Church Statements
Inadequacies in the Theological Methodology and Conclusions of The Sexual Person by Todd A. Salzman and Michael G. Lawler (2010)
Inadequacies in the Theological Methodology and Conclusions of The Sexual Person: Toward A Renewed Catholic Anthropology by Todd A. Salzman and Michael G. Lawler, Presented by the Committee on Doctrine, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, September 15, 2010
On November 2, 2007, Archbishop Elden Curtiss, then archbishop of Omaha, published a statement concerning two articles by Prof. Emeritus Michael G. Lawler and Prof. Todd A. Salzman, both members of the faculty of theology at Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska. Archbishop Curtiss expressed his disappointment that in these articles the authors "argue for the moral legitimacy of some homosexual acts."
He went on to affirm: "Their conclusion is in serious error, and cannot be considered authentic Catholic teaching." The following year Professors Lawler and Salzman published a book, The Sexual Person: Toward a Renewed Catholic Anthropology (Georgetown University Press, 2008). This book contains the same erroneous conclusion. Moreover, applying a deficient theological methodology to additional matters, the authors reach erroneous conclusions on a whole range of issues, including the morality of pre-marital sex, contraception, and artificial insemination. Because of the pastoral danger that readers of the book could be confused or misled, especially since the book proposes ways of living a Christian life that do not accord with the teaching of the Church and the Christian tradition, the USCCB Committee on Doctrine has examined the moral methodology found in the book and offers the following brief presentation of the problems posed by it.