While congratulating the new Pope Francis, the first in 1,300 years to be chosen from outside Europe to lead the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics, Presid
While congratulating the new Pope Francis, the first in 1,300 years to be chosen from outside Europe to lead the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics, President Yoweri Museveni said “I am sure you will use your life experience to bring the necessary changes in the Catholic Church, where Catholics are the majority in Uganda”.
But although Mr Museveni did not specify the reforms he would like to see from the 76-year-old Pope, the Rev. Father Anthony Musaala, in a missive to the media, blamed the Catholic Church and the Ugandan priests of hypocrisy in relation to their vows of celibacy. In order to address this issue he called for Catholic priests to be allowed to marry, or at least for discussions on the subject to be initiated.
Father Musaala lashed out at the church saying; “The number of Catholic priests and bishops who are sexually active in Uganda is unknown, but almost everywhere unedifying stories of priests ‘sexploits’, are not hard to come by. These stories are told in counselling or as anecdotes, or by the media. They are told within the parishes and beyond. They are told at home in families, in taxis, in hair salons and in the markets. What is talked about? Priests’ secret and not so secret liaisons with girls and women, coerced sex with house-maids, with students, with relatives; priests ‘wives’ set up in well-established homes; priests involved with a parishioner’s wife; of priests romantically involved with religious Sisters; priests offering money for sex, and so on…”
Father Anthony was echoing what some liberals have nudged the Vatican to do, among other reforms such as endorse same-sex marriage and the consecration of women as bishops, prescribe punishment for clergymen involved in sexual abuse and overhaul its near dysfunctional bureaucracy in order to modernise the Catholic Church.
Typical of the Catholic Church, Archbishop Cyprian Kizito Lwanga, moved in fast to shut down what Father Musaala was saying, by suspending Father Musaala and issuing a typically Roman Catholic Orthodox response. He said;
“This means therefore that Fr. Musaala, because of the publication of his article in the public media, which damages good morals of Catholic believers and further expresses a wrong teaching against the Catholic Church’s teaching, and that this stirs up hatred and contempt against the Church, he incurs a Ferendae sententiae penalty as prescribed by Can.1314. This means that Father Anthony Musaala is suspended from celebrating sacraments and sacramentals”.
For Uganda, the aftermath of the new Pope’s accession has definitely ruffled feathers. All sorts of topics have come to the fore in regards to openness, human rights and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) issues. Father Musaala is calling for more openness in the Catholic Church and a review of the doctrine of celibacy. With more openness, Catholic priests may stop spreading HIV and will not die from AIDS themselves. The outspoken Rev. Father has himself been accused by opponents of being a homosexual, an accusation he has vehemently denied.
The Reverend Father laments that he has been treated as an outcast, because he reached out to the Ugandan LGBT community, just like Jesus Christ who reached out to the most hated members of society.
“[In 2009] it was cited that I must be a homosexual, because I had homosexual friends and went to homosexual gatherings. Not that I cared much whether or not someone thinks that I am homosexual. Certainly I have been called worse things than that. In my defence, I tried to point out that I didn’t actually recall having had homosexual relations with any of my rabid accusers, neither did they; which meant that hearsay alone became the evidence.”
Judging by the way Father Musaala has been treated many liberal minded Catholics and human rights groups, are bound to be disappointed by the new Pope. In the face of HIV and AIDS, there are still so many reforms that world populations would be looking to the Catholic Church to make. Can the Church, become liberal on condom use and other forms of contraception, which so many catholic laity would benefit from? Can there be some laxity on abortion and post abortion care? How can the church and Pope Francis, become our partner in ensuring that there are zero new HIV infections?
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