@quthbert has been onto something today. I want to make a few comments from my own experience which may or may not help others reflect upon their own. https://twitter.com/quthbert/status/1281911564942155777

I was never in Courage. But this same view filtered down to me through a lot of different pastoral channels. For a long time, I also thought there was something fundamentally good at the base of my desires - that it could be redeemed as such.

This proved untenable for lots of reasons. One thing that changed for me was when a friend of mine - a Patristics scholar - pointed out that actually, the Fathers pretty much universally interpret the Epistles as condemning sex as such. Not just sex out of marriage. All sex.

They're very negative even about marriage. Both West and East. Realizing that, and going back to read the Gospels and the Epistles themselves (including passages that allegedly support marriage!) really opened my eyes.

The norm, for St. Paul, is celibacy. Period. Better marry than to burn, sure. But if you can live a celibate life, you have to. That's how the Fathers interpret St. Paul and Our Lord, with pretty much one voice.

So I'm okay with the idea of celibacy, intellectually. My problem is that (especially of late), the Church doesn't follow its own rules. We make all kinds of allowances for straight men and women. I have complained about this before https://twitter.com/JVanteau/status/1280059163486359554

What @quthbert says here has been true in my own experience. It falls to us to take seriously the writings of the Scripture that would most inconvenience our straight brethren. https://twitter.com/quthbert/status/1282078253373677571