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<div class="gmail-adn gmail-ads"><div class="gmail-gs"><div class="gmail-"><div id="gmail-:2gv" class="gmail-ii gmail-gt"><div id="gmail-:2gu" class="gmail-a3s gmail-aXjCH"><div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><font size="4"><b>Dutch bishop removes priest after ‘anti-gay’ homily upholding Church teaching
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</b></font><a href="https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/dutch-bishop-removes-priest-after-anti-gay-homily-upholding-church-teaching" target="_blank">https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/dutch-bishop-removes-priest-after-anti-gay-homily-upholding-church-teaching</a><br><span></span><span></span><span></span><span></span></p>
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<h4>Analysis</h4>
<p>May 10, 2019 (<a href="https://www.lifesitenews.com/" target="_blank">LifeSiteNews</a>)
—<span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b> Father Marc Massaer</b></span><span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)"><b> will be leaving</b></span> <span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b>his present parish</b></span> <span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)"><b>in the diocese
of ’s-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands</b></span>, by the 1st of July.<span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b> His</b></span> <span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)"><b>removal </b></span>is
seen by many as<span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)"><b> a consequence of</b></span><span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b> a strongly worded sermon he gave last
December 26, speaking out against</b></span> <span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)"><b>gender ideology and same-sex unions.
</b></span>Fr Massaer has published the news of his departure himself on his parish
website on May 7, explaining that he has accepted Bishop de Korte’s
suggestion that he leave Sint-Christoffel in West Maas en Waal on short
notice. His new destination is as yet unknown.</p>
<p>While the priest himself has not underscored the link between his
removal and his “controversial” homily (from the Dutch mainstream point
of view), it is certain that he has gone through a period of
confrontation with his parishioners, the Catholic members of eight
former parishes he has led alone for the last eight years when a
“super-parish” was formed, due to a dearth of priests and faithful in
the formerly heavily Catholic south half of the Netherlands.</p>
<p>Hostilities were opened following the “Second Day of Christmas,” as
it is called in Holland: a public holiday when many nominal Catholics
who seldom go to church are wont to join Mass. Fr Massaer was
celebrating in one of “his” eight parish churches, in Walen.</p>
<p>In this case<span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)"><b>, the daughter of a local choir member had come back to
her home town for Christmas and joined Mass on the 26th. Ceciel Kalkers
was shocked </b></span><span style="background-color:rgb(217,234,211)"><b>to hear </b></span><span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b>the priest condemning</b></span> <span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)"><b>“the indoctrination of gender
ideology.</b></span>”<span style="background-color:rgb(217,234,211)"><b> <span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)">He said</span></b></span><span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)"><b> it “is radically opposed to</b></span><span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b> the order of creation</b></span>,<span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)"><b>
and it promotes that what is not </b></span><span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b>Catholic.”</b></span> <span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)"><b>“This is a boomerang that
will head back towards</b></span> <span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b>humanity</b></span>,” he said, with all its “negative
consequences,” she wrote two weeks later <a href="https://www.demaasenwaler.nl/nieuws/ingezonden/27953/gedesillusioneerd-na-bezoek-h-mis-st-victorkerk-wamel?redir&fbclid=IwAR39S1jR_E26MIj0Vt9EvcfVcNdZrUCUBTNISU4c08g4iQe7UnSHGtJ21EQ" target="_blank">in an open letter to the local newspaper</a>, <em>De Maas en Waler</em>.</p>
<p><span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)"><b>She added</b></span> <span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b>another quote from the sermon from memory: “Only ‘holy families’ (man-woman-child) could bring peace and harmony.”</b></span></p>
<p>Her letter went on to speak of her “sadness,” thinking about “two
good homo friends, a homo-couple with a newborn child.” “I hardly know
