A Catholic priest said Tuesday
he can understand being a pedophile but not being gay.
"I could understand paedophilia, (but) I don't know about
homosexuality," Father Gino Flaim, a pastoral collaborator of
the San Pio X church in Trento, told an afternoon talk show on
La7 TV channel.
"I have been to school a lot and I know children," Flaim
said when asked to explain.
"Unfortunately some children seek affection because they
don't get it at home. And maybe they find a priest, and he gives
in...I can understand that".
Asked whether children cause pedophilia, he answered "to a
great extent, yes".
Flaim went on to say he believes being gay is a disease.
The fact that homosexuality exists "doesn't surprise me,
because the Church is a community of sinners".
Asked whether he thinks homosexuality is an illness, he
said "Yes, I definitely think so".
The Trento archdiocese stripped him of his duties soon
after the interview aired.
"The Trento Church dissociates itself fully from statements
made by an elderly diocesan priest to La7 TV," the archdiocese
said in a statement.
"He expressed positions that do not in any way represent
the position of the Trento Archdiocese or the feeling of the
ecclesiastical community as a whole".
"It is shocking to hear a priest justifying pedophilia, an
extremely serious and particularly hateful crime," said Lower
House MP Sandra Zampa (PD), who is the deputy chair of the House
Childhood and Adolescence Committee.
She went on to cite Council of Europe estimates that one in
five children is sexually abused, with 200 cases reported in
Italy last year.
"All the institutions are called on to contribute to stop
the spread of this practice, which has no possible
justification," Zampa said.
"Child abusers must be convicted," she said.
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