The social priest: old homo-negativity in a new dress

Reflections by Massimo Battaglio

Among the many videos made by Don Alberto Ravagnani, the now famous young social priest who is all the rage online, now there is one that concerns us. It's a conference call entitled “Comparison between believers and non-believers”, in which the youth ministry web star also talks about homosexuality (from minute 1:35:00).

I already had some suspicions on the contents transmitted by Don Alberto with so much new language. This half hour of jokes, insightful but old, light beyond the limit of superficiality, confirms this to me. Perhaps it is a limit of social communication, which requires proceeding through slogans and digs, a method that suggests a lack of elaboration or an awareness of saying things that are not very credible, of which, perhaps, one is not even convinced.

Our tackles the theme of homosexuality just like that: a simple series of arrows, you find grazing between vague memories of distracted readings. Like those who go to mushrooms without knowing the forest nor the mushrooms themselves, look for one, finds it, it shows us everything already; Someone points out that it is not a porcino but a foul -haulid; He looks for another always keeping the nice gaze of who is right. The stunning of information provided guarantees success but, if the video is reviewed, it turns out that the speech does not hold up. On the contrary: it does not really exist. Let's follow:

“The Church is not the one who enjoys saying no, you don't do it is not done. The Church has the concern to say: look: if you want to love, it is not enough to love and point. The phrase Love is love, to me, makes itchy come. Why does it mean? It doesn't mean anything. I can love one who hates me, I can love a column, I can love violence ... what does it mean? It makes no sense. It is a beautiful slogan that has been taken by a certain political movement and however it does not mean anything. The Church says that not all forms of love are authentic. "

Let's start well! It was taught to me that love has no boundaries. In the Gospel of John I read that "there is no greater love than this: to give life for one's friends". Jesus has never had doubts in front of people who love each other: he blessed them and that's it, without unioning if their love was legitimate, certified by the priests or simply lived by the protagonists.

He indicated, almost as examples to follow, the most heterodox loves possible: that between the centurion and his servant, that of the Samaritan for his partner with whom he was not married and that of the prostitute of Bethany. The right to investigate the authenticity of these loves has never been arrogated. The young social priest warns us that the Church, unlike "a certain political movement" (which one?), It does the opposite. And he defends it. Optimal!

"The Church does not disgust homosexuals eh! It is not a shame to be homosexual. Sins are always actions. A shame is a disordered action, therefore not orderly to the good. Sin is the sexual act. Trying a sexual attraction for a person of the same sex, recognizing in itself a homosexual tendency, is not a sin. It is a pity to perform a homosexual act. "

And so far, nothing new. I would expect a minimum of deepening but I must say that this dryness in repeating the summary of the doctrine is effective.

“But the Church is not that it has it with homosexuals. That is: as it is like to perform a homosexual act, it is a pity to have sexual intercourse before marriage. That is, the Church would ask for chastity to homosexuals and heterosexuals, indiscriminately. Except that today the debate on homosexuality was polarized; It has become the flag of a clash that wants to attack the Church. "

Here are two jokes: the one on chastity and that on the attack on the church. On the first, I would point out to Don Alberto that two heterosexual people who want to live in communion with the doctrine of the Church, they only have to get married. Two homosexual people no. Because the same Monsignors that he defends from the "clash" continue to repeat that there is no analogy between marriage and the union between people of the same sex. And therefore: lifestyle abstinence. On the contrary: as soon as two homosexuals are caught in the parish, you send them away with the automatic rejector, it was never that they spread strange ideas. The second joke - the one on the attack on the Church - seems to have been inserted, in its absurdity, to distract from the equally absurdity of the first.

“The Church is not that it is exposed against homosexual people. On the contrary: in response to all this attack on homosexuality, the Church was really asked. It is about meeting people. The Church care about people, people. A homosexual person must be felt desired well by the Church and helped to deal with this stuff ".

Now: the video is already a little old. Who knows if our social priest would repeat the same things today, when the official position of the Italian Church on the law against homophobia is that of a niet throughout the line. In these days, the Catholic hierarchies show that they certainly have people to heart but not all of them: some defend an alleged "freedom of expression" which, among other things, goes far beyond the offense. Of others, the homosexual ones, they only defend a completely abstract "dignity", denying the severity of the homophobic phenomenon. In the name of the ideas of the former, the barrels are accepted on the last. But let's not argue: we have to feel loved.

"Hostility towards homosexuality, medicine had it, before the church! It was not Benedict XVI who invented the words fagot, culattone, fennel. It was society, who brought the debate to a certain direction ".

Another deliberately hateful joke, put there to distract from the unsustainability of the previous one. It betrays a certain nostalgia for when science gave us sick but ... how pointed it is!

