Jan 30, 2004   | COMMENTS     

BRUSSELS — Few gay men and lesbians are actually gay and the rest are “sexual perverts,” a Belgian cardinal said last week in an interview, Reuters reported. “I am willing to write in my own blood that of all those who call themselves lesbian or gay, a maximum of five to 10 percent are effectively lesbian or gay,” Cardinal Gustaaf Joos, 80, told the Belgian weekly P-Magazine, Reuters reported. “All the rest are just sexual perverts,” Joos told the publication. Joos, made a cardinal late last year by Pope John Paul II, also is a parish priest in the small Belgian town of Landskouter, Reuters reported. “I demand you write that down,” he said in the interview. “I don’t care if they all come protesting at my door.” A spokesperson for the Belgian Catholic Church said Joos was speaking as a private citizen and his views do not represent those of Belgian bishops, Reuters reported. “Real homosexuals don’t wander in the streets in colorful suits. Those are people who have a serious problem and have to live with that. And if they make a mistake they will be forgiven. We have to help these people and not judge them,” Joos said in the interview, Reuters reported. “The church ... rejects homosexuality, not the homosexual.”

Pope calls on media to reject contraception, homosexuality
VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope John Paul II criticized the media last week, saying it often gives a positive depiction of extramarital sex, contraception, abortion and homosexuality that is harmful to society. The pontiff, in a statement issued ahead of the Catholic Church’s World Communications Day in May, urged the media to promote traditional family life. “All communication has a moral dimension,” his statement said. “People grow or diminish in moral stature by the words which they speak and the messages which they choose to hear.” He also said, “Infidelity, sexual activity outside of marriage, and the absence of a moral and spiritual vision of the marriage covenant are depicted uncritically, while positive support is at times given to divorce, contraception, abortion and homosexuality. Such portrayals, by promoting causes inimical to marriage and the family, are detrimental to the common good of society,” the pope said.

Focus on the Family to Bush: No strings on faith grants
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) — Representatives of one of the nation’s largest religious organizations said last week that President Bush’s plan to give federal money to church social service programs won’t work if it comes with strings attached. Bush spoke of a need to take advantage of faith-based services in his State of the Union address. Officials from Focus on the Family said federal rules requiring church groups to hire nonbelievers or people of other faiths would scuttle the plan. “It is imperative that we hire individuals with traditional biblical views, especially of God’s design for sexuality,” said Mike Haley, who runs a Focus on the Family program that tries to “convert” gays to become straight. Members of Focus on the Family and five other organizations were invited to speak before a hearing of the House Subcommittee on Criminal Justice, Drug Policy and Human Resources.

Notorious anti-gay preacher to protest Oregon photo display
BEAVERTON, Ore. — Rev. Fred Phelps, an anti-gay Kansas minister, said last week he plans to bring a group to protest a photograph exhibit sponsored by the Beaverton School District and displaying family diversity, the Oregonian reported. Phelps, pastor of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan., said nearly two dozen members of his church plan to travel to Oregon and picket Feb. 9 where the exhibit is being housed, the newspaper reported. Gay rights leaders said they will respond to the protest, but are hesitant to spark a confrontation and give credibility to Phelps’ efforts, according to the Oregonian. Phelps opposes the photo exhibit because it includes families with gay or lesbian members, the newspaper reported. “There is no pro-homosexual agenda,” Maureen Wheeler, a district spokesperson, told the newspaper. “This is about promoting respect and acceptance of all students in our district.”

Iowa priest gets one year for child porn possession
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — A Roman Catholic priest convicted of downloading images and movies of child pornography on a laptop computer he used to publish a church newspaper was sentenced last week to one year in prison. Rev. Richard Poster, the former director of liturgy and publisher of the newspaper for the diocese of Davenport, pleaded guilty in August to receiving pictures of children engaged in sexually explicit conduct. Poster told the judge he would not return ...