Hey! Remember how, not so long ago, a Mexican cardinal was claiming to know more about the male anus (and its differences from its female counterpart) than scientists themselves? Well, looks like he’s not the only dubious sexpert in the fold. Meet another churchman who’s making even more ironic (and idiotic) claims regarding homosexuality (and the right to live it) in light of the impending legalization of same-sex marriage throughout Mexico:
Hugo Valdemar, spokesman for the Archdiocese of Mexico City, maintains that the country is on the way to the establishment of a “gay empire”, and of “a real persecution” against those who oppose the so-called “gender ideology”, which will be “inevitable if Catholics and parents don’t put a stop” to this pretension, which “Pope Francis called the devil’s movement.”
Valdemar said that he had received two documents. One of them was from a group of 26 persons from the LGBTI community, responding to a text published in the weekly paper “From the Faith”, published by the archdiocese, and the other, from the Council for the Prevention and Elimination of Discrimination in Mexico City (COPRED).
“This is about two clearly intimidatory documents,” said Valdemar, who stated that “behind the formalisms (of the first letter, demanding the right of reply) there is a veiled threat of interposing more repressive recourses, which may be civil suits, penal denunciations, or legal protections.”
“From the Faith is one of the few periodicals in the land which has never refused the right to reply, because we do not fear disagreement, nor are we intolerant of those who think differently from ourselves. Next issue we will publish a response to their arguments which, for certain, are untenable and mean to repress religious liberty and freedom of expression,” Valdemar said.
The Catholic church spokesman also referred to a document sent by COPRED, which he considers to be a “censure” and which makes reference to an item published in From the Faith, in which a therapist assures that homosexuality can be “cured”, and tries to help others to free themselves of it. In that article, it was announced that the “therapist” gave workshops to “cure homosexuality” in Mexico City.
Valdemar claimed that COPRED could not refute “absolutely anything, because it is a fact that there does not exist a single scientific study which demonstrates that one is born homosexual.
“The proponents of gender ideology affirm dogmatically that one is not born man or woman, but that one is born homosexual. How could they maintain such an absurd line of reasoning? If, according to them, sexuality is constructed, then we must understand that it can be deconstructed. For that reason, if anyone is discontented with their homosexual attraction, how is it possible to prohibit helping them? That only happens in dictatorships, and we are at the beginning of the gay empire, of a dictatorship of thought similar to Stalinism or the cultural revolution of Mao Tse-tung,” Valdemar said.
Valdemar also called COPRED and the National Council for Preventing Discrimination (CONAPRED) “repressive institutions”, insinuating that they wanted to “repress” the march to defend “natural marriage”, called by the National Front for the Family, and slated for next Saturday, September 24, in Mexico City.
Valdemar said that one of the effects of the two letters he received is that the presentation by Richard Cohen was cancelled. Cohen was to give some workshops and conferences for homosexual persons who were uncomfortable with their preferences, so that they could “be cured”.
Richard Cohen, Valdemar says, was called “before some sort of tribunal, whose members were clearly enthusiastic followers of gender ideology and pro-gay. Their arguments let us see a true dictatorship of gay ideology.”
Valdemar read out a passage from COPRED’s letter: “The discriminatory actions against LGBTI people in Mexico City are unacceptable. For that reason, offering an option to ‘change’ a legitimate condition such as homosexuality must be considered as unjustified and tending to promote prejudices and stigmas in society. Any proposition or offer of ‘change’ places this sector of the population in a situation of vulnerability, given that in it is a message of option to ‘change based on wishes’ which may occasion pressures from third parties who consider said sexual orientation or preference unacceptable.”
Valdemar said that the Catholic church, evangelical Christians and parents who oppose the presidential initiative of equal marriage are called “homophobes and murderers”, for which reason he warned that there could be “very grave repressive consequences”.
Translation mine.
So we can see that the same paper that published that bizarre sex-ed lesson from the cardinal is now pushing another spurious claim: that there is no evidence that homosexuality is something you may be born with (or not, as the case may be). This in the face of a growing body of actual scientific evidence that, in fact, you CAN be born gay, and roughly one person in every ten is. Apparently the Archdiocese of Mexico City doesn’t know how to google, or read scientific journals. Yet they want to claim that they have the science to back up their religion? Mary, PLEASE.
Worse yet, they’re pushing an anti-gay “conversion therapy” proponent. Richard Cohen is a discredited hack who has made a lot of bank pushing “ex-gay” ideology. LGBT+ Mexicans have been opposing him for years. But his religiously-infused junk “science” meshes nicely with the Archdiocese’s view that being gay is some kind of demonic possession, so of course they want to promote his talks and workshops — and of course they’re pissy when human-rights advocates object, and use their freedom of speech to point out what’s wrong with the promotion of such a blatantly false view of LGBT+ people.
What’s truly hilarious and ironic is that the same church which has for centuries tried to suppress all evidence that homosexuality is real, normal, and even somewhat commonplace, is now accusing its opponents of censorship. And the same church which has for centuries held an imperial sway over most of Europe and all of Latin America, is now accusing a local human-rights movement, which is only asking for equality under law, of being a “gay empire”. And to “prove” the point, here is their representative: A man in skirts (perhaps a closet case himself, like so many Catholic priests and monks down the centuries, when the only “acceptable” way to be gay was to live as an ostensible celibate), giving unilateral dictation to the media about the “dictatorship” of said gay “empire”.
The mind…yea, verily, it boggleth.
