SOUTH BEND (IN)
Outreach.faith [United States]
July 27, 2026
By Ryan Di Corpo
Outreach Original / July 27, 2026Print this:
Exterior of St. Joseph Catholic Church in Mishawaka, Indiana. (Photo courtesy of John Consolie.)
A recent report from the McGrath Institute for Church Life, part of the University of Notre Dame, examines some pressing modern questions related to the spiritual formation of seminarians and offers pastoral suggestions to help assess a candidate’s suitability for the priesthood. Describing an urgent need, in light of the clergy sex abuse scandals, to establish clear guidelines for discerning the moral and psychological fitness of men pursuing ordination, the paper, authored by two men, considers how mental health professionals, bishops, rectors, formators and other relevant church authorities may properly determine if an interested man is well-suited for holy orders.
“Our emphasis…is on renewing the presbyterate by identifying men with a genuine vocation and the capacity for priestly formation, while ensuring that formation itself is responsive to their individual needs,” writes John C. Cavadini, a professor of theology at Notre Dame. “Ultimately, this will create an ecclesial culture where sexual abuse is less likely to occur.”
After addressing candidates’ psychological maturity and preparedness for a life of celibacy, the report considers the suitability of men “who experience same-sex attraction (SSA)” for admission to priestly life. It is notable that the co-authors, the Rev. Thomas V. Berg and the psychologist Timothy G. Lock, do not discuss “gay men” or even “homosexuals,” but candidates who experience an attraction that, for priests, is “often…painful and problematic.” Obviously, there is no mention of men “who experience opposite-sex attraction (OSA).” That term does not exist in their report. These men are simply called “candidates.”
Using the term “SSA” disinherits gay men from their sexuality by naming them not as fully-human sexual beings but as people with an unfortunate moral issue to confront.
The language of “SSA,” popular in some corners of the worldwide church, establishes a false and harmful binary between heterosexual men and men who have an attraction. Does a gay man have a sexuality or only a persistent genital urge? Does the church then understand gay men as confused heterosexuals with a vexing problem?
In its 1975 declaration “Persona Humana,” the Congregation (now Dicastery) for the Doctrine of the Faith described human sexuality as “one of the factors which give to each individual’s life the principal traits that distinguish it.” But using the term “SSA” disinherits gay men from their sexuality by naming them not as fully-human sexual beings but as people with an unfortunate moral issue to confront.
In November 2005, three years after news reports of widespread sexual abuse by members of the Catholic clergy in Boston prompted an international crisis for the church, the Vatican barred men with “deep-seated homosexual tendencies” from ordination to the priesthood. But the recent McGrath report finds that nearly one-quarter of bishops surveyed are “comfortable” ordaining such men if they are “firmly committed to celibacy.”
Relying on the Vatican’s instruction and offering their own insights, Mr. Lock and Father Berg urge church leaders to evaluate candidates for the priesthood on a case-by-case basis while also asking if a man’s “stable SSA” should be reason enough to stall formation or ultimately deny ordination. “Such a pause in formation may, more often than not, lead to a decision not to advance a candidate,” the report reads. The decision not to advance gay men to ordination, therefore, would be in line with the Vatican directive.
James Martin, S.J., in his recent article on the McGrath report, concludes that “the authors’ answer for gay men who feel called to the priesthood seems to be no.” Father Martin, who notes that he has encountered many holy and celibate gay priests over his decades as a Jesuit priest, offers five reasons why the church may still decline to admit gay men to holy orders.
These reasons include: A dearth of accurate data on the number of gay men in the priesthood, a concern that the priesthood may be considered “a gay profession” by the public, gay priests who are potentially ashamed of their own sexuality, “a false conflation between homosexuality and pedophilia” and a fear of public backlash against gay priests who are open about their sexuality.
Father Martin’s fourth point, regarding inaccurate fears that gay priests may abuse children, given the high proportion of boys among those sexually victimized by clerics, seems to be a major, if inexplicit, concern of the report.
First, the demand for a robust intrachurch response to the evil of clergy sexual abuse is cited as the paper’s raison d’être. “We want to address it proactively so as to make progress over time,” reads the foreword, “rather than simply react to flare-ups of the scandal, only to subside into inactivity until the next eruption.” Therefore, the authors’ concern with the ordination of gay men must be considered in the context of the report’s main goal: to prevent sex abuse by weeding out unsuitable candidates for the priesthood.
