What an ugly, tragic story:
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34432701
More evidence that the Bible, Old Testament and New, is incompatible with equality and fairness. The Vatican is manifesting bigotry/homophobia (just as Orthodox Judaism and Islam do* – we would have seen the same if this Polish priest, Msgr Krysztof Charamsa, had been a Rabbi or an Imam). If British Airways or General Motors sacked someone for ‘coming out’, the companies would be in Employment Tribunals immediately. How are religions able, in today’s day and age, to get away with such outright bigotry and homophobia**? Answer: because millions, billions, of people allow them to get away with it!
Priests, Rabbis and Imams would say that there is a difference, that BA and GM are not organisations established in the name of God, that BA and GM were not established to encourage people to live their lives in a certain way. That is no defence! What that is saying is that the raison d’être of the monotheistic religions is to advocate a certain way of life, a way of life which does not, must not, incorporate homosexuality. The Monsignor’s ‘goodness’, whatever it was that lifted him up through the ranks of the Catholic Church’s hierarchy, that is clearly irrelevant to the Vatican. All that is relevant to the Vatican is the fact that he has come out as gay. Insofar as the Vatican’s blueprint for how one should live is the Bible, and we know that Orthodox Jewish authorities’ and Islamic authorities’ dictates come from the same ‘Book’, why aren’t more followers of the monotheistic religions questioning the compatibility of their religions with goodness, kindness, fairness and equality?
Tragic!
* I don’t know where the polytheistic religions stand on the issue of homosexuality. I should add that although Baha’i is a monotheistic religion, I believe with its roots in Islam, I don’t know if it has the same attitude towards homosexuality as do Islam, Christianity and Orthodox Judaism.
I should also add that whilst Sikhism and Hinduism are thought of as Polytheistic religions, I am aware that they are, in reality, monotheistic (according to many academic definitions) but I don’t know where they stand on the issue of homosexuality.
My understanding is that Buddhism is neither monotheistic nor polytheistic and I do not know the Buddhist position on homosexuality.
** ‘homophobia’, technically, means a fear of homosexuals – the word, as it commonly appears, is used incorrectly – the Vatican is not actually manifesting a ‘fear’ of gay people – worse, it is saying that there is no place for them in their Church! What is usually meant by ‘homophobia’ is hatred of gay people.
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