Dumbledoor

The Catholic Attitude.
This is a post from Mark Shea regarding the Dumbledore controversy.

Whatever the cause of homosexuality, the Roman Catholic Church does not demand that a person with homosexual inclination change his or her orientation. (Neither does the Church pretend to know the reason people are gay.)

To experience homosexual orientation, or same sex attraction (SSA) is not in itself sinful.
The Church simply teaches that to act upon homosexual desire, that is, homosexual acts, is sinful.

Unwilling to bind up heavy burdens men are unable to carry, the Church merely teaches that homosexuals are called to chastity. All men and women are called to live chastely, even in heterosexual marriage, and the single are called to live chastely and celibately, either until heterosexual marriage or for life. That is all.

A commenter wrote:

“This is why I think it’s so important for Christians to have clearly in their minds the distinction between same sex attraction (which are not sinful) and homosexual acts (which are). Otherwise, it’s hard to see how people struggling with homosexual attraction will get any other message than “It’s not what you do, it’s what you are that’s the problem.”

Dumbledore, so far as we can tell, committed no sin in that department. Christians can acknowledge that. They can also point out (as I tried to do yesterday) that his SSA is, from a literary standpoint, the perfect image of the love of the Same that tempted him to Pureblood racism. It is notable that “love”, not sexual attraction, is the term Rowling uses to describe it.

So: can everybody turn it down a few notches? These are not the greatest books of all time. Rowling is neither a true or false prophet. Be aware that persons who are grappling with the Church’s teaching on homosexuality are getting a loud and clear message in most comboxes: It doesn’t matter whether you live chastely or not, if you are SSA then you are irredeemable. I doubt that’s the message anybody intends to send, but it’s being sent (and heard) nonetheless.” - Bleak But True

Thank you for saying it so well! H/T Mark Shea