PHOENIX (ChurchMilitant.com) – An Arizona bishop is claiming so-called LGBTQ Catholics possess a “sacred identity” and original sin is a failure to celebrate “our sense of being.”
Bp. John Dolan
Bishop John Dolan of the Phoenix diocese in Arizona made this claim in a recent article published by Outreach, a pro-homosexual website that Jesuit sodomy activist Fr. James Martin launched in 2022 through America Media.
“I wanted to unpack the meaning of ‘being Christian,'” Dolan posited. “To Catholics within the LGBTQ community, I wish to reaffirm your sacred identity. You are Christian — not just in name, but in fact.”
Referencing baptism, the prelate continued, “You have been configured to Christ and branded as Christian, even though some would like to re-brand you and consider you as objects to be discarded, rather than as beloved communal members of the Body of Christ.”
Confused Catechesis on Sexual Morality
Dolan noted his love for Gabriel Marcel, a 19th-century French philosopher, playwright and music critic. He then used Marcel’s axiom esse est co-esse (“to be is to be with”) as a launching point for redefining sin.
Catechism of the Catholic Church
“When people re-brand Catholics in the LGBTQ community as sinners, intrinsically disordered, or as persons inclined to disorder while forgetting that they are Christian, they have not only ruptured the ‘being’ of the other but even their own Christian selves,” Dolan opined.
“I have come to believe that rupturing our ‘being Christian’ is the source of sin and disorder,” he concluded.
What Dolan refers to as “re-branding” is Catholic teaching. The language of “disorder” comes directly from the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which famously states in paragraph 2357, “Tradition has always declared that ‘homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.’ They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.”
Naturally, the Church distinguishes between the intrinsic evil of homosexual acts and individuals who struggle with same-sex attraction.
In paragraph 2358, for example, the Catechism stipulates that those suffering from same-sex attraction must “be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity,” and that “every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided.” Nevertheless, in the same paragraph, the Catechism makes clear that such persons “are called to fulfill God’s will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.”
The Church teaches those afflicted with same-sex attraction are called to chastity and Christian perfection — as all Christians are — through reception of the sacraments, prayer and sacrifice.
Confused Catechesis on Christian Doctrine
Dolan wrapped up his thoughts on sexual morality with a few musings on Christian doctrine.
“Whenever people say that we must defend the deposit of faith, I wish to remind them that the truth is Christ,” he postulated. “Faith (fides) is Christ, who is with us. He is with us not just remotely, but imminently, intimately and sacramentally.”
It is unclear what Dolan means by “faith is Christ.” Christ is the beginning and the end of Christian faith, but not technically faith itself.
Indeed, the paragraph 154 of the Catechism clarifies that faith “is an authentically human act” made possible by grace and “the interior helps of the Holy Spirit.” Later, in paragraph 1814, the Catechism defines faith as the theological virtue “by which we believe in God and believe all he has said … and that Holy Church proposes for our belief, because he is truth itself.”
Nevertheless, Dolan continued, “When, in our attempt to define or defend truth, we fail to ask the question, ‘Who is truth among us?’ We treat the other as a puzzle and not as a mystery to celebrate.”
Your browser does not support the video tag.
The connection between the Church defending and propagating the Deposit of Faith and celebrating others as “mysteries” is anybody’s guess.
The bishop concluded by redefining original sin. “Our deepest sin, our original sin, misses the mark when we fail to celebrate our sense of being,” Dolan theorized.
The “deepest sin” is pride. Pride is the root and beginning of all sin. Original sin refers to the first sin committed by Adam and Eve and its consequences, namely, the fallen nature all human beings inherit owing to that first sin.
The bishop’s recently published opinions on Christian doctrine and sexual morality are difficult, if not impossible, to reconcile with immutable Catholic teaching.