SYNOD REPORT IGNORES ELEPHANT IN THE CHURCH

Exploring solutions to the growing priest shortage

When I was enrolled in a college seminary in the late 1960s, if I reported a seminarian for making homosexual advances, he was gone the next day. Today, however, because most seminary rectors, faculty members, and seminarians are homosexuals, a seminarian who reports homosexual predation or misconduct is usually shown the door. Some of these unjustly dismissed seminarians are featured in the video, Who Will Save Our Seminarians?

While most dioceses and religious provinces in the U.S. are headed by homosexuals who accept homosexual candidates for the priesthood, there are some orders that will not tolerate homosexual predation or misconduct. Among these straight communities are the Oblates of the Virgin Mary in Boston; the New York (St. Joseph) Province of the Dominicans; the Norbertines of St. Michael’s Abbey in Silverado, CA; the Society of Our Lady of the Most Holy Trinity in Corpus Christi, TX; and the Companions of the Cross based in Ottawa, Canada.

Just as straight men do not frequent gay bars, neither do straight men stay very long in seminaries that are populated mainly by gay men. This development over the past fifty years has led to a dramatic decrease in both straight seminarians and priests. According to the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA), between 1970 and 2025, the number of ordinations decreased in the U.S. by 47% from 805 to 426. The number of priests actively engaged in ministry declined during that same period by 59% from 53,273 to 21,750. In an effort to hide the true extent of the decline, Church leaders will quote statistics that include priests who are no longer engaged in active ministry, like retired priests (some who may be in their 90s), and priests removed from ministry for a variety of reasons (e.g., sexual abuse, recovering alcoholics, etc.).

As more and more churches are sold and converted into mosques, restaurants, and bars, owing mainly to a decrease in priests and worshippers, it appears that a Vatican synod study group would like to address the “lack of access to ordained ministry” by granting a greater role to lay people in leading worship. While the study group recommended that married couples and women become more involved in the priestly formation process, it failed to address the “elephant in the church,” i.e., the predominance of homosexual bishops, priests, and seminarians outside of continents like Africa.

The 24-page synod report provided recommendations for how seminarians are formed, including closer immersion in parish life. By failing to acknowledge that the majority of priests today suffer from same-sex attraction, the synod group, whose members may include closeted lesbian nuns and gay clerics, failed to acknowledge the danger young, straight seminarians face when assigned to parishes pastored by homosexual pastors. While my diaconate assignment was very positive, having been assigned to a parish with a holy, dedicated, straight priest who mentored and loved me as if I were his own son, there are many other straight seminarians and priests I know whose lives were seriously harmed, even to this day, after having been assigned to work with homosexual priests.

• After Former Buffalo seminarian, Ryszard Biernat, reported being sexually assaulted by Father Art Smith in his rectory bedroom at night, Auxiliary Bishop Edward Grosz threatened to send him back to Poland, never to be ordained, if he reported the assault to authorities.

• Baltimore Deacon Wieslaw Walawender was drugged and sodomized by Msgr. Edward Staub and promised that he would be ordained if he did not report Staub. When it was discovered that Walawender had confidentially informed a friend whose husband worked at the Polish Embassy, Cardinal William Keeler had Walawender thrown into the street just before he was scheduled to be ordained a priest. Archbishop William Lori and the Baltimore Archdiocese continue to cover up this egregious, deceitful, criminal behavior to this day.

• San Diego seminarian, Mark Books, a U.S. Marine Corps Veteran, was drugged and sodomized by Father Nicholas Reveles. In an audio recording made before he died, Brooks recounted how, in the process of confronting Reveles following the assault, he discovered Reveles watching gay porn videos at his home with San Francisco Archbishop John Quinn, who befriended, mentored, and promoted both Cardinals Robert McElroy and Blase Cupich.

• These and countless other cases documenting what can happen when homosexual priests supervise straight seminarians were never taken into consideration when the synod study group formulated their priestly formation recommendations.

One should not assume that unjustly dismissed seminarians are straight like Anthony Gorgia, Karl Discher, and countless other former straight seminarians. Now that most seminarians outside of Africa and Asia are homosexuals, there are more and more cases today in which gay priests will also prey on homosexual seminarians as “young meat.” When these seminarians refuse or report sexual advances often as forms of “sexual harassment,” their reports are either covered up or they are dismissed on spurious grounds. If a harassed homosexual seminarian’s complaint is covered up, he may be ordained and live in the closet like other gay clerics, or he may later leave and pursue an open gay lifestyle.

