esrosedotblog

The New York Irish establishment has relented.

They are going to allow "the gays" to march in the Annual St. Patrick's Day Parade.

Gay Groups to March in St. Patrick’s Day Parade as a Ban Falls

Basically, I don't give a shit one way or another but the annual scuffle over this has been a nasty slap in the face particularly to gay people who are members of the Catholic Church.

Oh. Yes, there are gay Irish. Quite a few in my experience.

Some people believe otherwise. I have actually met a few. Here and there. It is my impression that there are a lot of them.

For these people, personally it is a painful experience to be shunned by their own family. No matter how one braces for it, there is hurt. Deep hurt.

It is interesting how close the whole thing binds with the "Archbishopric" of New York. As that Cardinal goes, so goes the flock. So it is probably a bigger picture.

That is the funny thing to me. A bystander. When it comes to the Catholic Church the image frequently belies the actual practice. I have known so many gay priests! Amazing to me. They stay where they are, everyone knows, it is the open secret. Then as an institution they are homophobes. Self hatred.

One of the most flagrant high church homes was Cardinal Spellman. I think his drag name was "Franny". Hah.

This is the interesting part. The reverse effect of gay pride. The deeply closeted even unmarried queer who turns anti-gay so that no one will see his own nature.

For the regular folks, it is not so easy to doff one's heritage. Church is part of life for many. I had to deal with a mild case of guilt over my Methodist labeled sins. It used to be a liberal church. They turned somewhere in the 60s. They are still out there in bigotry land spouting their hateful shit.

Labels: bigotry, gay history, gay rights