“I thought, ‘This man must be totally insane.’”īut he had discovered the strange irony of the Catholic closet - it isn’t secret at all. “There will be a time in your life when you will look back on this and you’re going to just love yourself for being gay,” Father Greiten remembered this man telling him. He reached out to a former seminary professor who he thought might also be a gay man. It was a revelation: There were other people studying to be priests who were gay. He did not jump, but confided his despair in a classmate. Many gay priests spoke of being pulled between denial and confusion, finally coming out to themselves in their 30s or 40s.įather Greiten was 24 when he realized he was gay and considered jumping from his dorm window. Priests in America tend to come out to themselves at a much later age than the national average for gay men, 15. With whom do you have a relationship that would be a healthy human relationship?” “You couldn’t have a particular friendship with a man, because you might end up being homosexual,” explained a priest, who once nicknamed his friends “the P.F.s.” “And you couldn’t have a friendship with a woman, because you might end up falling in love, and they were both against celibacy. The higher-ups warned for years: Any male friendship is too dangerous, could slide into something sexual or could turn into what they called a “particular friendship.” No going on walks alone together, no going to the movies in a pair. Numquam duo, semper tres, the warning goes.
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The code is taught early, often in seminary. It is a cage.” “You can be taught to act straight in order to survive.”Įven before a priest may know he is gay, he knows the closet. “Life in the closet is worse than scapegoating,” he said. “The vast majority of gay priests are not safe,” said Father Bob Bussen, a priest in Park City, Utah, who was outed about 12 years ago after he held Mass for the L.G.B.T.Q. Widespread scapegoating has driven many priests deeper into the closet. A cautious few priests stepped through.īut if the closet door cracked, the sex abuse crisis now threatens to slam it shut. When Pope Francis uttered his revolutionary question, “Who am I to judge?” in 2013, he tempted the closet door to swing open. Just a few years ago, this shift was almost unimaginable. “You feel like everyone is on a witch hunt now for things you have never done.” “This is my life,” a parish priest in the Northeast said.
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He could lose all three if his bishop finds his sexuality disqualifying, even if he is faithful to his vows of celibacy. The church almost always controls a priest’s housing, health insurance and retirement pension. Most are in active ministry, and could lose more than their jobs if they are outed. A few had been expressly forbidden to come out or even to speak about homosexuality. Some agreed to be photographed if their identities were concealed.Īlmost all of them required strict confidentiality to speak without fear of retribution from their bishops or superiors. They were interviewed in their churches before Mass, from art museums on the weekend, in their apartments decorated with rainbow neon lights and between classes at seminary. Two dozen gay priests and seminarians from 13 states shared intimate details of their lives in the Catholic closet with The New York Times over the past two months. A priest in Florida put it this way: “A third are gay, a third are straight and a third don’t know what the hell they are.” One priest in Wisconsin said he assumed every priest was gay unless he knows for a fact he is not. Some priests say the number is closer to 75 percent.
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But gay men probably make up at least 30 to 40 percent of the American Catholic clergy, according to dozens of estimates from gay priests themselves and researchers.
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The stories of gay priests are unspoken, veiled from the outside world, known only to one another, if they are known at all.įewer than about 10 priests in the United States have dared to come out publicly.