anyone nicer. Weren’t these people welcome?” she said. And so <span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)"><b>her text
went on, deploring</b></span> <span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b>the priest’s tone, his “condemnations,</b></span>”<span style="background-color:rgb(208,224,227)"><b> his lack of
“inclusion.”</b></span></p>
<p>Kalkers tried to speak to Massaer in the sacristy, but he had already
left. The following day, she called him over the telephone, and was
again shocked to hear that he was standing by his words. “People should
start thinking, because they have fallen asleep,” he said, according to
Kalkers.</p>
<p>Challenged about the “hurt” such words could cause to homosexual<span style="background-color:rgb(255,255,255)">s,
she said Fr Massaer added: “A m</span>an with a man is no lifestyle. We can’t
make wrong things right just by talking. As a Church, we have a right to
say what is right and what is wrong. Every human being stands before a
choice, and I want them to think about that.”</p>
<p><span style="background-color:rgb(208,224,227)"><b>“So orientation is a choice, according to Fr Massaer,</b></span>” <span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)"><b>angrily wrote
Ceciel Kalkers</b><b>. She was even more indignant when she </b></span><span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b>heard him add: </b></span>
“<span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b>You’re <span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)">really going against</span> the order of creation and then you<span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)">’re just
sinning.</span> <span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)">Sins don’t fit</span> with the Christian lifestyle. I condemn <span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)">what is
wrong.</span>”</b></span></p>
<p>Shortly after this letter was published, the governing board of the
parish of St. Christopher reached out to the diocese of ’s-Hertogenbosch
(Den Bosch), whose bishop, Gerard de Korte, is known for his openness
to the “LGBT community,” having even accepted to open his cathedral for
the local “Pink pride” a few years back before <a href="https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/dutch-bishop-cancels-ecumenical-pink-saturday-service-in-cathedral-after-cr" target="_blank">being forced to back down</a>.</p>
<p>According to the regional press, the board’s move was dictated by
anger at the “gay-unfriendly” sermon of Marc Massaer, although the no
details were given. Its vice president <a href="https://www.gelderlander.nl/west-maas-en-waal/nashville-preek-van-pastoor-valt-verkeerd-en-zet-kerk-op-scherp~a5d49b75/" target="_blank">did tell </a><a href="https://www.gelderlander.nl/west-maas-en-waal/nashville-preek-van-pastoor-valt-verkeerd-en-zet-kerk-op-scherp~a5d49b75/" target="_blank"><em>De Gelderlander</em></a> that the board was “not happy with the impact of the homily.”</p>
<p>The newspaper compared Massaer’s words with the Nashville statement
condemning homosexual acts. At the time in the Netherlands, the
statement was being picked up and signed by local evangelicals, amid
furious media reaction. Some of them <a href="https://www.lifesitenews.com/blogs/dutch-christian-leaders-receive-death-threats-after-signing-biblical-sexual" target="_blank">even received death threats at the time</a>.</p>
<p><em>De Gelderlander</em> wrote on May 7 that Massaer’s sermon had
triggered “a storm of outrage, also among parishioners and volunteers.”
Now Massaer is being moved to other pastures.</p>
<p>Talks took place between the parish governing board and the diocese,
according to the newspaper: “It is not clear whether Massaer’s departure
is a result of those talks. No one at the diocese or in the parish is
prepared to answer requests for comment.”</p>
<p>Even if his new nomination was on the cards, reactions to his sermon
are sufficient to show how difficult it is in a deeply paganized country
such as the Netherlands to proclaim the full Catholic truth.</p>
<p><span style="background-color:rgb(208,224,227)"><b>Local media noted</b></span> <span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b>that Massaer “keeps himself strictly to church
rules.</b></span>” “Last summer he banned a nonreligious choir from singing at the
funeral of a parishioner,” noted <em>De Gelderlander</em>. But<span style="background-color:rgb(208,224,227)"><b> even that
liberal daily was obliged to acknowledge</b></span> <span style="background-color:rgb(255,242,204)"><b>that under Massaer’s guidance,
not one of the eight churches of the joint parish of West Maas en Waal
has been <span style="background-color:rgb(234,209,220)">shut down.</span></b></span></p>
<p>Facebook comments called the priest an “Inquisitor” and a “freak.”</p>
<p>That is how upholders of traditional Church teaching are now seen in secularized Holland.</p></div><div class="gmail-adL">
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