The Association of Roman Catholic Women Priests: God Created Us All Equal-Gay and Straight, See Roman Catholic Bishops Statements that Challenge Anti-Gay Prejudice after Orlando Massacre

The Association of Roman Catholic Women Priests (ARCWP) has always stood in  loving solidarity with  the  Gay Community. We, in ARCWP, have been calling our institutional

Left to right: Jane Via RCWP, Janice Sevre Duszynska ARCWP and Roy Bourgeouis at Vatican Embassy in Washington DC at Prayer Vigil on Holy Thursday, March 24, 2016

Church to embrace equality and justice for LGBTQI community and women priests. God created us all equal-Gay and Straight. 
We have a number of LGBTQI in our women priest inclusive communities...all are equal and welcome at our table. "There is no them, there is only us, " as Jesuit James Martin wrote.  We are one in Christ. 
We pray for all the victims of the Orlando Massacre. This violence is rooted in sick teaching. Now is the time for the Roman Catholic Church to change its official teaching that homosexuals are "objectively disordered". This teaching is cruel, promotes self-hatred and contributes to suicide and to violence against LGBTQI. It is based on a theology that is inconsistent with the teaching of Jesus who shows us that God is love and that we are called to love one another. This is also a call to live Gospel non-violence in our communities locally and globally as instruments of peace. 
Bridget Mary Meehan ARCWP www.arcwp.org, sofiabmm@aol.com

https://evangelizadorasdelosapostoles.wordpress.com/2016/06/15/multiples-los-obispos-catolicos-de-mostrar-solidaridad-con-la-comunidad-gay-la-asociacion-de-mujeres-sacerdotes-cato

(Statement Delivered to Vatican Embassy on March 24, 2016 and on June 1, 2016 to Pope Francis)

To Pope Francis and the Catholic Church:

Where there is injustice, silence is complicity. We have come to the Vatican Embassy in Washington, D.C. this Holy Thursday, March 24,

2016, to speak out against the grave injustice being done to women and gay people by the Catholic Church.

WOMEN IN THE CHURCH: God created women and men equal: “There is neither male nor female. In Christ you are one.” (Galatians 3:28) God calls both men and women to the priesthood, but Catholic women who are called are rejected because of their gender. Who are men to say that their call from God is authentic, but God’s call to women is not?

The ordination of women is not a problem with God, but with an all-male clerical culture that views women as inferior to men. The problem is sexism and sexism, like racism, is a sin.

GAYS IN THE CHURCH: The official teaching of the Catholic Church states that homosexuals are “objectively disordered.” For millions of gay people, this teaching instills shame and self-hatred. It has contributed to gay people being rejected by their families, fired from their jobs, bullied and even killed. This teaching has also contributed to suicides, especially among teenagers.

God does not make mistakes in creation. Our all-loving God created everyone of equal worth and dignity: gay and straight. Our Church’s teaching on homosexuality is cruel and is based on a theology inconsistent with the teaching of Jesus.

We are here today to call upon Pope Francis and the Catholic Church to ordain women and start treating LGBT people as equals.

                                           In solidarity,

                                           Jane Via, RCWP

                                           Janice Sevre-Duszynska, ARCWP

                                           Roy Bourgeois

odel of Ordained Ministry in a Renewed Roman Catholic Church"

Roman Catholic Womenpriests Responds to Massacre in Orlando Roman Catholic Womenpriests mourn those killed in the Orlando Massacre and all killed by gun violence. Our hearts and prayers are with the LGBTQI community grieving the loss of friends, siblings, spouses and children. We call on all religious and political leaders to follow the Gospel call to Love Our Neighbor and condemn violence and oppression of any kind toward the LGBTQI community. Our prayers are also with the Muslim community, who too often become victims of Islamophobic retaliation in attacks like this one. Board President Jennifer O’Malley says, “Roman Catholic Womenpriests condemn this senseless act of violence and reaffirm our commitment to welcome all to the table of God regardless of sexual orientation, gender or ethnicity.” MEDIA CONTACT:Jennifer O'Malley Board President Roman Catholic Women Priests-USA http://www.churchmilitant.com/news/article/multiple-bishops-show-solidarity-with-gay-community#.V2FA5rjn3tI.mailto

"Bishop accuses Catholic Church of "anti-gay prejudice" following Orlando massacre"

DETROIT (ChurchMilitant.com) - Several American prelates are conveying support for Catholic homosexuals in the wake of the weekend's terror attack in a Florida gay nightclub, chastising the Church for its alleged "anti-gay" prejudice. 

