Courage, an organisation that supports same-sex attracted people is set to break out of the shadows and, with confidence and compassion, tell the Good News that really is good news. Anthony Barich reports.
By Anthony Barich
Hiding in the shadows for fear of persecution by media, Courage, a movement founded to support Catholics and others who experience same-sex attraction, is about to go public with the Good News – that they can live fulfilling lives chastely, in Christ.
An Oceania Courage Conference will bring the issue to the fore on October 16-18 at the La Valle Centre, a former Marist Brothers College that closed down last year, in Rosalie in inner Brisbane.
While there was interest shown from the Philippines and England, attendees are expected from around Australia and New Zealand.
The conference’s headline speaker is Fr Paul Check, a former US Marine and now moral theologian and international director of Courage.
Fr Peter Joseph, appointed this year by Cardinal George Pell as Sydney’s Courage chaplain, will attend also, as will Marie Mason from Melbourne who helps run Encourage, a movement to help family and friends of same-sex attracted people support them.
Brendan Scarce, director of Brisbane Courage, says: “It’s time for the Courage ministry to be more upfront, and live up to its name”.
It’s hard to maintain a good moral life without the support of others, Mr Scarce says, as the media and culture are “so against what Catholicism stands for”.
“The gay lobby has been so powerful that if you say anything, even as an academic, you’re labelled homophobic, and that stops many from making statements,” he said.
“It’s very intimidating, and there’s a lack of knowledge about Catholic sexuality and morality, and due to the overwhelming gay rights agenda and so many shows have a gay person in TV dramas, sitcoms etc, it’s very difficult to articulate a healthy stance, to show that you’re a compassionate person… if you raise the question you’re a homophobe.”
If anyone’s equipped to take the inevitable hits to come from the secular culture, it’s Mr Scarce, who is married with three children, though not same-sex attracted.
As a counsellor, he’s been in prison ministry and dealt with murderers, bank robbers and street kids.
“Psychiatry is always about being loving to the person I meet; embrace the person and be honest with them,” he says.
The conference is to tell Catholics there is a worthwhile, competent and compassionate ministry to men and women with same sex attraction.
Mr Scarce has written to 23 Australian bishops, including Archbishop Barry Hickey, for support.
“We’ve been under the radar for too long – necessarily as we needed to be prudent,” he said, “but we need to now educate pastors, family members of those attracted and priests, religious, all who may come into contact with same-sex attracted people so they know there’s something there to refer people to that has a Catholic ethos.”
Courage is a movement started in New York in 1980 by a group of same-sex attracted Catholics who had decided to commit themselves to a life of chastity.
To a popular culture that hails individual freedoms over an informed conscience and the common good, this concept is anathema. Poplar culture says that same-sex attracted people don’t have a choice, so anyone who suggests they can’t get married to the same sex as a bigot, a homophobe.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church says that it is for that very reason – that they did not choose the inclination for themselves – that they must be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity. It is, however, because homosexual acts close the sexual act to the gift of life and do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity, that the Church teaches that under no circumstances can they be approved.
But this does not mean that the inclination itself is sinful.
Like all temptations in life, it’s how one acts on it that counts.
Michael Curtin, editor of the Brisbane Courage Newsletter bi-monthly newsletter for 10 years that circulates to 100 around Australia, says the conference aims to capitalise on the momentum gained by the highly successful stall that Courage manned at the University of Notre Dame Australia at World Youth Day 2008 in Sydney.
Brisbane Courage became an Archdiocesan agency five years ago, and, as Mr Curtin says, aims to raise awareness of the Catholic Church’s position on homosexuality, “that it’s not a position of homophobia”.
They face an uphill battle. Even among the faithful, Mr Scarce says, there is confusion about the Church’s teaching and arguably a lack of education among clergy.
This, Mr Scarce says, is due to the prevailing culture, prompted by the powerful gay lobby, which wrongly confuses the Church’s teaching on complementarity and the openness to life with bigotry.
Pastorally, it presents another conundrum altogether. Archbishop Barry Hickey asked Perth Vicar for Clergy Fr Brian McKenna to start a ministry for same-sex attracted men two months ago.
The archbishop had heard many reports of same-sex attracted men approaching priests about how to develop their spiritual lives given their unique situation, but too often priests felt ill-equipped to deal with such situations.
Fr McKenna, chosen as he is co-director of the Archdiocesan Spirituality Centre, told The Record that same-sex attracted people are on a journey like the rest of humanity, seeking an encounter with God.
“I’m no psychotherapist, but it’s the same approach – finding out where God is operating in their lives, helping them reflect on their relationship with God.
“They’d have their challenges just like anyone else.”
Their situation is different though, he says, so pastoral care needs to be sensitive to that.
Mr Scarce says that, in his experience, the life of a chaste same-sex attracted person can be isolating, and there can be much pain involved.
The Catechism states as much: “These 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.”
Easier said than done. But wait, there’s more… “By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.”
Like all humanity, however, this journey is strewn with difficulties.
