On the front page of today’s Washington Times is a story about Fr. James Haley, a priest of the Diocese of Arlington, Virginia, who was silenced by his bishop back in 2001 after he spoke out about homosexual priests. He has been involved in an ecclesiastical lawsuit to resolve his situation and he’s even had sexual misconduct allegations made against him (after his silencing).
Fr. Haley claims that 60 percent of the priests of Arlington are gay. Sources I’ve heard from, ones who know the Arlington situation very well and are themselves critics of the lavender mafia in the priesthood, think that’s an exaggeration. A big exaggeration.
If only men can be bishops, then why do so few *men* get appointed?
Why doesn’t Haley obey orders and stay silent? Good question. The answer is more or less given away, as the article discusses the material he is collecting for a possible book. Maybe he thinks he has nothing to lose.
For all the claims to “orthodoxy” that pervade a jurisdiction like Arlington, there are a few cracks in the surface here and there. For a long time, every new church built looked like a barn. That’s not so true anymore. There was a period of over a year when we were without a bishop, when some of the shenanigans described in the article went on.
The younger priests are all really straight arrows for the most part. And that generation is just now taking over leadership of parishes. Most came in while Father Jim Gould was vocations director. In the article, he had some good words for Father Haley. Makes you wonder…
From close up, the situation is a bit more complicated than “Haley good, Loverde bad.” But it does betray the clumsy way that scandal is handled by a local church.
I think Father Haley should study Saint Francis and Martin Luther. They both confronted terrible trouble in the church. One built it up and the other tore it down.
Loverde isn’t perfect but he did speak out before the election about abortion and politicians, and he has got a guy in the office (finally, after two misfires) who seems to have his head together about child sex abuse, parental rights and the lot.
I think Father Haley should study Saint Francis and Martin Luther. They both confronted terrible trouble in the church. One built it up and the other tore it down.
Loverde isn’t perfect but he did speak out before the election about abortion and politicians, and he has got a guy in the office (finally, after two misfires) who seems to have his head together about child sex abuse, parental rights and the lot.
Wow, I love understatements like that.
Imagine that—Loverde isn’t perfect. =) No kidding.
Wow, I love understatements like that.
Imagine that—Loverde isn’t perfect. =) No kidding.
I was really troubled by Haley’s attitude that he was punished for complying with his legal obligation to testify at a deposition to which he had been subpoenaed. If you read the transcript of that deposition, you can see that he did a lot more than just answer the questions put to him. He took the opportunity to engage in a free-wheeling discussion of everything he didn’t like about the diocese. (I can hear his defense right now: “No I didn’t; there are lots of things I don’t like about the diocese that I didn’t get around to discussing because the stuff I did took up so much time.”) In the process, he threw out casual, unsupported, and unsolicited accusations that several priests of Arlington and neighboring dioceses were homosexuals (including the rector of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, the then-rector of Arlington’s cathedral, and the priest who baptised my oldest son), which seemed to fall right under the dictionary definition of detraction.
Interestingly, among those he accused of collecting homosexual porn was the pastor who carried on an affair with a married woman in his parish, who later broke up her marriage to “marry” the pastor. That’s hard to reconcile with the hypothesis of homosexuality.
I admit that Fr. Haley found himself assigned to work under some real losers (the aforesaid adulterer, and two embezzlers), but there are things in his story that just don’t make sense. I hope the ecclesiastical trial gets to the bottom of things. I just hope that if Bishop Doran ends up upholding Bishop Loverde, people don’t accuse him of being “part of the cover up,” the way some people did about Independent Counsel Ken Starr when Starr concluded that Vince Foster had actually just committed suicide.
I was really troubled by Haley’s attitude that he was punished for complying with his legal obligation to testify at a deposition to which he had been subpoenaed. If you read the transcript of that deposition, you can see that he did a lot more than just answer the questions put to him. He took the opportunity to engage in a free-wheeling discussion of everything he didn’t like about the diocese. (I can hear his defense right now: “No I didn’t; there are lots of things I don’t like about the diocese that I didn’t get around to discussing because the stuff I did took up so much time.”) In the process, he threw out casual, unsupported, and unsolicited accusations that several priests of Arlington and neighboring dioceses were homosexuals (including the rector of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, the then-rector of Arlington’s cathedral, and the priest who baptised my oldest son), which seemed to fall right under the dictionary definition of detraction.
Interestingly, among those he accused of collecting homosexual porn was the pastor who carried on an affair with a married woman in his parish, who later broke up her marriage to “marry” the pastor. That’s hard to reconcile with the hypothesis of homosexuality.
I admit that Fr. Haley found himself assigned to work under some real losers (the aforesaid adulterer, and two embezzlers), but there are things in his story that just don’t make sense. I hope the ecclesiastical trial gets to the bottom of things. I just hope that if Bishop Doran ends up upholding Bishop Loverde, people don’t accuse him of being “part of the cover up,” the way some people did about Independent Counsel Ken Starr when Starr concluded that Vince Foster had actually just committed suicide.
Make that one embezzler and two collectors of homosexual porn (totalling two pastors).
Make that one embezzler and two collectors of homosexual porn (totalling two pastors).
“Thatnt>
For all the claims to “orthodoxy” that pervade a jurisdiction like Arlington, there are a few cracks in the surface here and there. For a long time, every new church built looked like a barn. That’s not so true anymore. There was a period of over a year when we were without a bishop, when some of the shenanigans described in the article went on.
The younger priests are all really straight arrows for the most part. And that generation is just now taking over leadership of parishes. Most came in while Father Jim Gould was vocations director. In the article, he had some good words for Father Haley. Makes you wonder…
From close up, the situation is a bit more complicated than “Haley good, Loverde bad.” But it does betray the clumsy way that scandal is handled by a local church.