St. Louis Man Takes on Catholic Charity

That sure is a slippery use of the meaning of discrimination. If he disqualified himself then why was he allowed to be the vice-pres for 5 years. This is just another classic example of what is wrong with Catholicism. Don't want anything to do with it.

There has to be a way to get him to blow off his hatefilled church. And given that 50% ior more of the priests are gay, its time to form a gay priests union. Who will dare to tell the truth about the church. And bring it to its knees, or let its horrible immorality, grounded in Gobbles "if you tell a lie often enough it will be seen as the truth", result in its own self destruction. Supposedly there were three secrets revealed at Fatima in Portugal in 1917. The first two are not important. The 3rd one is that the church will be destroyed. Our job, as the army of truth, is to make it happen. And yes, ending their 501c3 status would be one hell of a firstt step. Anbd also convincing the many good catholics that they have the wrong church, and its time to leave and implement Jesus second of two commandments - to love thy neighboer as thyself. The grip on people by the church is the threat of hell, the scam of heaven, the pride of belonging, and the were a family aspect.

Okay, let us take the Church out of equation, and look at the Law. Society of St. Vincent de Paul of St. Louis is part of a 501(c)(3) non-profit incorporation from what information I have been able to find. The incorporation is bound by the laws in the state where it was incorporated and it's by-laws. If the by-laws do not specifically state that Gays cannot be president, he has a legal standing and can sue. If the bylaws state such, he may also have grounds to have the charity stripped of it's non-profit status. Remember these are incorporations and are still bound by the Law.

So, Zip Rzeppa might just as well have written: he disqualified himself by living a life of truth and openness instead of lies and hypocrisy, as the Catholic Church requires of its members.

Zip Rzeppa was a sports announcer years ago on a local TV station. My mother loved him because he was so enthusiastic. Sooner or later the RC Church will have to come to terms with gay and lesbian relationships. After all, popes had their slaves at times, and even the bishop of St. Louis and the St. Louis Jesuits had theirs. They eventually evolved to realize slavery was unjust and immoral, just as they will some day (probably not in my lifetime) come to terms with the immorality and injustice of discriminating against gay people. It is good to hear of people confronting them about their discriminatory behavior, nonetheless.

When you join a club you have to abide by the rules, and the Roman Catholic religion is no more than a club it seems. All Churches that continue to demean their gay members in such fashion show themselves to be clubs as well. It makes no sense to belong to these clubs, "as is"", find a real Christian Church.

It doesn't appear that Goldone has a leg to stand on in this argument. TheChurch does not condone homosexual relationships and he's in a homosexual relationship. So, obviously they are not going to want him as the President of one of their organizations. To force them to make an exception for Goldone would be a violation of their right to religious freedom. It's interesting that the Church described the relationship as "illicit" it's not clear from this article if they are referring to civil / criminal code or Biblical law? Regardless, I don't think that it would help the movement for civil rights to force religious groups to have members who are not in line with their values and beliefs. And why would someone want to be a member of a group that is not in line with their values and beliefs anyway? Rather than force our minorities into their ranks, it would be better to force the organizations to change by opening / growing our own organizaitons to compete with them and close them down.

Robbie is right, my Benedictine monk gay friends in Europe tell me that the pope is totally a self-loathing homophobic gay man (by first hand reports). This accounts for his total homophobia, just like the right wing christian (no caps please), Republican brethren. Why do people continue to be interested in being part of these homophobic organizations who have taken the Christ out of Christianity? Join an organization that supports gays and believes in true spirituality. Like Anne Rice did, grow some balls and get out of this spiritually dead hateful organization.

If he's good enough to them to be on the board at all, then I don't see how he's not good enough to be president. It's double standards like that, that I feel it's distasteful to be a part of any Catholic organization, charity or otherwise.

It seems to me something's being lost in this controversy that could shake Catholic doctrine to its core - a loophole in the Catholic Church's prohibition on homosexual activity. Apparently, the ONLY time a gay man is allowed to be in a same-sex relationship in the Catholic Church is on the condition that he is... vice president of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul of St. Louis, Missouri. Now, if he were to be elected president, he would lose this privileged status, but so long as he is VICE president, he can gay it up!