by Hilary White, Rome Correspondent
LONDON, July 20, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The homosexualist organization Quest has announced it will be holding its annual general meeting, with the theme “A Prophetic Community,” at a London retreat centre owned by the Catholic bishops of England and Wales.
The meeting, which starts Friday, is to be held at the All Saints Pastoral Centre, a London retreat and conference centre that is both owned by and part of the Catholic Archdiocese of Westminster.
Quest describes itself as “a group for lesbian, gay and bisexual Catholics. Its purpose is to proclaim the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ so as to sustain and increase Christian belief among homosexual men and women.”
However, the group has been described by several Catholic organizations as one dedicated to the homosexualist ideology and to pressuring the Catholic Church to abandon its teaching on sexuality. The Organisation of Catholic Families has accused Quest of being “dedicated to denying the teaching of the Church.” The campaign group Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice, has also called it “a militant homosexual group.”
In 1998, Quest was removed from the Catholic Directory for England and Wales on the instructions of the late Cardinal Basil Hume, then archbishop of Westminster. In 2007, the venue for their annual conference was cancelled by Liverpool University Catholic Chaplaincy at the insistence of Archbishop Patrick Kelly, after the Catholic organization Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice intervened.
A survey conducted of Quest membership in 2000 found that 89 percent of members said “no” when asked, “Are you convinced by any arguments that you have heard to the effect that sex outside marriage is always wrong?” When asked “Should Quest work for change in official Church teaching on sexuality?” 90 percent said “yes.” Asked, “Should it be part of the purpose of Quest to encourage its members to live chaste lives with no sexual activity?” 81 percent of the membership said “no.”
Featured speakers at this weekend’s conference include Margaret Morris a “retired Anglican priest” who served as the Anglican bishop of Leicester’s Chaplain for People Affected by HIV. Quest says that “the local LGBT community has justly recognised prophetic value in her words and work.”
Approval for the use of archdiocesan property by a group that opposes the Catholic Church on sexuality is apparently just part of the status quo for Westminster, the leading see of the Catholic Church of England and Wales. Vincent Nichols, the archbishop, has a long record of supporting the homosexualist agenda in Britain.
Despite years of protests by faithful Catholics, Nichols continues the policy of his predecessor, Cardinal Cormac Murphy O’Connor, and allows the continued celebration of so-called “gay masses” at Our Lady of the Assumption parish in London, sponsored by the homosexualist group, the Soho Masses Pastoral Council.
Nichol’s support for the homosexualist movement is part of a larger problem among the bishops of England and Wales. In December last year, a former bishop of Westminster, now archbishop of Birmingham, Bernard Longley, attacked a group of Catholics who had for years been praying outside Our Lady of the Assumption – and protesting to Rome – calling them “judgmental.”
In September 2010, Nichols publicly confirmed that the English and Welsh bishops have en masse knowingly refused to support Catholic teaching on sexuality. Nichols vehemently denied that the Church opposed the homosexual agenda, and told a BBC interviewer that it was the settled policy of the Catholic bishops of England and Wales not to oppose the push for civil partnerships by the homosexualist lobby.
In 2007, at the height of the Church’s struggle to maintain its adoption agencies, Nichols, who was then archbishop of Birmingham, told media http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/archive/ldn/2007/jan/07012906 that it has always been the policy of Catholic adoption agencies to allow adoption by homosexual singles.
Together with the Catholic Education Service of England and Wales, Nichols was vociferous in his support for the Labour government’s plans to make explicit “sex education” – that included information on how to obtain abortions – mandatory in all of Britain’s publicly funded schools. By the government’s own admission, the sex-ed scheme, which ultimately failed after hard lobbying by faith groups, would have made promotion of abortion, contraception and homosexuality mandatory even for “faith schools.”
Contact information:
Congregation for Bishops
Marc Cardinal Ouellet, Prefect
Palazzo della Congregazioni,
Piazza Pio XII, 10
Roma, Italia
00193
Phone: 06.69.88.42.17
Fax: 06.69.88.53.03
We have too many bishops of your sort. Stay in England or truly Convert!
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