Anyone who was unfortunate enough to be raised Catholic will know of the hallucinatory awkwardness of confession: the parched, tremulous priests; those endlessly clattering rosary beads; and the ceaseless, stammering admissions of shame.
Plus, the walls of your average confessional are usually made of two-ply tissue paper, so everyone hears your shit.
Well, one hapless Redditor just shared a story that’d make a plaster statuette of the Virgin Mary break down and weep.
It stars an elderly priest obsessed with “homosexual lust” and a man who’s just trying to get his earthly sins off his chest so he doesn’t burn in hell for all eternity.
How about we take this to the next level?
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Here it is, Cath_Dad’s confessional confession:
“Worst ever confession experience.
It’s a one-priest parish, rural area, everybody knows everybody.
Our newly arrived, elderly priest doesn’t hear well. I could overhear others’ confessions and moved far away… then I had to talk to drown it out.
When it was my turn, I confessed my sins of lust, but after the first few seconds, this priest interrupted with a question, asking if it was homosexual lust.
I was very surprised and truthfully said, “No, I’m a heterosexual married male and a father.
But he didn’t hear or didn’t care, and spent 15 minutes telling me all about homosexual things he has heard of.
He got agitated and very loud.
He kept repeatedly and graphically describing homosexual encounters and asking for my opinion on them.
People, including my wife and kids, could hear him all the way across the church.
I feel that everyone who listened will now incorrectly think I am a gay father and husband.
I am in shock and disbelief over the ruinous effect this will have on our family’s reputation.
What can I do? Change parishes?
The kids are right in the middle of their religious ed program, and preparing for First Communion.
This is terrible.
Would complaining to the priest or the archbishop accomplish anything, or just create fuel for future homilies?
Will leaving the parish just add fuel to the rumors? I’m embarrassed to show my face there again.”
Needless to say, the Reddit community was more than happy to share their two cents’ worth of advise with our humble narrator.
“This is a very serious breach of the confessional seal,” says digifork.
“The priest is not supposed to announce your sins or penance to everyone within earshot, let alone accuse you of sins you didn’t commit (intentional or not).
If I were you, I would speak to another priest in your diocese for advice. He would have a better handle on what strategy for dealing with this problem would be effective for that priest and/or the bishop.”
“From what you said it seems the priest in question might actually have some sort of obsession about the subject,” says Gaivs_Marivs, “so chances are w of your parishioners, especially the male part, had the same experience.
“This sounds really inappropriate to me,” says improbablesalad, “even without the problem of being overheard!”
“I’m not sure what the right course of action is, but I know that I wouldn’t want anyone else to have a bad experience like that (like, what if it happened to a teenager? Creepy.”
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“It sounds like something is off with this priest,” says supersciencegirl. “You mention hearing loss, but is dementia a possibility? Sometimes an early symptom is a loss of propriety and social norms.”
“I think you should talk to this priest and to the bishop. If this is hearing related, they need to figure out how to adjust the confession environment to allow the priest to hear parishioners while preserving privacy. If it’s something more complex, your bishop needs to know what’s going on so he can address it.
I don’t think you should worry about what fellow parishioners will think. Chances are they are having uncomfortable conversations with this priest too.”
What advice would you offer this family man? Should he stop sweating that loudmouth priest obsessed with gay sex? Or come to terms with the fact that he will be stretched across kamikaze fireballs for all eternity?
Sound off in the comments below.
Kieran
So let’s get this straight. The guy goes to church with his wife and kids and admits he can hear what’s going on in the confessional. So of course rather than walking out he walks into the confessional himself and is horrified that others could hear what was being said in the confessional.
Next time he goes to confession he should confess to being an imbecile.
Josh447
Sounds accurate to me. And make sure everyone hears it.
Brian
I don’t think he was super concerned about people overhearing his confession until the priest turned it into an issue of First Hand magazine. “Lust” sounds like the type of generic sin you’d confess to when you don’t want to say what’s really going on In your life.
Knight
Wow…once again, Queerty shows that bigotry and intolerance is still VERY active within the Gay community. David Grant, you are seriously one sorry, sack of excrement. You are of course entitled to your little opinions, but NOT entitled to pretend you know about something when it is absolutely clear you do not. When you say; “the walls of your average confessional are usually made of two-ply tissue paper, so everyone hears your shit.” shows that a) you don’t know YOUR “shit” (or better said, you don’t know YOU’RE shit) and b) you didn’t bother to read (or simply didn’t understand) the original article.
It’s hard to deal with close-minded bigots on any level, since they are so filled with the hate they spew that their brains are completely inaccessible to reason and fact, so I won’t bother to educate you here. But for everyone else, it’s very clear from the commentary in this article, which had to go trolling to a Reddit site for a topic of discussion that Queerty is on its own pitiful Crussade against all Western religion…which has done far more to advance humanity and civilization than any of the authors of Queerty have ever done/will ever do.
https://www.facebook.com/notes/michael-sanchez/the-catholic-church-is-the-largest-charitable-organization-in-the-world/399364450111086/
eddiesocket
So you’re saying an organization that loudly declares gays are evil and sinful is not close minded, but those who condemn said organization are? Seriously?
