Catholics have a lot of rules: Natural Family Planning Edition

Serious burtations.

By now everyone knows that some Catholics say that you can't be gay and Catholic.

Even if you are chaste and live a celibate life - you may not be a really good Catholic if you say "I'm gay."

Likewise, you can't be SSA and celibate if ... wait - has that been defined yet?

I'm exaggerating - but you know what I'm saying.

Who am I to judge?  Jesus said something like that when he asked Peter: "How does that concern you?" - John 21:22

All sarcasm aside, it now seems that you can't use NFP - Natural Family Planning to avoid having children unless your reasons for doing so equal 'heroic virtue'... otherwise it's just plain contraception and couples that do that are selfish pigs - just like the Sodomites.

BTW.  Did you know not all of the people of Sodom were gay?

So anyway - Catholics online are arguing about NFP again, and pointing out the evil side of human nature and lust.  Of course, there are those who say NFP is not contraception - and those who think it is - and those who don't know anything about it.

See what I've been trying to tell you?

So even if I just called a cab for Bruce Jenner, to take him to his sex-reassignment surgery I would be condemned, no questions asked. (JK)

I know you aren't following what I'm saying...  I blame myself.

What?

"Take warning from the example of Lot's wife who, because she was disturbed at the destruction of Sodom, turned back to look at it." - John of the Cross

Over the years, something Jean Vanier wrote reminds me of what I have seem to have always known to be true. It is our lives which give witness to the truth of the Gospel. If we are faithful, the Holy Spirit attracts those around us to the Church. The Church waits with open arms, Catholic teaching is recognized as lovely and true. The Church's ministers are there to reconcile and counsel those who return.

Evangelization is not about 'fixing' people or seeing success or telling them what and how to do things - it is about living - a living witness, even when it is only a silent, loving action at work in the midst of them. "Jesus walked in peace through the midst of them." Without thinking of them as 'them' however, as if we are, or I am different from 'them'. As Madeleine Delbrel explained, "To be people immersed as deeply as possible in the midst of the world ... just like people you find everywhere."*  Christ dwells in our midst...

“Many people are good at talking about what they are doing, 

but in fact do little. Others do a lot but don't talk about it; 

they are the ones who make a community live.” 

― Jean Vanier

*"To be people immersed as deeply as possible in the midst of the world, with no rules, no vows, no habits, and no convents separating us from the world; to be poor, but just like people you find everywhere; to be chaste, but like people from every social stratum; to be obedient, but just like people of every nationality.  We will not be the Church, and salvation will not reach the ends of the earth, unless we help save the people in the very situations in which we live. And we will not be working toward salvation, we will not let it pass through us, unless in their very midst, we remain purely and unchangeably the Church." - Madeleine Delbrel

Never mind.