Shame On You, Greg Griffith

It took Bishop Mark Sisk's public letter to the people of his diocese (posted in its entirety here at The Episcopal Cafe's The Lead) to trigger it, but the folks at StandFirm finally chimed in on the Paul Moore story. In general, the comments are a lot less nasty than I expected. Of course, that is partially due to the fact that I agree that Paul Moore violated his marriage vows and acted improperly with some men that came to him for counselling and advice.

Having said that, I cannot let this comment by Greg Griffith (#7 in the comment thread) go unchallenged:

Say… any word on how just how young this “young man” was?

The implication Greg is not so subtly making is that the other person involved was "under age." Either Greg did not bother to read the article in The New Yorker, or he is deliberately trying to paint Bishop Moore as a pedophile (or perhaps both). If he had read the article he would have found this:

Andrew had been a student at Columbia, a Roman Catholic. "I was considering being received into the Episcopal Church," he said. This was in 1975.

In other words, the young man in question was a college student at the time.

Later in the comment thread (#12) Greg continues to raise the red herring of pedophilia:

And even if it was difficult… how is it, by any stretch of the imagination, a suitable excuse for… uh… imposing oneself sexually on a “young man”, as though there can ever be a suitable excuse for so vile a thing?

Is this what the Cafe commenter, Bryant Hudson, really thinks is a reasonable assessment of Moore’s failings? Is this by any chance what we’re going to be asked to accept next - that “the closet,” not the person, is to blame not only for homosexuality, but… um… having an “extra-marital relationship” with a “young man”?

Note the continued use of quotes around the phrase "young man." Instead of sticking to the facts in evidence, Greg has done exactly what he frequently accuses the liberals of doing: twisting the facts to fit his view of what is going on. In this case, gay man = pedophile, a frequently appearing theme on that particular site.

In this case, Greg, that dog won't hunt.

Peace,
Jeffri