I have good news to report, (in a twisted way). I was asked by a young man, well younger than me, who I did not know if I wanted a . I said no. Believe it or not I was not overwhelmingly triggered. I was triggered but it was less. I guess the passage of 40some years and incredible amounts of therapy has helped me. The same thing happened at my last parish. the difference is that it was a woman, I knew her and that she was a tad mentally ill, we were having a discussion and she blurted out that she, I ignored her and I felt nothing.

Now I must get out there in the universe…that I have been cursed, or blessed, with sooooo much sex-appeal that it just oozes out of every pour of my body all of the time. Add to that add my absolutely devastating handsomeness and you have a recipe for constant sexual harassment. Of course I jest. I’m old and cranky. My goal in life is to become a saint of course but also a curmudgeon, I think they are compatible.

Now my pastor said that in all his years as a priest he has never been propositioned. What was I suppose to say? How was I supposed to feel at that comment? I take it now as not being believed. That is unfair to him because maybe that is not what he meant at all. But because of my damage and because of my past that is where I go first.

What is wrong with people? Why would you offer to perform oral sex on a person that you just met, someone that you don’t even know? Are you that in need of money that you are willing to debase yourself. (I’m assuming that he would have wanted some kind of monetary compensation.) Did I mention that I’m poor? I thought maybe he had been in prison and that’s the way things work there. Regardless, it was at the very least inappropriate.

That’s what it seems the world has come too at least when dealing with priests. How many people would have jumped at that offer? How many priests would have? Isn’t that a sad commentary on society and on the priesthood that someone would even say that out loud to a priest. Is it because of the long history of sexual abuse? And all priests getting painted with that broad brush of being sexually active is unwelcome and untrue.

When making the promise at Deaconate Ordination to forgo marriage and knowing the Church’s teaching on sexual expression outside of a sacramental marriage why and how could a priest acquiesce to such a proposition? Prayer, fasting, spiritual reading are supposed to be what it is we are about. We are in the world not of the world. Carnal desires and worldly wants are things we need to constantly battle. The more that is given to you, like ordination, the more that is expected from you. Falling is not an option, fighting the enemy is necessary. It’s not easy but it is easier when living the life a priest promises to live.