Interviewed in the latest issue of Hot Press, former RTÉ presenter Michael Murphy said that the Catholic Church’s strong stance against homosexual acts  – that they go against the natural law – is “nonsense”.

He went on to make a radical suggestion which would alter the training period for priests in a fundamental way to better align priests’ experiences with the needs of parishioners.

“The Vatican said that we’re intrinsically disordered with a tendency towards evil,” said Murphy on the subject of homosexuality and the Catholic Church’s teachings.

“That’s the direct quote of the teaching, which is a very heavy burden to bear. Can you imagine: you get out bed in the morning and you realise you’re intrinsically disordered with a tendency towards evil?”

The Vatican’s official stance on homosexuality in 2017 is that being a homosexual is not a sin, but that homosexual acts are.

Love

Murphy also revealed that he fell in love with an American priest when he was in his twenties and also spent time training to become a priest in 1965.

“At 25 I fell in love with a priest. An American priest who was on a sabbatical. It was a joyous liberation. After that I fell in love with another man from Donegal and I lived with him for about two years.”

While Murphy initially trained to become a priest, he went on to have a career in broadcasting at RTÉ spanning over four decades until he had to retire at the age of 66 because of an “arbitrary civil service retirement age” which he called “ridiculous”.

Now Murphy, who works as a psychotherapist in his own practice, is advocating for priests to be able to have sexual relationships while they are studying to better equip them to deal with the marital counselling of those in their parish.

With fewer new trainee priests than ever enrolled in Maynooth seminary this year, perhaps linked to last year’s reports of a priest removed amid Grindr allegations and reports of a ‘gay culture’, Murphy’s suggestion of encouraging trainee priests to engage in sexual relationships for the purpose of better facilitating their duties might not be too far-fetched.