The New Inquisition

NY Times reports on the new Catholic Church investigation of gays in seminaries: "Catholic Church investigators tasked by the Vatican to review U.S. seminaries will be looking for 'evidence of homosexuality' and for professors who dissent from Church teaching, the New York Times reported on Thursday.

The newspaper said a Vatican document prepared to guide the process and given to The New York Times by a priest, surfaces as Catholics await a Vatican ruling on whether homosexuals should be barred from the priesthood.

American seminaries are under review as a result of the sexual abuse scandal that swept the priesthood in 2002, the year the probe which is now starting was announced.

In a possible hint of the ruling's contents, the American archbishop supervising the seminary review said 'anyone who has engaged in homosexual activity or has strong homosexual inclinations,' should not be admitted to a seminary.

The Times said Edwin O'Brien, archbishop for the United States military who is supervising the seminary review, told The National Catholic Register that the restriction should apply even to those who have not been sexually active for a decade or more."