Mr Scarce says, “it is very difficult for the same-sex attracted. They have a life of conflict and suffering, as they’re going to have isolation and loneliness. Most heterosexuals have a partner in life, but the same-sex attracted know that ‘if I lead a Christian life, the life of the Cross, it means I can’t have a partner’, and it becomes a floundering point for many.
“This is where I see a lot of pain among same-sex attracted people,” he says.
Fr McKenna, who has already been contacted by same-sex attracted men since The Record publicised his new ministry, says it doesn’t have to be this way, though. “We all need to connect with other people; (living a chaste life) is not asking them to live a life in isolation, but for them living it as best they can in living out their relationship with God as well.”
“The Archbishop’s concern is that guys in this situation, they can feel isolated from the Church; he doesn’t want them to have that experience. “He wants them to have a connection with the Church, so it’s about showing pastoral concern as for anyone who is Catholic.”
There are same-sex attracted people who get married to the opposite sex. One man once in contact with Courage has taken such a path, and no longer keeps in contact with the group – “and that makes sense. That was a part of his life and he’s gone beyond the need for Courage.”
Mr Scarce refutes the notion that such people are living a lie. It’s just about self-mastery. The Catechism makes perfect sense.
“We all have our contradictions, we have choices, behaviours, and things we struggle with. If I deal with a pyromaniac or a kleptomaniac, I’d say keep away from places if it temps you.
“They may fail occasionally, but it’s part of who they are, it may be there their whole life. Some may always have a tendency a certain way, but we don’t have to be parading it,” he said.
“Sometimes I deal with a person who’s oversexed, they want affairs… but must have a discipline about their tendencies or where they go, near porn, etc.
“When people come to me about issues, with each person I ask about their background, why they want to leave their wife or husband, it’s a developing conversation and professional relationship, but also a brotherhood relationship to, or fellowship.”
St Paul’s personal testimony puts it succinctly in 2 Corinthians 12:9: “Three times I prayed to the Lord about this (physical ailment) and asked him to take it away. But his answer was: ‘My grace is all you need, for my power is strongest when you are weak.’ I am most happy, then, to be proud of my weaknesses, in order to feel the protection of Christ’s power over me. For when I am weak, I am strong.”
To bring Christ to others, Mr Curtin says the challenge for the Church is to meet people personally “so they can see in an incarnational way that the morality of the Church is something wholesome”.
Courage has received a particularly positive response from school teachers, happy that there is a coherent value-based education out there for a potentially confusing issue for teens.
“Homosexuality is actually such a minor part of the overall picture of sexuality, but reading magazines, watching TV, you’d think it’s major,” Mr Scarce says.
That’s why the conference will start with Theology of the Body, presented by Sydney’s Good Shepherd Rector Fr Anthony Percy, a specialist on the concept pioneered by Pope John Paul II and author of Theology of the Body Made Simple.
Ray Campbell, director of the Brisbane Archdiocesan Bioethics Centre, will also speak on Human Integrity in Human Sexuality, as will Sydney psychologist John Poon speak on Counselling the Same Sex Attracted.
Mr Scarce himself fell into this vocation.
“I didn’t want to get involved in the work, but I saw I had to do it. It’s like a vocation. I didn’t choose it, but I’ve accepted it and I know it’s my work to do,” he says.
He started off in a Protestant ministry where they would refer same-sex attracted people to him as they viewed the Catholic perspective as beneficial to such people.
There’s a humility about the work, though:
“In all my years of experience though, and all my degrees in psychology etc, I still don’t have the answers to everything.
“All I can offer is love.”
In the Archdiocese of Perth Courage can be contacted on: (08) 9472 5625.
The Catechism on same-sex attraction
Excerpts from the Catechism of the Catholic Church on same-sex attraction
– “They do not choose their homosexual condition; for most of them it is a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity.”
– 2357 Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity [Cf. Gen 19:1-29; Rom 1:24-27; 1 Cor 6:10; 1 Tim 1:10], tradition has always declared that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.”[Cf. Persona Humana] 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.
– 2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. They do not choose their homosexual condition; for most of them it is a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God’s will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross to the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.
– 2359 Homosexual persons are called to chastity. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.”
Source: The Catechism of the Catholic Church
Security guard finds redeeming truth in Catholic teaching
Monica* is same-sex attracted and believes the Catholic Church teaches the practical truth on sexuality. She doesn’t see her struggle as being against repression, but for liberation.
Monica, a 45-year-old Brisbane security guard (“professions like mine tend to attract lesbians”), had a brief lesbian affair at age 37, and was racked with guilt the whole time. She believes everything the Church teaches – that the homosexual inclination is ‘disordered’ as it closes the sexual act to the gift of life and does not proceed from sexual complementarity.
This is completely practical to Monica, and she finds support and fraternity among Brisbane Courage, knowing that she’s around others who know what she feels and strengthen each other through prayer and friendship.
It’s not that easy, of course, but Monica believes as sure as the sun rises that if one conscientiously resists the impulse to respond to temptation, one can ultimately start to get on top of their desires.
“Catholic morality absolutely has practical application,” she says, from personal experience.
