LGTB ROMAN CATHOLICS IN SAN FRANCISCO WORRY

Next week, a key player in the passage of Proposition 8 — a man who has decried the "contraceptive mentality" of modern life — will become the leader of the Catholic Church here in the city that thrust same-sex marriage onto the national stage, the birthplace of the Summer of Love.
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But many gay and lesbian Catholics worry that they will be marginalized after [Salvatore] Cordileone's arrival. Oasis California, the Episcopal Church's gay ministry, convened a meeting recently at a Castro District bar to discuss how spiritual people should respond to the "architect of Prop. 8" coming to town.

One easily understands why LGTB Roman Catholics worry.

But in a recent interview at the headquarters of the Oakland diocese, where he has served as bishop for three years, Cordileone was more direct: Gays and lesbians who are in sexual relationships of any kind, he said, should not receive the sacrament of Holy Communion, the central ritual of Catholic life.

"If we misuse the gift of sexuality, we're going to suffer the consequences," he said, "and I firmly believe we are suffering the consequences."

What consequences?  Hurricanes?   No, I suppose not.  Earthquakes perhaps since he's in San Francisco.  Did the archbishop-designate take lessons from Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell (May God rest his soul!)?

And though he strives to deliver Catholicism's absolutes in as nuanced a fashion as possible, Cordileone said, people need to understand that "the church is not going to change its teaching. ... The solution isn't to say, 'Well, I'm just going to disagree and continue being a Catholic.' That's not how we arrive at holiness."

Nuance will not cut it for the archbishop-to-be.   Cordileone's message comes across loud and clear.  His message echos that of Pope Benedict:

Cordileone was appointed to head the high-profile Diocese of San Francisco by Benedict — who, as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, drafted a key 1986 letter that outlined Catholic doctrine about homosexuality.

"Although the particular inclination of the homosexual person is not a sin," Ratzinger wrote, "it is a more or less strong tendency ordered toward an intrinsic moral evil; and thus the inclination itself must be seen as an objective disorder."

That teaching, Cordileone said, still holds.

If LGTB Roman Catholics in the archdiocese see Cordileone's appointment as a slap in the face, who can blame them?  And don't let the smile on Cordileone's face in the photo fool you.  Unless LGTB Catholics play by the church's rules, they are not welcome at the table of the Lord...so the RC Church says.  You know what?  It's the Lord's table, not the table of the pope or any Roman Catholic prelate or clergy, and no human of whatever position or denomination has the right to withhold the sacrament of the Lord's body and blood from another human being.  Of course, that's just my opinion.

Photo from Wikipedia.

UPDATE: My Facebook friends reminded me that just last month Archbishop-elect Cordileone was arrested for DUI in San Diego after he failed a sobriety test.  He has issued an apology.