Venn Diagrams: A Papal Primer

I recognize that the Pope is probably not a big fan of mine -- I'm a member of that pesky gay and lesbian club -- but I must say I was impressed with him this week.

He clearly hasn't come around on the gay issue. My friend Hilary Rosen points that out quite clearly in her recent post. It does appear, however that he (and the media) have evolved on the relationship between homosexuality and pedophilia.

The Pope seems to understand more now about the 'Venn diagram' relationship in which each of the following statements are true:

• NOT all pedophiles are gay
• NOT all gay people are pedophiles.
• SOME gay people are pedophiles
* SOME straight people are pedophiles
• SOME pedophiles are gay

The Pope put it more succinctly the other day. He was quoted in an Associated Press story saying:

"I do not wish to talk at this moment about homosexuality, but about pedophilia, which is another thing," he said.

We gay activists have been working on this for years. See my friend Cathy Renna's post on this subject about our work during my tenure at GLAAD. You may also have noticed that in interviewing victims of sexual abuse, we even saw women.

So we can now add these Venn diagram statements to the Pope's papal primer.

• NOT all priests are gay.
• Straight priests can be pedophiles.

Maybe this week, he illustrated that he knows that the real truisms are as follows:

• The Pope has a big fat mess on his hands
• The heart of the matter is not sexual orientation
• He needs a thoughtful, compassionate plan that carefully vets all, candidates, gay and straight, for the priesthood, understanding commitment and motivation. And scapegoating gay priests who make the cut won't cut it.

This week he demonstrated that he was paying a lot of attention to the big fat mess. All of us, gay and straight, should be watching closely where he goes next on this one. Follow that Popemobile.

Comments

[RedDogBear]

Keep in mind that the pope worships a man he believes was born from a virgin by a weekly sacrificial ritual where he drinks that man's blood and eats his body. He also refuses to let human embryos be used for research that could cure people with MS and other terrible diseases because "life is sacred" and hence the embryos must be burned or flushed down the drain rather than used to help living humans who are suffering. Rationality is not his strong point. I don't see why you care so much what he thinks about sexuality.

[CatholicJoe]

RedDogBear, The Pope believes the only place a human embryo should be created is in a woman"s womb. And you find this belief irrational? Also, if stem cells obtained from the killing of human embryos are such a sure way to cure diseases, why is it that the private sector is not interested in funding the research? It"s time to admit that taxpayers have been conned into funding research that the private sector doesn"t believe will bear much fruit.

[radmul]

As long as we listen to Morons that believe in nonsense based on no evidence about anything we will not solve the problem of tolerance for sexual tastes or deal effectively with criminal pedophiles

[CatholicJoe]

You don't seem to have much tolerance for those people who believe in God. What was it you called them... morons was it?

[EspritDeVoltaire]

I really don't care what diagram you use. What I want is pedophile priests turned over to the police for prosecution, plain and simple. Justice is an entirely separate matter from any truisms.

[newshawk14]

You're article caught my attention in its' mention of Venn diagrams and their relation to set theory.
I thought your points were well taken and would recommend that everyone read a Scientific
American article, from a few years ago, on Animal Sexuality, it's not as simple as you might think.

[hoopesaz]

Here's what I don't get:

"He needs a thoughtful, compassionate plan that carefully vets all, candidates, gay and straight, for the priesthood"

The pope may understand the difference between homosexuality and pedophilia, but my understanding is that the Catholic church is still against homosexuality. That being said, it seems a bit hypociritcal of them to be vetting gay men for the Priesthood.

[BrighterStar]

Here is where you are wrong. The church speaks out about homosexual acts not homosexual orientation. Priests are not supposed to have any sexual acts at all so the fact that someone has a homosexual orientation should be irrelevant. That may be why there seem to be so many homosexual priests. For a homosexual that believes in the teaching of the catholic church the priesthood seems to be a logical choice.

[OuterBoroughPrincess]

I think that's presently a moot point, since priests are expected to uphold an oath of celibacy.

[Clinton]

So they'll compromise on sexuality, so long as celibacy is maintained? What kind of doctrinal contortions led to that?

[Michelle Pilecki - Huffpost Blogger]

See Michelle Pilecki's Profile

No contortion at all. The church does NOT identify homosexual identity as a sin. It does, however, define as sinful all sexual acts outside marriage. Ergo, homosexual ACTS are sinful. For that matter, homophobia is also a sin under Catholic doctrine. Got it?

[cjh]

"All priests are NOT GAY"?

Did you mean "Not all priests are Gay"?

Surely at least one priest is gay. It seems likely, anyway.

-caleb

[cjh]

I see you made the change. Thanks - I don't often get the chance to flex my set theory. ;-)

-caleb

[Clinton]

As usual, the emphasis has been taken away from the victims and used to make some obscure point in the name of identity politics.

[jmyoung666]

It's not an obscure point to note that homosexuality and pedophilia are two separate things.

[Clinton]

The abuse of children being associated with homosexuality is not a smart approach, Venn diagrams or no Venn diagrams. Moreover, this post seems to be using the issue of childhood sexual abuse in a rather cynical way. It's disgusting.