"The church is not a hotel for saints, it is a hospital for sinners."- Saint Augustine
If Augustine’s Confessions wasn’t clear enough about what he meant by this metaphor (real deliverance from sexual enslavement to sainthood), we shouldn't simply agree, we need to exemplify: Are we understanding and naming the "disease"? With due recognition that healing is a process, are "medical practitioners" intentionally engaged in "healing"? Is it actually happening?
Very specifically, if we're not calling adulterous, homosexual (LGBT+), extramarital activity "sin" (activity, not orientation!)-- if we're not intentionally engaged in the process of greater understanding, resulting in repentance and conversion, if we're merely "welcoming" them, we are disparaging the very purpose and capacity of church to be Christ's salvation in this world.
Worse, if we've validated such lifestyles by not addressing them, and are offering Holy Communion, we're not just making a mockery of the Sacrament, a lie of "communion," we're bringing condemnation upon them. (1 Cor. 11:29 / CCC 1385) The "hospital" ceases to be a place of healing, and in fact becomes a place of festering, terminal illness.
There is no love without truth, and no truth without love.
Truth is not something we can create, but Someone who created us. When we say "Amen" upon receiving the Eucharist, we are declaring our agreement with all the Church teaches. Without such assent, we're really lying. The whole point of God's revelation in Jesus Christ is our salvation, without which all matters faith and church are absurd. Without humble regard for such truth we are really worshiping ourselves in the name of God.
The third Spiritual Work of Mercy is to admonish the sinner. If we don't appropriately do so, even as we battle sin ourselves, we are committing a sin of omission.
We need to address perhaps the greatest epidemic of human history: "church as hospital" evoked, but not exemplified.
Last year Pope Francis appointed Fr. John Dolan from a "pro-LGBT parish" to join San Diego Bishop Robert McElroy as an auxiliary bishop. We all ought to "welcome" sinners. Without being sinners, we wouldn't need a Savior. The question, for which I am here genuinely and humbly seeking an answer: In all of their homiletic history (McElroy and Dolan), have they named the sins of extramarital sexual activity, including LGBT+ activity, and called for repentance and conversion? In short, as "medical practitioners" are they naming the "disease" and intentionally administering "healing"? Are people actually being healed?
With such evidence, many of us need to change our perceptions and attitudes. The degree to which we have judged wrongly (we are called to judge rightly, CCC 1749), where such evidence is evident, we need to sincerely and humbly repent.
However, without such clear evidence (we should not have to search... the masses should have no occasion to regard the "hospital" as anything other than the occasion for "healing" of sin), our concerns are not only legitimate, they are morally required. Silence implies consent. This is resulting in mass confusion. We must speak truth in love to our families, to our friends, to our culture, and yes, to our hierarchy.
St. Catherine of Siena, who was sainted in part for rightly challenging the popes of her day, put it best: “We’ve had enough of exhortations to be silent! Cry out with a hundred thousand tongues - I see the world is rotten because of silence."
The only orientation that matters is the one we all share: from sin to salvation in Jesus Christ.
We all need greater conversion. The church is meant to be the occasion of such conversion. A light on a hill.
To emphasize the real implications of all this, please read Joseph Schiambra’s testimonial, "The Catholic Church Should Apologize to Gays."
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