“The Church is exposed to say what is the right way, la forma migliore dell'amore: quella che corrisponde alla verità che noi siamo. Then homosexuality is a fact. Non è che si può far finta di niente e dire: beh, gli omosessuali non esistono, è un'invenzione, bruceranno all'inferno. Una volta che assumiamo che esistono delle persone così, facendoci carico anche della ferita che comporta scoprirsi omosessuali… Perché questa cosa non è molto detta ma non è pacifico eh! It's an ordeal."

Qui, gli interlocutori di don Alberto non ci stanno più e lo interrompono. Gli fanno notare che la ferita, il travaglio dello scoprirsi omosessuali non sono dati di natura ma dipendono dalla mancata accettazione sociale, dalla negatività che sentono nei propri confronti. E parlano esplicitamente di una “eredità cattolica”, come dire che la Chiesa parla di travaglio ma è la prima a generarlo. But the priest insists:

Today, a boy, when he is building his identity, finds himself having to ask himself this question (and the question is imposed on him): but I am heterosexual or are they homosexual? As if homosexuality or heterosexuality were already written identity that one must only recognize within themselves. This thing is not true. Homosexuality and heterosexuality are not identities. That is, we are not the actions we do. Having a homosexual tendency is not the same as being homosexual. The problem is that today you want to inculcate this idea: you are homosexual ".

We are almost at the apex (but not yet): smoky words but with cool tones to reiterate that the homosexual is abnormal and that some dark lobby wants to "inculcate" the opposite.

"Why is Pride in the homosexual world? Once the medicine was hostile to homosexuality and in the psychiatry manuals there was the homosexual category, it was considered a disease, it was considered a disorder. Now I am not a psychologist but this thing very discriminated against homosexuals in society. When this thing was revised, almost to avoid a sort of return, by the homosexuals it was carried out this' pride ':' Here, we are like that! First you discriminated against it and instead now tiè! Do you know what we tell you? Bam! We slam you this being in the face and we do it with pride. '

I, this pride, do not understand it. On the one hand you want normalization, you want to be recognized in all respects with your rights as if homosexuality was not a strange thing, but then it is said: 'Look that we are different. We are different and we pride with our diversity with pride '. This is the problem. "

Maybe I didn't understand: is the problem that we no longer go through for mental sick people? Or is the term "pride" not nice? If that's why, I noticed that, in other videos, the social priest often speaks of the pride of being Christian, and speaks well. Our pride of being ourselves, however, is not good. According to its logic, we commit two sins: one is that of the impure acts and the other, even earlier, to be proud to be in the world. We should be saddened, more troubled, please for Don.

“Today the debate is exacerbated. I can't say anything about homosexuality. Because I guess that on the other side there would be no listening. Because they would immediately tell me: ah you church! You are against homosexuality! You are old! My attempt to say that what you care about is you and I am willing to enter dialogue with you, it would not be absolutely understood. Because there is the intention to pass a message that is an ideological little screen ".

Note: the message "a little ideological" is always that of others. Reconstructing history to suit one's own convenience, mocking science, defending oneself with rhetorical devices, is not ideological. Ideological is what comes from "a certain political movement". Point.

“The issue of gender, transgender… now it is said that one chooses sexual genders... one chooses whether to be male or female... That is... they are questions of considerable philosophical importance, which however are slowly penetrating many layers of society"

Qui, la domanda da porre al prete social sarebbe: ma dove hai sentito queste castronerie? Where studied? On the bignames of the pro-life movements? Ma piano perché sta per arrivare il carico da novanta:

What does normal mean? Normal means that it can happen, that I can find this situation within myself or that I can find a person who has this tendency. Normal means that it is in the order of things. But, from a biological point of view, it is not normal for my body to be attracted to the body... or rather... this thing can happen, but there is something that isn't working. But then, man and woman are not exactly the same. Sono due mondi completamente diversi, non solo dal punto di vista biologico fisico ma anche dal punto di vista psicologico. La psicologia parla chiaro, cioè…”

Another interruption: one of the two boys who discuss the social priest, burst. It points out that the role differences between male and female derive largely from anthropological, cultural and social factors. He says that, in the human psyche, there are much more marked differences between individuals with different life stories than with different genre. And he adds that, in nature, homosexuality is present in many species and has a fundamental function in the conservation of the species itself.

Here, Don Alberto does not reply. He nods, as the one who knows everything, read everything or at least he heard, but he moves on to something else. The social priest thus obtains to confirm his ideas: "On certain topics, I can't say anything".

But dear my social priest: it is not a question of not being able to say anything. He is that an expert connoisseur of mushrooms will never be able to accept to discuss on par with a Novellino who has never set foot in a forest or who knows the forest for hearing about it from the messes! And you, a twenty -six -year -old priest heterosexual, cannot pretend to know of homosexuality more than me, a layman fifty -five years old homosexual in love with his partner. Your duty, before depopulating on social media, is to listen. And study, even if it is tiring.