With the heightening crisis in the Catholic Church, THE WEEKLY STANDARD readers might recall a relevant article published in this magazine in July 2002 by Mary Eberstadt:
NO MATTER what is decided in Dallas or elsewhere by the bishops and the rest of the Catholic hierarchy, some public reappraisal of homosexuality in American life seems very nearly an inevitable consequence of the Church's man-boy sex problem. In following through, we are all called to intellectual humility, and the Catholics among us to spiritual humility as well. For believing Catholics, more than any others, it makes no more sense to be "homophobic" than to be "contracepto-phobic," say, or "fornicato-phobic," or "phobic" of any other group falling short of the Church's rigorous moral demands. The Catholic church teaches compassion towards all mortals, homosexuals very much included. The Catechism, among other Church documents, emphasizes this particular call to charity: "This [homosexual] inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most a trial." At the same time, today's ideological sensitivities must not be allowed to trump what ought to be a universal effort to protect the young. Much about human sexuality remains a mystery, and we may never know why men who abuse children do what they do. But if humility is now required of Catholics, so too is backbone. If it takes shutting down certain seminaries to protect boys of the present and future, close them now. If vocations to the priesthood should be so far reduced by stringent screening for abuse victims that American Catholics have to travel 50 miles to Mass, let them drive. And if protecting children means reopening the uncomfortable question of what makes sexual orientation, that too is a sacrifice that everyone should be willing to make. There is more than enough for all of us to do, Catholic and non-Catholic. As John Paul II said, this mission is society-wide.