Experience shows that young heterosexual men and women who live together can sometimes become sexually involved with one another. Yet, how is it that neither Church officials nor the laity question the wisdom of housing men with same-sex attraction in seminaries where they live, eat, study, work, and sometimes even shower together? Why should one be surprised to learn that homosexual behavior often occurs in such seminaries?

With regard to the acceptance of homosexual candidates for the priesthood, the current Church Instruction only requires that homosexual “tendencies must be clearly overcome at least three years before ordination to the diaconate.” Because it takes three years of theology before one is ordained a deacon, one could literally attend a gay orgy the day before beginning one’s theological studies and still fulfill the requirements for acceptance into a major seminary.

Unfortunately, even though one is expected not to engage in sex for three years before diaconate, this is often not the case for many gay seminarians and novices who today engage in sex with both seminary faculty members and fellow students. As long as seminaries or houses of formation are run by homosexual clergy who accept homosexual candidates, one cannot expect gay seminarians or novices to overcome their “tendencies” and be celibate for at least “three years before ordination to the diaconate,”

In light of astronomically high celibacy failure rates, I would recommend closing all high school and college seminaries which would allow men time to discern if they can truly lead celibate lives, particularly in the case of straight seminarians who would be forgoing not just sex, but more so, the love and support of a wife and children. After graduating from college, and perhaps even working and living on their own for a few years, candidates would bring a maturity to the priesthood which is often lacking in many priests today.

While these recommendations could help the Church to be served by truly celibate and chaste priests, I don’t believe it will provide sufficient priests to meet the pastoral needs of Catholics. Let’s consider the following options:

1. Continue operating under the current system involving mandatory celibacy, in which most clerics are homosexuals, and in which no more than half of all priests, at any given moment in time, are practicing celibacy.

2. Go with the recommendation of the synod and delegate more liturgical responsibilities to lay people who would be authorized to preach and distribute the Eucharist consecrated by a visiting priest.

3. Follow the recommendation of prelates like Luxembourg Cardinal Jean-Claude Hollerich, the Relator General for the Synod on Synodality, who argued that the prohibition on ordaining women is not an infallible doctrine and should be revisited to address the global priest shortage. Personally, I fear the majority of nuns who are pushing for the ordination of women are lesbians, and their ordination will only compound the Church’s current problems, leading to even more empty pews as one sees in many Mainline Protestant Churches in which congregations are often pastored today by “married” or single gay and lesbian clergy.

4. Follow the lead of the Eastern Rite Churches and allow Roman Catholic diocesan priests the option of promising celibacy or marrying before ordination. Not only would there be more young heterosexual vocations, but there would also be more older men - viri probati - whose children were already grown up, who would be ordained. While the number of homosexuals would still be high in religious orders that could not practically accommodate a married priesthood with men and women living together, the diocesan priesthood should witness a dramatic decline in the number of homosexual priests who, for centuries, have used the priesthood to hide their homosexuality. Because there is a direct correlation between sex abuse and the number of homosexuals in the priesthood, optional celibacy would also bring about a reduction in the number of sex abuse cases in the Church.

After reading “The History and Consequences of Mandatory Celibacy” (Part I and Part II), it is evident that I favor option four as the only way Catholics can rid themselves of the Lavender Mafia currently in control of the institutional Roman Catholic Church. Unfortunately, because many Catholics do not want to admit to astronomically high celibacy infidelity rates which date back to when celibacy was made mandatory, and because they are in denial about the high percentage of gay clergy who are being ordained and living together in the Vatican, episcopal residences, rectories, and seminaries, I fear many naive Catholics believe that the Spirit can still move straight men to join a fundamentally gay presbyterate even though “straight men do not frequent gay bars.”

If you appreciate my research and writings, please contribute to the “Save Our Seminarians” Fund that will help safeguard young men from becoming victims of homosexual predation in U.S. Catholic seminaries.

Gene Thomas Gomulka is a sexual abuse victims’ advocate, investigative reporter, author, and screenwriter. A former Navy (O6) Captain/Chaplain, seminary instructor, and diocesan Respect Life Director, Gomulka was ordained a priest for the Altoona-Johnstown diocese and later made a Prelate of Honor (Monsignor) by St. John Paul II. Email him at msgr.investigations@gmail.com.