How Close Are We To Schism And Heresy?

“Beyond the confines of the Roman church”
USF theology professor is ordained priest, but not a Catholic one
In a letter printed in the March 21 edition of Catholic San Francisco, Jesuit Father Stephen Privett took author George Weigel to task for saying in a column that Catholicism is “vestigial at best” on Catholic college campuses. In response, Privett said the University of San Francisco, of which he is president, “has a Catholic Studies program; a Catholic focused curriculum in the Theology and Religious Studies Department,” as well as other Catholic-inspired programs and activities.

USF may have all these things, but it also has Vincent Pizzuto, who, besides being assistant professor in the university’s Department of Theology and Religious Studies, is also an ordained priest in the Celtic Christian Church. Pizzuto also serves on the board of directors of the LGBTQ Caucus of the University of San Francisco, which says it was formed in the Fall of 2005 “as a way to promote social justice for LGBTQ people.”

According to the USF web site, “in addition to his teaching, Prof. Pizzuto lectures in local parishes on areas of prayer and spirituality with particular outreach to the gay and lesbian community.” In a discussion, “Is it Ethical to be Catholic? – Queer Perspectives,” given at Most Holy Redeemer Church in San Francisco in 2006, Pizzuto said that ethical questions have “driven faithful Catholics beyond the confines of the Roman church where they might more faithfully live out their catholic faith elsewhere. And I count myself among them.”

From “a so-called ‘queer’ perspective,” Pizzuto said the underlying ethical dilemma he found in “the Roman Church” was that, “as a relatively healthy gay man, I had been deeply loyal and committed to an institution wherein my attempts to live honestly, openly, and with integrity of faith were met over and again with an institutional condemnation insisting that I was ‘objectively disordered’ and that my most natural inclinations toward intimate relationships was the manifestation of sin and inherently self-indulgent.”

These attempts “to openly and honestly integrate my sexual orientation and my faith as a Catholic -- and to help others do so,” said Pizzuto, “were made to be a mockery in light of the discovery that while publicly denouncing my openness, honesty and call for dialogue, this same institution was not just sporadically, but systematically protecting sex offenders of the most vulnerable members of society.” Further, said Pizzuto, the Church had the temerity to blame homosexuals for pedophilia.

It was thus that Pizzuto left the Catholic Church to join the Celtic Christian Church, which claims apostolic succession through the Old Catholic Church and other independent jurisdictions. The Celtic Catholic Church claims to be “an independent catholic and orthodox Church, living our faith in the spirit of the ancient Celtic Church. Our faith is that of the first seven ecumenical councils of the undivided Christian Church.” Pizzuto was ordained a Celtic Christian priest in San Francisco in July 2006.

He serves as “presider” over the New Skellig community in the Bay Area, which, says its web site, is a “catholic contemplative community of lay people” meeting “in small intimate settings in the homes of its members.”

Link (here)