Angry in the Great White North

From the Montreal Gazette:

A colorful and controversial Roman Catholic priest who worked as a male prostitute and in a gay leather bar in his youth, is considering a run for Parliament.

Since when did the English-language style guide drop the first "u" in "colourful"?

Still, colorful or colourful, the description seems aimed to make Gravel sound like Robin Hood or something:

Rev. Raymond Gravel, a maverick who has publicly disagreed with his own church in areas such as same-sex marriage, says he is seriously interested in running for the Bloc Quebecois nomination in the byelection to fill the vacancy in the riding of Repentigny, a Bloc stronghold.

The riding, off the eastern tip of Montreal, was left vacant in late August when popular Bloc incumbent Benoit Sauvageau was killed in a traffic crash.

In an interview Tuesday, Gravel said he's interested in being the Bloc's candidate in the Nov. 27 byelection to fight for justice.

Well, I would think that being a priest means you're already on the front lines of that fight for justice, preaching to the faithful. In fact, the Church is quite clear on the non-political role of priests, and how social changes via elected office are supposed to affected by laypersons:

33. Political and Social Obligation.

The priest, as servant of the universal Church, cannot tie himself to any historical contingency, and therefore must be above any political party. He cannot take an active role in political parties or labour unions, unless, according to the judgement of the ecclesiastical authority, the rights of the Church and the defence of common good require it.(97) In fact, even if these are good things in themselves, they are nevertheless foreign to the clerical state since they can constitute a grave danger of division in the ecclesial communion.(98)

Like Jesus (cf Jn 6:15 ff.), the priest "ought to refrain from actively engaging himself in politics, as it often happens, in order to be a central point of spiritual fraternity".(99) All the faithful, therefore, must always be able to approach the priest without feeling inhibited for any reason.

The priest will remember that "it does not fall on the shoulders of the Pastors of the Church to intervene directly in political activities and in social organisations. This task, in fact, forms part of the lay faithful vocation, in which they work by their own initiative together with their fellow citizens". (100) Nevertheless, he will not be absent "in the effort to form in them an upright conscience".(101)

The reduction of his mission to temporal tasks, of a purely social or political nature, is foreign to his ministry, and does not constitute a triumph but rather a grave loss to the Church's evangelical fruitfulness.

Grave loss? When it comes to letting priests run for elected office, the Vatican has set the bar very high. Essentially, there has to be a unique situation in which the laity are not able to fulfil their "vocation" of running for public office. I can't imagine too many situations in which that would occur. I suppose if you had a country in which a particular ethnic group was disenfranchised, a group that coincidently represented the bulk of the Roman Catholic membership in that country, a priest who happened to belong to the other ethnic group that was allowed to hold public office could be given special dispensation to be the elected voice of those people in order to work for their eventual inclusion in a fully representative government.

But in Gravel's case, there does not seem to be any compelling reason to allow him to run for office. He certainly does not provide a reason. He says it is to fight for justice. What justice is that? Certainly not the justice the Church is interested in -- respect for the sanctity of marriage and protection for the unborn, for example:

It is not surprising therefore that during the recent federal election campaign in June 2004, Father Gravel once again mocked Catholic moral teaching. Not only does he not uphold Catholic teaching, he contradicts it, telling the media that he is in favour of homosexual “marriages,” and that he is pro-abortion. “I am pro-choice,” he told journalist Leo Kalinda, and “there is not a bishop in the world who is going to prevent me from receiving Communion, not even the pope.” This was a reference to the debate in the U.S. whether Catholic pro-abortion politicians should be allowed to receive Holy Communion.

Wow, not only does he reject Church teaching, he rejects the authority of the Church herself!

Just who thought ordaining this guy was a good idea, and why hasn't he been run out of town?

He admits he still needs to get permission from Rome:

However, he cautions he has to first get the permission of the Vatican.

''I'm a priest before I'm a politician.''

Sounds like he's neither.

So what does his bishop, Msgr. Louis Dicaire have to say? On this, the public record is confused. Catholic Insight alleges that Dicaire did not take the comments all too seriously:

His bishop laughed it off and refused to rebuke him. When questioned about the incident, the spokesman for the Assembly of the Quebec Bishops, Msgr. Louis Dicaire also dismissed it with, “The Catholic Church is a faith community, not a pressure group” (National Post, August 1, 2003).

On the other hand, Canadian Catholic News reported that Dicaire was upset:

Quebec priests dissenting from Church teachings on homosexuality have stained the image of the priest says an auxiliary bishop from the province.

Bishop Louis Dicaire, auxiliary bishop of Saint-Jean-Longueuil, told Le Journal de Montreal Feb. 27 he was irritated by an open letter signed by 19 priests that appeared Feb. 25 in La Presse because their dissent should have remained private.

The priests, members of the Forum Andr‚ Naud, contested Church stands against same-sex marriage and the ordination of priests who support the so-called gay culture.

They accused the documents of displaying negative attitudes displayed that foster homophobia.

Dicaire told the Feb. 27 French-language newspaper the faithful have been confused and stunned by what the priests have done.

Definitely a lack of clarity. Dicaire needs to take a clear position, and take his pastoral role more seriously. Gravel's media impact is certainly out of proportion to his importance, but that in itself is a problem that has to be addressed and quickly. The fact that his disdain for Church authority is being splashed around without a response from the Church is only going to give other rogue priests like him confidence to openly revolt as well.

Unless that's the plan...

Maybe the Church is giving Gravel the rope he needs to hang himself, and to hang some other priests like him as well -- metaphorically, of course. That could explain the muted response.

But I doubt it. I think Dicaire is unsure of what to do. If so, Rome is going to have to step in and dish out a bit of discipline, which will probably include showing Gravel the door.

Update: A more current news report supports the idea that Gravel is being allowed to run in order to ease him out:

He had to get special permission from the Vatican to run in the federal byelection because Catholic doctrine prevents clergy from belonging to a political party. In order to run, he had to give up his duties as parish priest at St-Joachim-de-la-Plaine Church in La Plaine, east of Montreal.

When he sought permission, perhaps it was judged that he would choose politics over his pastoral duties in the parish. Church authorities would have then demanded of Gravel the price they guessed he would be willing to pay -- no more preaching to the faithful. The Church can now assign a new parish priest tasked with the job of repairing any damage Gravel has done locally, while Gravel gets out there and starts making noise. Chances are he'll gleefully trash the Church over and over again after prodding by reporters, and the Church will have all they need to toss him out.

Update: On the other hand, maybe Gravel is just lying about getting permission:

I do not believe the Globe & Mail has it right that "the Vatican" gave Gravel permission to run. None of the news stories mentions a specific Vatican office or officer or decree, and in none is there evidence that a reporter made contact with the Vatican in an attempt to confirm the permission story. It is much more likely that Gravel or Gravel's bishop succeeded in pulling the wool over the eyes of the Holy See by means of -- how shall we put it? -- tactically expedient omissions in their communication with the responsible persons, and then recast the Holy See's silence as approval.

I wouldn't put it past him. Everything suggests he has not respect for authority.