When the Association of United States Catholic Priests (AUSCP) gathered in San Antonio for its 2025 Assembly, it selected Father Ronald Rolheiser, OMI, as retreat master. Lepanto Institute reported on that decision in June, noting that the organization chose Rolheiser for his record of eroticized mysticism, doctrinal ambiguity, and soft-focus spirituality, making him the perfect voice for a group devoted to undermining Catholic teaching under the guise of spiritual language. Lepanto Institute further provided a recording of part of a meeting at that Assembly where priests openly discussed with Rolheiser everything from masturbation to same-sex “marriage” and gender dysphoria.
Now Rolheiser’s influence is once again on display. In a recent interview, celebrity pro-LGBT priest Fr. James Martin introduced him as “one of my favorite all-time spiritual authors” and praised his book Sacred Fire as a guide he returns to every year. This was not casual appreciation. Martin framed Rolheiser as one of his spiritual masters, a voice he reads annually, a guide for his own Jesuit vocation.
The AUSCP platforms Rolheiser because he spiritualizes dissent. Martin promotes him because he supplies the theology Martin needs to dress activism in mystical garb. The activist priest and the erotic mystic are not separate currents in the Church today. They are one stream, flowing together, and Martin himself points to Rolheiser as the deeper source from which his own program imbibes.
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