“What really bugged me when I was with this woman I had the affair with was that I knew that it was a really dreadful way to treat another person, to just use them for your own gratification was the most horrible thing.
“I used to work with a bloke who was a playboy, he’d pick up women and dump them, and I knew I was doing the same thing – I didn’t love the person concerned.
“Yes, in my head, the whole Catholic moral teaching on human sexuality, sex before marriage and same-sex marriage is very integrated – it’s not just about rules and regulations, its about what the Church is really teaching in an integrated way, what it’s saying about the human person, what sex and marriage is all about, and what’s contrary to it.”
“Catholic teaching is not just about rules and regulations, it’s about what the Church is really teaching in an integrated way, what it’s saying about the human person.”
She’s now moved past the point where same sex attractions bother her. To Monica, it’s all about changing one’s mindset. Not to be ‘cured’ from homosexuality, so to speak, just to stop focusing on the impulse, and start focusing on things that bring her happiness… “although just when you think you’ve got it beat, they (the desires) come roaring back out of the blue in the most unexpected places”.
She knows it will be with her the rest of her life, but there’s not point dwelling on it. She’s even open to the possibility of a relationship with the opposite sex, should an opportunity present itself. “I don’t regard it as a particularly bad struggle, though I do struggle with it at times,” she says. “I know that if you conscientiously change the way you think about things you can get on top of it.”
It’s a struggle as she still has many gay friends – many of them female – but “I just make a conscientious effort not to get sucked in to their rhetoric and their way of looking at things, and try to maintain what would be a heterosexual world view, though I don’t t think I am one”.
Is this living a lie?
“My ultimate response would be: my understanding is that regardless of how we feel about people, acting on our impulses” that are not open to life and complementarity, she said, is, “one way or another, a failure to love. God is the author of love. I may see a woman and think I’m madly in love with her and imagine we should be together, but ultimately if I know that’s against the will of God then I know it has nothing to do with love.
“So when the gay lobby carries on about wanting to be together, why can’t we get married if we love each other, etc, that’s crap… and lets face it, Lucifer was one of the most beautiful angels in heaven before the fall, and he can still deceive our senses into thinking something that’s really ugly looks beautiful.
“What we have to stick with is the teaching of the Church as we know it’s the truth and to see past all those funny things that dazzle our senses.
“When I hear the gay lobby carry on about this, I just think, ‘You’re barking up the wrong tree’.”
Monica had a friend in the Pentecostal faith who, she says, “fell into the trap” with a woman and, said to her ‘why can’t you just be happy for me if I’m happy”.
“I said to her, ‘the reality is you’re not happy as you’re not living the life you’re supposed to live’. She ended up breaking up with this chick and texted me saying ‘I couldn’t do it as I knew its not right with God’.” The logic applies the same with heterosexual couples, she said, who contracept or have sex before marriage in the belief that it goes hand-in-hand with the love they have for each other.
Monica grew up in what she describes as a very privileged home with her parents, who she said didn’t have the perfect marriage but were never divorced, (“though I had some funny issues between me and my mum”), and a good education at Catholic schools. She is one of the organisers of the Oceania Courage Conference in Brisbane in October.
She contacted Brendan Scarce, the head of Brisbane Courage, in the wake of her lesbian affair, telling him “I’m in a psychological mess”. “I’ve never actually regarded or identified myself as gay, but I do certainly know what same sex attraction is,” she says now.
Courage, Monica says, helps her find her comfort zone, being around others who understand her faith issues and moral values. The group prays and chats about life.
“It’s comforting to know I was amongst people who knew where I was coming from, what I wanted to be and the difficulties that go with achieving that, as I didn’t enjoy my same-sex experience… I was pretty disgusted with myself, so it was nice to be able to talk to others who had understood the attraction and were trying to get on top of it. Since then, I certainly have not been in a situation since that I’ve been compelled to jump into bed with someone. It’s this quest for chastity.”
Monica kept her affair very secret, even her own family knows nothing of her same-sex attraction or her affiliation with Courage. She only revealed the affair to a select few friends.
“If my family asked me I’d deny it vigorously,” she says, but not so much because of the reaction she’d expect – though that is part of it… no, it’s more her sense of responsibility to the children of her siblings.
The second oldest of four children, she has six nieces and six nephews. “I know they’ll be adults and deal with adult things, and I was absolutely determined they wouldn’t have to deal with an issue like homosexuality prematurely just because good old auntie shoved it in their face. Some of my friends also have nieces of nephews have grown up with ‘auntie Deb’ having girlfriends instead of boyfriends.
Curiously, one of her brothers asked another brother if he thought Monica was gay, but the younger one was supremely confident she wasn’t. Monica heard about this but still did not reveal the truth, not wanting to give one the satisfaction of being right and not wanting the other to be disappointed in being wrong.
Living this life has its complications, but she says it comes down to pride – the sin, she says, that stops us from seeing that we’re sinning. She’s lived alone for 15 years, but knows that life will only get worse if she indulges in desires that sometimes come rushing back.
“It’s as much about humility as chastity,” she says.
*Monica is her Confirmation name.