Homosexual Behavior

Regnum Christi Spirituality Center Ask a Priest

“Ask a Priest: What If I Were to Transgender?”

Q: I am a new convert and joined the Church at the Easter vigil. I have a question regarding transgender sexuality. If a person is born male and they engage in sexual acts with another male, that is considered homosexual and a sin. But what if a person was born male, undergoes hormone therapy, surgery, etc., and transitions to female? Would it then be considered homosexual for that person to be involved with a male? Would it be considered homosexual/lesbian for this person to then be with a woman? Or, if a male transitions to female, is their only acceptable partner a female who transitioned to male? I have been struggling with what to consider. I am afflicted with transgender thoughts and am contemplating transitioning. But if I do, where do I fall? Completely celibate? Or is there a path for me to go forward and find a compatible partner? I would really appreciate some moral guidance. – R.

Answered by Fr. Edward McIlmail, LC

A: It’s good to see that you were drawn to the Church, and in that sense a warm welcome is in order. The catechesis you received before entering the Church now needs to be deepened and broadened.

It’s providential that you have entered the embrace of the Church now, since this gives you the chance to get real guidance.

Lesson one: All the talk about transgendering is nonsense.

You were created as a male. You are a beloved son of God. And his glory shines through you in your masculinity.

One of the key steps to happiness is learning to accept ourselves as we really area.

Pope Francis has touched on this theme in regard to our sexuality.

In his encyclical Laudato Si’ the Holy Father wrote:

“Pope Benedict XVI spoke of an ‘ecology of man,’ based on the fact that ‘man too has a nature that he must respect and that he cannot manipulate at will.’ It is enough to recognize that our body itself establishes us in a direct relationship with the environment and with other living beings.

“The acceptance of our bodies as God’s gift is vital for welcoming and accepting the entire world as a gift from the Father and our common home, whereas thinking that we enjoy absolute power over our own bodies turns, often subtly, into thinking that we enjoy absolute power over creation. Learning to accept our body, to care for it and to respect its fullest meaning, is an essential element of any genuine human ecology. Also, valuing one’s own body in its femininity or masculinity is necessary if I am going to be able to recognize myself in an encounter with someone who is different” (No. 155).

Being male or female doesn’t mean we are locked into stereotypical ways of dealing with life, however.

“It is true,” Francis writes in his apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia (No. 286), “that we cannot separate the masculine and the feminine from God’s work of creation, which is prior to all our decisions and experiences, and where biological elements exist which are impossible to ignore.”

He adds: “But it is also true that masculinity and femininity are not rigid categories. It is possible, for example, that a husband’s way of being masculine can be flexibly adapted to the wife’s work schedule. Taking on domestic chores or some aspects of raising children does not make him any less masculine or imply failure, irresponsibility or cause for shame. Children have to be helped to accept as normal such healthy ‘exchanges’ which do not diminish the dignity of the father figure.”

What might be happening in your particular case is that you are a bit confused about your identity. You are not accepting yourself as you are. That is a different kind of question.

The best thing would be to find a solid, regular confessor and/or spiritual director who can guide you. It might also be helpful to seek out a counselor (suggestion: Catholic Therapists).

For now, as always, you are called to live a life of chastity in the stage of life you find yourself. Homosexual behavior is absolutely prohibited.

As for the various scenarios you ask about, the simple rule is this: If born a male, a person has to conduct himself as a man. If born a female, a person has to conduct herself as a woman. Period.

If a life of celibacy awaits you, then that can be a path toward holiness. Celibacy doesn’t hold anyone back from loving others at the deepest level, as Christ loved others.

In any case, part of our call to love is to love ourselves as we are created.

Stay close to the Blessed Virgin Mary. She will help you to accept yourself.

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Today’s secular world throws curve balls at us all the time. AskACatholicPriest is a Q&A feature that anyone can use. Just type in your question or send an email to [email protected] and you will get a personal response back from one of our priests at RCSpirituality. You can ask about anything – liturgy, prayer, moral questions, current events… Our goal is simply to provide a trustworthy forum for dependable Catholic guidance and information. So go ahead and ask your question…

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Regnum Christi Spirituality Center Ask a Priest

“Ask a Priest: Could the Magisterium Be Wrong on the Issue of Homosexuality?