Following Sunday morning's attack at the Orlando nightclub that left 50 people dead, including the shooter, Omar Mateen, multiple bishops issued statements expressing their solidarity with the LGBT community. In a letter read to the Chicago's Archdiocesan Gay and Lesbian Outreach (AGLO) before Sunday Mass, Abp. Blase Cupich declared the archdiocese of Chicago stands with "the whole lesbian and gay community."

"For you here today," Cupich wrote, "and throughout the whole lesbian and gay community who are particularly touched by the heinous crimes committed in Orlando, motivated by hate, driven perhaps by mental instability and certainly empowered by a culture of violence, know this: the Archdiocese of Chicago stands with you. I stand with you." The archbishop continued: 

Let our shared grief and our common faith in Jesus, who called the persecuted blessed, unite us so that hatred and intolerance are not allowed to flourish, so that those who suffer mental illness know the support of a compassionate society, so that we find the courage to face forthrightly the falsehood that weapons of combat belong anywhere in the civilian population.

In an initial statement published Sunday on Facebook, the prelate ignored terrorist Omar Sateen's connection to the Islamic State and the Muslim faith as motives for the massacre, instead labeling "easy access to deadly weapons" as the cause of the mass shooting, the worst seen on U.S. soil. "We can no longer stand by and do nothing," Cupich declared. "Our prayers and hearts are with the victims of the mass shooting in Orlando, their families and our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters."

Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego echoed the words of Cupich in a blog post published Monday, in which he asserted the "hatred and violence" behind the shootings are "rooted in a counterfeit notion of religious faith and magnified by [the American] gun culture." 

"This tragedy is a call for us as Catholics to combat ever more vigorously the anti-gay prejudice which exists in our Catholic community and in our country," McElroy stated. "We pray for the Muslim community in our nation, who have acted in unanimity to deplore this act of violence and to reject hatred rooted in a distortion of Muslim faith."  

Bishop Robert Lynch, head of the diocese of St. Petersburg, Florida, in a blog postMonday accused the Church of alleged intolerance toward the LGBT community and stated it is "religion, including our own, which targets, mostly verbally, and also often breeds contempt for gays, lesbians and transgender people."

"Attacks today on LGBT men and women often plant the seed of contempt, then hatred, which can ultimately lead to violence," the bishop wrote. He concluded by asserting that "there are as many good, peace loving and God fearing Muslims to be found as Catholics or Methodists or Mormons or Seventh Day Adventists."

Father James Martin, editor-at-large of Jesuit magazine America, criticized those prelates who either did not publicly acknowledge the massacre or failed to mention the LGBT community in their statements. "This is revelatory," Martin wrote. "It reveals how the LGBT community is invisible to much of [the] Church. Even in death they are invisible. For too long Catholics have treated the LGBT community as 'other.' But for the Christian there is no 'other.' There is no 'them.' There is only 'us.'"

The statements come as reports swirl that the shooter himself may have been gay. Multiple individuals who spoke with the Orlando Sentinel and other news outlets claim 29-year-old Omar Mateen frequented Pulse nightclub for years prior to the massacre Sunday morning, and others recall receiving messages from Mateen on gay dating apps. A former police academy classmate of Mateen's also maintains the gunman was a closeted homosexual.

Mateen's ex-wife also alluded to a private homosexual lifestyle. "When we had gotten married, he confessed to me about his past ... that he very much enjoyed going to clubs and the nightlife, and there was a lot of pictures of him," she stated in an interview with CNN. "I feel like it's a side of him or a part of him that he lived, but probably didn't want everybody to know about."