The Devil and Daniel Avila

Daniel Avila’s article, “Some Fundamental Questions On Same-Sex Attraction”, caused such an outcry that it was pulled from the diocesan newspaper in which it appeared; the editor of the newspaper printed an apology; and Mr. Avila offered a “retraction/apology”. I’ve read Mr. Avila’s original article, the newspaper’s apology, and the retraction.

And I’d be left scratching my head…except that I’m as aware as anyone else of “political correctness” and the power of the homosexual political agenda, both outside the Church and within it.

It seems that the most volatile statement made in the article came from this paragraph:

In other words, the scientific evidence of how same-sex attraction most likely may be created provides a credible basis for a spiritual explanation that indicts the devil. Any time natural disasters occur, we as people of faith look back to Scripture's account of those angels who rebelled and fell from grace. In their anger against God, these malcontents prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls. They continue to do all they can to mar, distort and destroy God's handiwork. (my emphasis)

Of course, the first sentence – especially the part I’ve emphasized – was taken out of context by the mainstream media and the “gay” media. Mr. Avila did a fine job, I think, of summarizing: a) the pain-filled questions of those affected by homosexuality; b) the theological and logical reasons for not assuming that God wants homosexual people to act on their feelings; and c) the scientific evidence that speaks against a genetic cause of homosexuality.  And then he suggests that, as Catholics, we must look beyond the material:

We look for ultimate explanations that transcend the strictly physical world and that stretch beyond our limited ability to mold and reshape reality as we know it.

If you have not read the article, you should. It was removed from the diocesan website, but I was able to access it here.

Here’s an example of the gross misrepresentation of Mr. Avila’s statements to be found in the media: an article from the “Gay News Network” entitled “Devil makes you do it writer resigns”. Here are some excerpts, with my comments in brackets :

A senior advisor to the US Conference of Catholic Bishops has resigned after publishing an article stating Satan caused homosexuality. [This is not true. Nowhere does Mr. Avila state that Satan causes homosexuality.]

Avila called same-sex attraction a "natural disaster" caused by Satan entering the mother's womb. [This is a blatant lie. The author goes on to quote a sentence from the article, from which he presumably drew the above conclusion:] "…Whenever natural causes disturb otherwise typical biological development, leading to the personally unchosen beginnings of same-sex attraction, the ultimate responsibility, on a theological level, is and should be imputed to the evil one, not God," he wrote. [That’s a far cry from “Satan enters the mother’s womb”.]

The “Gay News Network” article concludes:

“Avila’s resignation is a good first step for the bishops,” Marianne Duddy-Burke, executive director of gay Catholic organisation Dignity USA told the Rainbow Times.

“But they need to demonstrate they understand the ramifications of the violent language against the gay Catholic community and our families. [I do not find “violent language” in Mr. Avila’s article!]

“Dignity USA is calling for a policy advisory committee consisting of LGBT Catholics and family members to be appointed by the bishops and to be consulted by them on decisions that affect to our community.”

There you have it: the homosexual agenda within the Church. The “gay” news media misrepresents the article, and the “LGBT” community demands to “be consulted”.

And it appears that our bishops are more interested in appeasing these misguided souls than in educating and counseling them. How difficult is it to quote the Catechism of the Catholic Church?

2357…Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared 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. Under no circumstances can they be approved.

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.

Frankly, I see nothing in Mr. Avila’s article that contradicts these paragraphs. Neither do I see in his article any malice toward homosexual people, nor any lack of compassion for their trials. He has not accused them of being possessed, nor of being evil in and of themselves! He has merely suggested that it is possible that Satan has a hand in the course of events that leads to a person experiencing same-sex attraction.

I don’t think he’s wrong.

Rachel Weeps

"A voice in Rama was heard, lamentation and great mourning; Rachel bewailing her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not." (Matthew 2:18, also Jeremiah 31:15) 

What we are doing to our children is unfathomable...

In Iraq, this report says, children of Christians are killed and displayed as if crucified in order to terrorize and torment the parents and force them to leave the country. What sort of mind a) conceives of such a vicious plan; and b) actually puts it into action? Who could do such a thing to a child?

In China, women are dying along with their unborn babies as abortions are forced on those who are pregnant without the necessary permission. There are plenty of stories of these atrocities from LifeSiteNews. The agony of these women and their families as their children are destroyed is unbearable to consider, yet we must confront it.

In the US, there are certainly many abortions that are coerced if not physically forced (though I believe there are accounts of the latter as well). Many other abortions are consented to by women who have bought the lie that "it's just a blob of cells", but who afterwards discover the truth, or recognize what they knew in their hearts was true, and then suffer the anguish and guilt of knowing they killed their own children.

All of this is horrendous and incomprehensible if you take even a couple of minutes to think it through. If you can't conjure up mental pictures, just do a google search online, and you'll find plenty of evidence of the horrors we are visiting upon our children.

That's not the end of it, though. These examples are all about physical harm - deplorable and disgusting and horrifying, of course. But what about spiritual harm, and even spiritual death? Is society not visiting that harm upon our children as well? Think about sex education at increasingly young ages, for instance. What is accomplished by this? How does it teach our children to think about sex? And now, of course, the homosexual political agenda is thrown into the mix, and we have children thinking about sex and becoming convinced that they are "gay". We have them exposed to contraceptive thinking early on;perhaps even more insidious is the information they are given on  how to prevent disease as well as pregnancy when they are having sex  - which is presented to them as their right and as something they should desire, and should be allowed to experience.

And of course there's homosexual marriage to consider. What does this issue say to our children? What is a marriage? What is a family? If parents are not actively teaching their children the answers to these questions - answers that up till fairly recently were so well-known and accepted that no explanation was needed, because most people were living examples of them - then their children will be indoctrinated into the liberal world view of "anything goes".

All of this exposes our children to spiritual harm, if not death. Their unformed consciences are battered by untruths which, in many cases, their parents are at a loss to combat, perhaps not even knowing what lies their children have been exposed to. And the more the lies and immoral lifestyles are played up in the media, the more numb a child's conscience will become, until finally there is no hope of resuscitation.

Rachel weeps - not just for the physically harmed children, but for the spiritually harmed children, too.

And I suspect Rachel weeps for the contracepted children as well. I know I do. But that's another story.