tirelessly pursuing reason in
our quest for relationships, love, and the Truth that "Am What Am."
There is no real conclusion to my drama. It is ongoing and vital. Your
organization is playing an important part in educating the Church. The lessons
you teach are monumental, and not merely of passing interest. The issues you
raise and champion are beyond politics and partisanship. Because you are
reading from the book of nature, just as Galileo did, what you stand for will
triumph in general understanding.
We relate to God through our humanity. And we are humanized in the
series of relationships that foster our life, from the primary others (father
and mother) through significant others, to the Ultimate Other. The only label
that comes close to having any meaning in this realm is love. And we are not
it. (Only God is love.) We can participate in it. What is spoken in the desert, if it is true, will someday be shouted from steeples. Or at least it has a chance of engaging in meaningful dialogue. We can't ask for more. Back to the Archives Index |