Juanjo
Drop dead queen. You have a rather absurd definition of bigotry.
irbaboon
Why would you expect LGBT people to like an institution that has spent the past 2000 years persecuting their kind?
Knight
Eddies you are completely ignorant if you think the Catholic church has ever declared gays are evil or condemned them. You are seriously misguided.
Juanwhore you’re much closer to dropping dead at this stage of your life than I am, so why don’t you lead by example. Quitando aire a los jovenes, puto de mierda. Véte a tu puta madre que te parió.
Clay83
Knight, you are very much mistaken. Religion has taken people backwards not forwards. Queerty has never tried to advance the world it is merely a site for news and entertainment.
Your brainwashing by the church is so severe that you come here and spew your shit for us all to see. A quick google shows me exactly what the Catholic Church feels about Gay people, Homosexuality is addressed in Catholic moral theology under two forms: homosexual orientation is considered an “objective disorder” because Catholicism views it as being “ordered toward an intrinsic moral evil”, but not sinful unless acted upon.[1] Homosexual sexual activity, by contrast, is viewed as a “moral disorder”[1] and “homosexual acts” are viewed as “contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementary.
I grew up as a Catholic and trust me, the moment I could leave that shit behind me I ran for the hills.
Can I suggest you leave this website and go pray
Rex Huskey
Bingo Mr. Knight! While I don’s always agree with your views, you’re correct here. Also I warm to your call for BlowJo to exit..
Knight
Rex thanks. No one has to agree with ANYTHING I say/my views…ever. I welcome any/all good discussion. The point is we should be able to have a difference of opinion without resorting to name-calling or mean-spirited insults. However, people like Juanwhore have decided since the day I arrived on this site to try and tear me down for having a difference of opinion. And they do it with ANYONE they disagree with. All it shows is they are miserable human beings who are unfit for social interaction.
Anyway, enjoy the week, bud.
chris33133
That was the time to interrupt the priest in a voice loud enough to overcome his rant: “Father, fix your hearing aid. I am NOT gay. What the f**k are you talking about?” And then, he should have walked out, taken his wife and kids from there, and sent a strongly worded letter to the local bishop.
I used to be an altar boy. I know exactly the kind of old-fart priest he’s talking about. They hear what they want to hear. And the only thing you can do is to avoid them and warn others to do so as well.
Knight
Agreed. I wouldn’t have used that tone or words, but yes.
eddiesocket
Or maybe don’t belong to a blatantly homophobic organization to begin with.
DarkZephyr
This story gave me a good laugh. I guess I am evil. lol
Serves him right for thinking that homosexual lust is somehow more shameful or embarrassing than heterosexual lust.
o.codone
So, you’re a Catholic hater. Are you also a Jew hater, a Muslim hater? Or maybe you’re a black hater or a woman hater? Never mind, you’re a hater. Simple as that.
Knight
Dude, the answer is Queerty hates anything Catholic or Christian…this is a given. Jews are of course off-limits (most of the writers are in fact jewish, which you can look up individually). Muslims are also “off limits”; you will hear about the plight of gays in muslim countries, but of course the religion itself isn’t the problem…and of course anyone who points this out is a hater.
Just pick up your PC handbook for brain-dead liberals anywhere fine propaganda is sold. You’ll get the gist.
eddiesocket
The people in the story were gay haters. But I guess you’re cool with that?
Juanjo
I see the sock puppets are out to wring their hands again. There is no hatred of anything Catholic or Protestant in the article. Go clutch your pearls over a real issue instead of one that exsts entirely in your pointy head.
Knight
Juanwhore has anyone ever told you how hideously goat-;like you look? Did your mother pass out and get gang-raped by a pack of sheepherders AND their flock? Was there ever a time when anyone ever found you remotely attractive or relevant?
Josh447
The writers are just typical humans doing their jobs exporting drama. What else is new. It’s the world we live in. Love it or leave it. But beyond all that. Just quit your bitch’n. It’s boring.
o.codone
When they quit their hatin’. *That’s* boring. Sorry to keep you up old guy. Nighty night.
SiamSam
“Anyone who was unfortunate enough to be raised Muslim” said no one at Queerty ever despite the rampant homophobia in Islamic countries.
Juanjo
Siamsam – that’s a lovely red herring you have there. Now go play in traffic – you’re the one who hates Jews and Muslims [among others].
Knight
Siam incredibly good point. Of course, such wisdom is lost on the foul, hideously troll-like beings that inhabit the brain-dead world of ultra-liberalism like Juanwhore.
SiamSam
@juanjo I didn’t realize dementia could be so funny. Please continue commenting.
Mykey
I in now way support any religion, they are (well the Abrahamaic ones) full of bigotry, misogyny and enslavement of their followers! But never do you here Judaism or Islam being condemned as much as Christianity. Anti-semitism, islamophobia and homophobia have been lumped into the same basket as though any one of those groups would support gay people and the leftists want us to think that we are one big, happy, oppressed family…
tricky ricky
this stinks to high heaven. don’t believe one little bit of it. and queerty, one never hears the clinking of rosary beads whilst in the confessional unless one has them in their own hand.
irbaboon
Maybe not everyone is as hard of hearing as you are!