Cardinal Gets Sued by Homosexuals

Now, Religion in the News, a report and comment on religious trends and events being covered by the media. This week’s item is from Expatica News, January 26, 2004, with the headline: “Cardinal Sued for Calling Gays Sexual Perverts,” dateline: Brussels—“One of Belgium’s leading civil rights groups has announced it intends to sue Belgian Cardinal Gustav Joos for violating the country’s antidiscrimination laws. Joos said in a recent magazine interview that he believed that 90 to 95 percent of gay people were ‘sexual perverts’ and that the remainder needed help. The Center for Equal Opportunities and the Fight Against Racism or CEOFAR, which receives government funding said that it had decided to sue the Cardinal because it found his views unacceptable.

“The organization argued that in its opinion such statements were illegal in Belgium, which has tough antidiscrimination laws. CEOFAR added that it was suing Joos alone, not the Roman Catholic Church.”

Tom: Dave, the Cardinal’s got a point, is making some points, but he also has a problem. This organization has a problem. It’s the Center for Equal Opportunities and the Fight Against Racism. Let’s start with that. Is an “alternative lifestyle,” as they call it, does that have anything to do with racism?

Dave: Well, I thought it was just a certain race that were involved in homosexuality, wasn’t it? Hardly, I mean it seems to involve all races, so it has nothing to do with racism.

Tom: It’s not a race issue at all.

Dave: Right, right, it’s a moral issue.

Tom: Exactly.

Dave: And I would think the Cardinal would have every right to express himself on morals. And that antidiscrimination ought to prevent these people from preventing him for expressing his opinion on morals. Because that is discrimination. They can say horrible things about Christians. They can make buffoons out of Christians in television programs or in movies. People can curse Christ all they want and use His name—they take the name of God in vain. Well, shouldn’t there be someone defending God for that? Defending Christ? Why can’t he say what he wants to say about these people?

You know they have ethnic jokes, for example. Is it going to be against the law for anyone to have an ethnic joke?

Tom: It stirs people up if they begin to say, “Oh, this is a hate crime.”

But, Dave, when he uses the term “sexual perverts,”—now in some cases, people use that as a slur, but let’s take a look at what that means. He’s talking about sexual perversion. So the question is: is an act, a sex act of a homosexual or lesbian and so on, is that a natural act, or is it a perversion of sex as it was meant to be according the Scriptures?

Dave: Yeah, well, Tom, I don’t think anyone can argue that fact.

Tom: I don’t know how.

Dave: This is not natural and normal. And we’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, I don’t know how they can have gay pride parades when they are practicing and promoting a way of life, which if everyone adopted it, it would be the end of the human race. They do not procreate, and if the entire world became homosexuals, that’s the end. There are no more human beings on this planet. The same thing would be true with animals.

So this is not some natural thing: “Oh this just happened to genes….” If it happened, the genes got fouled up. So if the genes got fouled up, then it’s not natural. It is a perversion, all right? But evolution would wipe that out in one generation. Because homosexuals, lesbians, don’t produce children. Now some of them had already done that before they adopted this life style, but nevertheless….

Tom: That’s the intent, that’s the….

Dave: Yes, if evolution were true, it would very quickly wipe these people out.

Tom: Dave, the other thing about this is—and I’m trying to think of an analogy. I’ve been thinking about it, trying to think about it for years. This is a moral issue. But now a moral issue has been given the status—well, they push it to the point of being racial, and that’s ludicrous—but a moral issue. How does a moral issue qualify you for a particular status? Because you know, you’re going contrary to the norms, as you’ve indicated.

Dave: Tom, it has been recognized as abnormal, as a perversion by every generation of every society for thousands of years. When did it get changed? Well, these people have been putting pressure—they’ve come out of the closet. That used to be shameful. But now they’re determined to make their way of life acceptable to everyone. In fact, it’s preferable. They get preferential treatment. And you know when it happened. It happened in San Francisco at the meeting of the American Psychiatric Association.

Tom (simultaneously with Dave): —Psychiatric Association.

Dave: And the homosexuals were there, and they threatened that if they didn’t reverse—it was in DSM, it had been considered to be a perversion, abnormal, something that wasn’t natural. And under pressure, they were forced to change this. Pressure from the homosexuals, who threatened them. But it wasn’t unanimous. I don’t remember, was it 3,000 to 2,000—something like that?

Tom: Dave, that was only a small part of those who voted. But those who wrote in—in other words, they were overwhelmingly against it—the American Psychiatric Association, according to their membership. But that didn’t stop the vote from being controlled by those who intimidated.

Dave: So it got changed. And then the courts—what are we doing? Why do the candidates, political candidates, succumb to pressure? Because it means votes.

Tom: Right.

Dave: Now, Tom, you were a Catholic. You know that in some seminaries, Catholic seminaries, they themselves acknowledge 70 percent homosexuals. This is something normal? How did all these homo…how did they all end in the Catholic seminary? Or you know the history. Read The Fatal Shore of Australia. It was a penal colony! They were forced to engage in homosexuality. This is not a normal natural thing, and it doesn’t come from the genes, okay? It’s that simple.

Tom: And as a moral issue, I’d ask our listeners [to] try and find some other moral issue in which you can develop a—almost a constituency, you know for example, bank robbers, or you go down the line. It’s absurd in any other area of morality, but it’s okay here. I don’t get it.

Dave: And furthermore, Tom, it shortens the lifespan by about 50 percent [through the] spread of disease.

Tom: It’s tragic Dave.

Dave: It is. I would disagree with the Cardinal on most theological issues of course, but on this moral issue, I would have to support him.