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Manhattan Diary by Cahir O'Doherty

Cardinal Keith O'Brien was turned in by his priest boyfriend

Posted on Friday, March 22, 2013 at 09:22 AM

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Cardinal Keith O'Brien

When will this charade ever end? That's the question most people are asking about O'Brien.

I'm not talking about the duplicitous, vindictive and amoral villain on PBS's Dontown Abbey, although on reflection I suppose I might as well be.

I'm talking about former Scottish Cardinal Keith O'Brien, until last month the most senior Catholic in the United Kingdom.

Yesterday morning I involuntarily dropped my spoon into my porridge reading about the real reason for O'Brien's downfall: his ex-boyfriend, a priest, turned him in.

O'Brien, if you recall, was famously deemed 'bigot of the year' by the gay advocacy group Stonewall. He gave them pretty good reason to. Last year O'Brien said same sex marriage was a 'grotesque subversion of a universally accepted human right' and that same-sex partnerships were 'harmful to the physical, mental and spiritual well being of those involved.'

Apart from being an obvious cart full of you-know-what, this kind of hateful rhetoric doesn't square with the experience that most modern people actually have of their gay friends and relations. Attacking the dignity of every gay person on the planet whilst suggesting it's for their own good just doesn't play like it used to.

Don't tell O'Brien though, last year he was calling homosexuality 'a moral degradation.' Whilst actively pursuing that 'moral degradation' every chance he got, apparently.

So I don't know why it came as such a terrific surprise to me, but it now appears that this was the last straw for the priest that O'Brien was reportedly in a long term sexual relationship with, and who - it turned out - was utterly repulsed by his hypocrisy.

I don't fool myself, hypocrisy is one of long agreed social glues that that binds society together. One hundred years ago, even ten years ago, O'Brien would have probably gotten away with his high handed condemnations. Allegations against him would probably have been dismissed as hearsay.

What has changed is the way information is shared now. Thanks to technology, we now live as the old Irish insisted we should - in each others shadow.

Technology has allowed us to see that there are millions of gay people in the world, on the net, and on our street. They're no longer people who know nobody and who nobody knows.

Thanks to one gay man, Alan Turing, you now have a computer to read this on, and thanks to him you're not speaking German and eagerly anticipating the Fourth Reich.

They didn't teach you that in school but they're going to, because information is coming out of the closet just as fast as people are these days. Technology has given the little people a community and a powerful voice.

Technology also allowed the priests who were abused by Cardinal O'Brien to find each other and compare their experiences. It gave them a voice too. They were not the powerful pink mafia that some in the press have spoken of, they were instead just outraged solo voices who finally find each other online and took strength from it.

Gay rights have made their unparalleled advances because technology has allowed us to see that we had nothing to fear, and so much to gain. That's even true in the Vatican now. See more: Vatican , LGBT , Irish News Blog , Irish Catholic Church , Irish Catholic Priest

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STEVENSTAR | Apr 05, 2013, 06:49 PM EDT

PERSONALLY SPEAKING ID RATHER SEE THESE PREISTS HAVING RELATIONSHIP WITH MEN AND WOMEN THEN I WOULD WITH CHILD SEXUAL ABUSE WHICH WAS HIDDEN BY THE CHURCH FOR YEARS.. OVER HERE IN IRELAND THE AMOUNT OF INNOCENT CHILDREN WHO WERE SEXUALLY MOLESTED BY THESE PRIESTS IS TRULY EVIL FRIGHTENING AND SICKENING !! IF THEY ARE STRAIGHT THEY SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO MARRY WOMEN AND IF THEY ARE GAY THEY SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO MARRY MEN BECAUSE ANYING IS BETTER THEN FOR THESE DROWN MEN TO BE GOING AROUND SEXUALLY MOLESTING INNOCENT CHILDREN.

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SingleDonald | Mar 24, 2013, 10:20 PM EDT

I can't understand why my morning post was removed! Two posters below should stop calling each other "sinners"!

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Smyrnian | Mar 24, 2013, 08:11 PM EDT

Olovely - how about your advocation for the mass killing of the unborn innocents ????

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olovely | Mar 24, 2013, 06:50 PM EDT

misswhisp, the worst sinners are always those who - like you - insist they are not sinners. we must add the sin of omission to your already significant catalogue of pride, anger, wrath and judgment. i only hope that God will treat you with more mercy than you have shown unto others.

