New Catholic Times

Meg decided at age seven she didn't want to become an adult because she perceived life to be too hard. School had already made her miserable when kids treated her as "different."

When the talented girl who liked to write plays and stories and participate in forensics competitions went to college, she became withdrawn, lost her wit and drastically changed her appearance, said Mary Black, her mother.

"Meg could not tell me what was wrong. Then at age 25 after she moved to Los Angeles, she fell into a deep depression and avoided coming home or inviting her parents for visits."

Finally, Meg wrote her mother a letter revealing that she was a lesbian.

"My hopes and dreams vanished," said Black who then wondered what she had done wrong in Meg's upbringing. Such parental guilt is typical and often results in a withdrawal from family and friends.

i Then, God changed things, said Black, after she joined Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG), an organization that "embraces everyone, including those of diverse sexual orientations and gender identities."

i"Now I'm happy and proud to be the mother of a lesbian," said Black, whose daughter and her partner now live near her in Detroit.  the subject of homosexuality, said Casey Lopata, co-founder and board member of the Rochester, NY-based Fortunate Families, a nation-wide volunteer network for Catholic parents of gay children, one of a handful of support groups filling the void for the Church.

In 1997, the National Council of Catholic Bishops addressed parents of gay children in their pastoral letter, "Always Our Children" in an attempt to reach out to them during a difficult time. The bishops not only clarified Church teachings but they dismissed erroneous information circulated about gays. It is a document that Fortunate Families frequently cites in its advocacy work.

Sexual orientation, be it heterosexual or homosexual, is "a fundamental dimension of one's personality..." says the letter. While the Church acknowledges that there is "no single cause of a homosexual orientation," it maintains that such an orientation is not a sin because "morality presumes the freedom to choose."

Nevertheless, the bishops made it clear that they do not endorse what some people call "a homosexual lifestyle" and that "homogenital behavior is objectively immoral" because intercourse may only occur between a man and a women and every act of intercourse "must be open to the possible creation of new human life." This doctrine is rooted in the Genesis 2-3 when God created man and woman to be in union with one another.

The bishops were careful to add that although sexuality is integral to one's identity, sexual orientation-be it heterosexual or homosexual-does not necessarily imply that identity is all about sexual activity. Chastity remains a most important virtue for all people, which is defined as "integrating one's thoughts, feelings, and actions, in the areas of human sexuality, in a way that values and respects one's own dignity and that of others" (Pontifical Council for the Family, The Truth and Meaning of Human Sexuality, 1996, n. 16).

The bishops advised parents to encourage their gay children to "cooperate with God's grace in order to live a chaste life." They also urged parents to avoid concentrating on homosexuality itself or to believe that therapy may change their children's sexual orientation for there is no data to support that such therapy works.

Throughout the document the bishops implored the local Church community to avoid shunning gays, justifying prejudice or violence against gays, or believing that HIV/ADIS is "direct punishment from God" but rather to welcome them. And they also encouraged gays to participate in the life and leadership of the Church.

In practice, the Church's discomfort over homosexuality is rather omnipresent and the 2001 priest pedophilia scandals didn't help, especially when many people assumed the offending priests were gay. The recent release of the film, "Milk," which is about gay activist Harvey Milk of San Francisco, and various states' initiatives to legalize gay marriage has again stirred up the controversy.

"The whole Church lives in an aura of fear and that doesn't exclude the hierarchy," said Tom Nelson whose son nearly committed suicide over his homosexuality. He has tried to no avail to convince Detroit bishops to change their teachings on homosexuality but it appears that veering away from official Church teaching remains a problem.

Emblematic of the Church's own fear of homosexuality is Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls' inference in 2002 that gays are unfit for the priesthood. He specifically referenced the U.S. priest pedophilia cases.

Mary Black also remains skeptical of the Church.

"I would never send anybody to a priest [to deal with a homosexual child]," she said. "Find a friend you trust instead."

While the Church wrestles with its own institutional policies and teachings on homosexuality, families like the Nelsons are leaving the Catholic community because of this issue. Out of six children, only one daughter is a regular Church-goer.

Sidebar - Support Groups for Parents of Gay Children

Dignity USA - www.dignityusa.org

Fortunate Families - www.fortunatefamilies.com

New Ways Ministry - www.newwaysministry.org

PFLAG - www.pflag.org

Author's Bio

Olga Bonfiglio is a professor at Kalamazoo College in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and author of Heroes of a Different Stripe: How One Town Responded to the War in Iraq. She has written for several national magazines on the subjects of religion, social justice, food and travel. Her website is www.OlgaBonfiglio.com. Contact her at olgabonfiglio@yahoo.com.