Certainly not all gay men (or all straight men) are excellent candidates for the priesthood, but the determining factor need not be their sexual orientation or same-sex attractions.
Second, the paper prominently cites an instruction from the Vatican in 2005 banning men with “deep-seated homosexual tendencies” from ordination. That directive, promulgated by Pope Benedict XVI a few months into his pontificate, was widely viewed as a response to the clergy sex abuse crisis, pinpointing homosexuality among priests as the problem. The Vatican document specifically notes that the question of ordaining gay men was “made more urgent by the current situation”—a reference to the abuse crisis at that time.
And third, both of the McGrath report’s authors have experience working with or ministering to survivors of clergy sex abuse. To be clear, this is vitally important and undoubtedly commendable work that sets an important example for other pastors and mental health professionals. But taken altogether, it is plainly evident, if not so bluntly stated, that fears of clergy abusing more children have played a notable role in the report’s discussion of ordaining gay men and the serious reservations it raises.
Some negative social media responses to Father Martin’s article, in which he supports ordaining gay men, illustrate this anxiety. A startling but unsurprising number of critics have recalled abuse scandals as a major reason for their disapproval. “Gay priests gave us the abuse crisis. They are the majority of abusers,” reads one comment on X. “The clergy sex scandals which have rocked the Catholic Church were primarily rooted in allowing gay men to be priests,” reads another. While these sentiments do not appear in the McGrath report, it does not dispel abuse-related concerns about ordaining gay men.
Gerard J. McGlone, S.J., a psychologist and a survivor of clergy abuse, cites research that most sex offenders against children are married heterosexual males with children of their own, but he notes that those factors alone are not the cause of abusive behavior. The John Jay Report, a thoroughgoing, independent, church-commissioned, study of child sex abuse by Catholic clergy in the United States, notes that “many” sex offenders do not necessarily target minors of a particular age or gender. “Individuals who molest children may be heterosexual, homosexual or bisexual with regard to victim selection,” reads the report, published in 2004.
In an article for Outreach, Father McGlone provides suggestions for how sex offenders can be identified. “Sexual offenders tend to exhibit certain characteristics: A lack of sexual integration or knowledge, poor coping skills, immature psychosexual development, poor peer friendships and a history of trauma.” These characteristics, not sexual orientation by itself, ought to be especially considered when evaluating men for the priesthood.
Certainly not all gay men (or all straight men) are excellent candidates for the priesthood, but the determining factor need not be their sexual orientation or same-sex attractions. Efforts to prevent the scourge of sexual abuse by clergy should not rest on longstanding sexual prejudices or false claims that cite homosexuality, understood in most cases as a primary attraction to adults of the same sex, as a reliable predictor of child sexual abuse.
In 2019, Thomas G. Plante, a leading psychologist studying sexual abuse by clergy, addressed disinformation relating to the crisis in a speech at Santa Clara University. Plante debunked arguments that gay priests, or homosexuality in general, are the cause of the scandal by acknowledging the significant proportion of male victims, about 81 percent, but characterizing abuse as a crime of opportunity in certain cases.
Historically, clergy sex offenders had greater access to boys, as altar servers or as students in single-sex schools, than they had to girls, who were not allowed to act as altar servers under canon law until 1994. Therefore, clerics had more opportunities to abuse males. Here we encounter issues of easy access to children and a willingness to engage in sexual activity with minors, not issues of homosexuality or heterosexuality exclusively.
Richard Wortley, a noted criminologist and forensic psychologist, elaborated on the theme of opportunity in a study published in 2018. “Child abuse is found to occur in contexts where potential victims can be easily accessed and where personal, social, situational, and legal control over potential offenders are weak,” reads the abstract to his study.
For Catholics rightfully angered and horrified by decades of sexual abuse by priests, the above distinctions and nuances may read as splitting hairs. But these painful realities are necessary to understand if the church is truly committed to embracing LGBTQ Catholics and preventing the further abuse of children. It is prudent and possible to do both.
“Safety doesn’t occur if we allow myths and misunderstanding and misinformation to rule the day,” said Plante.
Ryan Di Corpo
Ryan Di Corpo is a journalist and was previously the managing editor of Outreach.