Q: I am currently a catechumen and should be baptized and confirmed next year at the Easter Vigil Mass. I have two questions which are of great importance to my faith, though they are deeply interconnected. My first question is about homosexuality. For the sake of context, I am a homosexual man, and I do struggle with the Church’s teachings on homosexuality, but not because of emotional difficulty. I am a bit of an armchair philosopher. It was St. Thomas Aquinas’ Summa Theologiae which convinced me to become a Catholic, and I base my sense of morality in natural law theory because of him. However, the Thomistic arguments for the immorality of homosexual acts have not convinced me, and further, in an attempt to think the issue through from a Thomistic perspective, I am inclined to think that homosexual acts can be morally permissible as far as natural law theory is concerned, but I have heard it said that natural law cannot truly conflict with divine law and Church teaching, so this produces a dilemma for me. I know this is at odds with the magisterial teachings of the Church, and this bothers me. If I am factually in the wrong, I want to be corrected. But if I am right, it introduces a new problem, and that is how to view the infallibility of the magisterium. I do accept the infallibility of the magisterium in matters of faith and morality, in principle. I have been told that the magisterium is infallible because of a charism/grace granted by the Holy Spirit to the individuals who exercise the offices of magisterial authority. But I have also been told that grace can be resisted, due to free will. If this is so, there is the possibility of culture putting blinders on their eyes, so to speak, and this isn’t something they could be at fault for if they are ignorant of the fact that they have these implicit biases in the first place. So please, tell me where I’ve gone wrong, because I don’t want to be in conflict with the Church unnecessarily. – R.

Answered by Fr. Edward McIlmail, LC

A: It is good to hear that you are drawn to the Church, despite your difficulty with some of its teachings.

Church teaching is deep and broad, and it all fits together. It is the fruit of centuries of reflection, guided by the magisterium, which enjoys the gift of infallibility.

The answer to your first question (about homosexuality) lies partly in the answer to the second (about the magisterium). Here I have to sidestep the issue of natural law, since it involves a much longer kind of answer. But since you have a passion for philosophy and theology, I can recommend The Way of the Lord Jesus, by German Grisez, as worthwhile, post-Vatican II treatment of moral theology from a Thomistic point of view. The entire four-volume work is available ONLINE HERE. Now onto the issue.

First, the gift of infallibility functions like a guardrail on the side of a mountain road. It keeps cars from plunging over the cliff, no matter how bad the drivers are.

Fortunately, infallibility doesn’t even depend on people being open to grace. It is simply a gift whereby the Holy Spirit will prevent a pope or ecumenical council, for instance, from making an error in a matter of faith or morals to be held by the universal Church.

In practice this means a saintly pope as well as a corrupt pope (and there were a few of them in the early Middle Ages and the Renaissance) are both protected from teaching error in the area of faith and morals.

Without this guarantee we could never really be sure that Church teaching was on course.

Now, the issue of homosexuality — and here we mean homosexual behavior — is not an insignificant matter. If the Church were wrong on this point, then there is no reason to think it has gotten anything right.

What that means in practical terms is this: It isn’t unusual for someone to have difficulty with one point of Church teaching or another. I dare say that if a pop quiz on doctrine was distributed in any given parish church on any given Sunday, not every Catholic in the pews would get high marks.

Learning the faith, in fact, can be a lifelong task. The key point is that, when faced with a teaching we find hard to accept, the best thing is to give the Church the benefit of the doubt, and then try to research the point more.

Perhaps a better text to read on this issue is John Paul II’s theology of the body (the Waldstein translation is recommended you can find it HERE).

You are probably familiar with the Catechism on the matter of homosexuality. Two numbers worth quoting here are:

2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them 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 to the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross 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. [end of quoted material]

Significantly the Church believes that people with same-sex attraction can aspire to the heights of holiness, with the help of prayer and the sacraments.

That is a nutshell is what the Church and its teachings are here to help all of us become: holy.

Perhaps its high ideals are among the factors that draw you to the Catholic faith. That dynamic is something you want to pursue. Don’t give up your journey because of a difficulty you have with a teaching.

It might help you to find a priest or spiritual director who could guide you and give you encouragement at this moment. This journey of faith is one that you don’t need to make alone.

Keep learning more with Ask a Priest

Got a question? Need an answer?