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BishopSean | Mar 24, 2013, 04:17 PM EDT

Maureen Hawkins reyr 22/03 post, Rabbi Saul (Rev Sha’ul) had been a mix of Scripture Studies and “politically correct” Jewish thinking of his era. Paul was not even following the teachings of his mentor, Gamaliel (one of 5 “Rabbans” in history of Judaism). Then, when the Lord got a hold of him, prideful Saul (named for the 1st king of Israel) took the Latin name Paulus (“the Least”) & learned the Scriptures (SS) more deeply, forsaking “political correctness” and “cultural Judaism” and even volunteered as apostle to despised gentiles as well as fellow Jews. I believe God gives us personal messages in the SS, but these cannot be at variance with the SS interpreted in the light of the entire Bible. Repeatedly, in the Old and New Testaments, homosexuality is described as a more serious sexual sin, following bestiality and incest, listed by gravity of sins in (Lev. 18, Lev. 20; Deut 23, etc). Jesus will forgive and purify us from all sins (1 Jn. 1:9). Let’s trust and obey.

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Smyrnian | Mar 24, 2013, 04:00 PM EDT

Olovely - you don't judge others??????

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SingleDonald | Mar 24, 2013, 07:21 AM EDT

seanomelb, You have read his 2 works which, I concede, I never read! I am aware of them, and really should read them.I did read how Zecharia Sitchin met with a monsignor, in the Vatican. This priest told him that they were both on the stairway toward heaven, if on alternate steps! misswhisp & olovely, I wish you both would stop condemning the other!

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seanomelb | Mar 23, 2013, 07:18 PM EDT

Like your redaing material singleDonald I have read Sitchin("Stairway to heaven" and "The twelfth planet" another good read is Gilgamesh". I believe the first few books of the bible are an ancient plagairisation of the "Gilgamesh"

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olovely | Mar 23, 2013, 09:30 AM EDT

That means you aware you are full of sin and still spend your all waking hours condemning others. You're the biggest sinner of them all.

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olovely | Mar 23, 2013, 08:37 AM EDT

It's prideful arrogance to assume to you know His mind or can speak for God as sinfully as misswhisp does.

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Maureen Hawkins | Mar 22, 2013, 09:01 PM EDT

For you "Christians" out there who base your condemnation of homosexuality (& lots of other things) on the Bible & what your priests tell you; I'd like to remind you of another person who read the Bible thoroughly, prayed over it, consulted his priests until he was sure he understood God's will & what God wanted him to do about a group of people who were breaking God's law as stated in the Bible & by the priests, so he went out and did it. His name was Saul of Tarsus.

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SingleDonald | Mar 22, 2013, 08:23 PM EDT

According to "Rule by Secrecy", by Jim Marrs, the destruction of Sodom & Gomorrah occurred around 2040 B.C. It was a nuclear attack, which fallout spread northeast to ancient Sumer. This caused the abandonment ot the Ancient Civilization by the Anunnaki, an extra terrestial alien race. The dispute was caused by the forces of Enlil becoming angry at the inhabitants of those 2 cities. Why? Because the 2 cities were sacked by Marduk/Ra, an Eqyptian god. When the inhabitants of those 2 cities switched their allegiances to Marduk/Ra (similar to Japanese accepting Americans a few years after the dropping of the atomic bomb), since Enlil didn't come to their defense, this angered Enlil (often considered the Yahweh of the Old Testament). Thus, he had the 2 cities nuked. However, he underestimated the power of his own weapons, which lead to his alien race leaving the earth in their spaceships. Only a caretaker force may have remained behind. I know this is hard to believe, as it challenges our understanding of history. There are many similarities between the Bible and the cuneiform transcriptions of ancient Sumer. These were inscriptions made in clay tablets, which were allowed to harden. Samuel Noah Kramer, a Jewish archeologist, brought much of this to light. He was followed by Zecharia Sitchin, who delved further into Sumer history. I recommend the book I referred to ("Ruled by Secrecy"-2000), as well as other books by S.N.Kramer & Z. Sitchin

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eiriamach | Mar 22, 2013, 07:29 PM EDT

I see that misswhisp is still slandering God and bedeviling the truth-tellers.

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seanomelb | Mar 22, 2013, 06:08 PM EDT

Historically speaking Sodom and Gomorrah may have existed

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olovely | Mar 22, 2013, 05:38 PM EDT

It's also spelled Gomorrah, by the way. If you can't be troubled to learn English can you be trusted to offer opinions?

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