Cardinal Timothy Dolan will still participate at a controversial religious summit later this month after other headline speakers dramatically withdrew after learning of the group's rigidly anti-gay views.
The Legatus summit, founded by Domino’s Pizza founder Tom Monaghan in 1987 to network Catholic business leaders, is scheduled for January 29-31 in Naples, FL.
But this week a host of high profile speakers have bailed out after anti-gay editorial stances taken in the organization’s magazine became public.
One such article stated, “Along with masturbation, fornication, and adultery, homosexuality is a selfish act that cannot fulfill the divinely ordained purpose of the reproductive powers.”
The magazine also referred to “the disorder of same-sex attraction” and encouraged gay Catholics to be celibate or to seek a medical cure for what it called their SSA, or same sex attraction.
The magazine also claimed that “significant numbers of homosexual persons have undergone treatment and had their sexual drives properly ordered.”
This was the last straw for Peter Coors, corporate executive of the famous brewing company. Oscar-nominated ‘CSI’ actor Gary Sinise and Fox News anchor Bret Baier also canceled their plans to appear at the conference this week when word that the anti-gay Catholic group supports “ex-gay” therapy.
"When I accepted the invitation to speak at the Legatus conference about veterans' issues and share my story, I was unaware of the controversy surrounding some of the participants, and their views on personal matters,” Sinise tweeted this week.
“Bret Baier has withdrawn his participation as a speaker at the upcoming Legatus Summit due to the controversy surrounding some editorial stances in the organization’s magazine,” a spokesperson for Fox News told the press.
Still attending the summit will be Cardinal Timothy Dolan and Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal.
Dolan will be the Grand Marshall of the Saint Patrick’s Day Parade on Fifth Avenue in March and has welcomed the participation of the first gay group to march under its own banner in the 2015 parade.
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