Today’s secular world throws curve balls at us all the time. AskACatholicPriest is a Q&A feature that anyone can use. Just type in your question or send an email to [email protected] and you will get a personal response back from one of our priests at RCSpirituality. You can ask about anything – liturgy, prayer, moral questions, current events… Our goal is simply to provide a trustworthy forum for dependable Catholic guidance and information. So go ahead and ask your question…

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Regnum Christi Spirituality Center Ask a Priest

“Ask a Priest: Being in a Same-Sex Union, Can I Return to the Church?”

Q: I have been away from the Church for 15 years. I would like to return to the Church and take Communion, but I know I must confess my mortal sins first. How do I approach confession after so long? Also, I am in a same-sex marriage. Is there a way for me to return to the Church in the first place? – R.

Answered by Fr. Edward McIlmail, LC

It is good that you feel a desire to return to the practice of your Catholic faith, and to be able to partake of Communion again. Even when we are away from the sacraments for a while, the Church still considers us her sons. And Jesus himself says that there is more rejoicing in heaven over one lost sheep who returns than over 99 who have no need of repentance (Luke 15:7).

Receiving Communion, as you mentioned, means being in a state of grace (no mortal sins). So after 15 years of being away, a good confession would be one of the key first steps.

One of the ingredients for making a good confession is to have contrition for one’s sins. No. 1451 of the Catechism says, “Contrition is ‘sorrow of the soul and detestation for the sin committed, together with the resolution not to sin again.'”

The “resolution not to sin again” means that we have to make an effort to break with sin. In the case of someone in a same-sex union, that would require ending the relationship and separating from the other person.

This would be required for your own spiritual benefit, which is what the Church is concerned about here.

The Catechism in No. 2358 says, “The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them 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 to the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.”

Out of a sense of love and duty, the Church teaches 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” (Catechism, 2357).

The Church understands that there is a lot of confusion today about the right use of sexuality. It also knows that God has a plan for sexuality, and that it is meant to unite a man and woman within the bond of marriage.

So the first question would be: Are you willing to break with this relationship? That would be a prerequisite for making a good confession and receiving Communion.

This will require a radical change in your life. Perhaps you are ready for this change, perhaps not.

At least for now it would be helpful to make time for prayer each day. Pray to the Blessed Virgin Mary for help. Feel free to attend Mass, even if you can’t receive Communion. Just hearing the readings and the prayers and the homilies might help you on your spiritual journey.

Perhaps you might seek out a local pastor and, if you aren’t ready for that radical break, at least speak with him about your situation.

The Church is here to help you each step of the way. Sometimes the road back home seems difficult. But with the grace of God anything is possible.

For an idea on the Church’s concern for people with same-sex attractions, you might check out “The Third Way“. Here is also a good guide to confession, that could help.

I hope some of this helps. Count on my prayers.

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Alex Kucera

Atlanta

Alex Kucera has lived in Atlanta, GA, for the last 46 years. He is one of 9 children, married to his wife Karmen, and has 3 girls, one grandson, and a granddaughter on the way. Alex joined Regnum Christi in 2007. Out of the gate, he joined the Helping Hands Medical Missions apostolate and is still participating today with the Ghana Friendship Mission.

In 2009, Alex was asked to be the Atlanta RC Renewal Coordinator for the Atlanta Locality to help the RC members with the RC renewal process. Alex became a Group Leader in 2012 for four of the Atlanta Men’s Section Teams and continues today. Running in parallel, in 2013, Alex became a Team Leader and shepherded a large team of good men.

Alex was honored to be the Atlanta Mission Coordinator between 2010 to 2022 (12 years), coordinating 5-8 Holy Week Mission teams across Georgia. He also created and coordinated missions at a parish in Athens, GA, for 9 years. Alex continues to coordinate Holy Week Missions, Advent Missions, and Monthly missions at Good Shepherd Catholic Church in Cumming, GA.

From 2016 to 2022, Alex also served as the Men’s Section Assistant in Atlanta. He loved working with the Men’s Section Director, the Legionaries, Consecrated, and Women’s Section leadership teams.

Alex is exceptionally grateful to the Legionaries, Consecrated, and many RC members who he’s journeyed shoulder to shoulder, growing his relationship with Christ and others along the way. He knows that there is only one way, that’s Christ’s Way, with others!