Catholic Bishops Prohibit Mass for Gay, Lesbian Organization

Is it true, according to Andrew Webb (“Gays’ Quest for Civil Rights Is Hobbled by the Brethren Hiding in the Closet,” Op-Ed Page, June 23), that it is only individual gays who hold the key to unlock the closet? Webb emphasizes this responsibility while alluding to the black civil rights movement. One individual, Rosa Parks, refused to give up her seat on the bus, thus asserting her rights as a human being. Therefore, it is going to take individual action by gays coming out, unlocking the door to the closet.

Ironically, the very day Webb’s column appeared, another article reveals that it’s not only assertiveness by individual gays that will change society’s perception of them. Archbishop Mahony wrote a strongly worded statement that gays and lesbians cannot participate in one of the essential rites of the Catholic Church: the Mass. Certainly, it is true that Archbishop Mahony did not just deny this to gays and lesbians, but to heterosexuals as well, who practice “genital activity . . . without being open to procreation.” And so the rite of Mass is being denied to gays and lesbians who are open in their sexuality but will still be given to married and unmarried heterosexuals and to other gays and lesbians who keep their “unprocreational genital activity” locked up in the “closet.”

The analogy to the civil rights movement is a dangerous one. Rosa Parks’ action was not bound up in moral, ethical and religious questions. Even though it’s not exaggerating her action as the morally and ethically right thing to do. Gays do not have it that “easy.” And I charge Webb and others like him with a sanctimoniousness that makes it that much harder for other gays to come out.

AIDS, and I’m not diminishing it as a medical problem for both gays and heterosexuals alike, was a horrible setback for the gay rights movement, along with the Supreme Court decision of a few years back in the Georgia sodomy case. AIDS is also covered in a moral and ethical shroud by today’s heterosexual community--individuals and organized religions.

The decision to stay in that closet is self-defeating but tragically understandable. The task for all of us appears insurmountable--the right to be open in one’s sexuality without it being damned as a moral and ethical wrong. Until all of us, gays and heterosexuals, change that perception those doors will remain shut.

STEPHEN C. JORDAN

North Hollywood