Jeffrey Burrill, the Secretary to the Bishops of the United States who used a gay dating app

In a new scandal that shakes the Catholic Church of the United States, the secretary general of the Episcopal Conference of this country (USSCB), Jeffrey Burrill, had to resign after a Catholic media outlet accused him of regularly using a gay dating app and frequenting gay bars, also traveling for reasons related to his post.

Burrill, who has only held the post since November last year, immediately tendered his resignation, as announced by USSCB president Archbishop José Gómez.

“The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has learned of the existence of press information awaiting publication, suspecting possible indecent behavior of its secretary general, Monsignor Jeffrey Burrill, ”the organization wrote in a statement.

“To avoid this distracting attention from the operations and work of the conference, Bishop Burrill resigned with immediate effect,” he added, noting that “all allegations of misconduct were taken to the serious”.

As secretary general, Burrill coordinated the administrative affairs of the conference, and it was the highest office in the body which is not a bishop.

“On Monday, we learned of impending media reports alleging possible inappropriate behavior on Burrill’s part,” Gomez explained.

The American Catholic Church, which has been at the center of several major pedophilia scandals in recent years, has stressed that the accusations “do not relate to indecent conduct towards minors”.

Revelations from a Catholic website

Anyway, Gómez said, “to avoid becoming a distraction for the ongoing work of the Conference, the Bishop immediately resigned”.

The accusations come from an investigation by the Catholic portal The pillar, which is based on information gathered from your mobile phone’s location that was “commercially available”.

After the resignation was made public, The Pillar assured that the information came from the data that the Grindr app stores by its users and verified by an independent company.

The portal details that Burrill used the dating app “almost daily” in parts of 2018, 2019 and 2020, both in his office and in his residence, and that he also frequented gay bars, between them a well-known sauna in Las Vegas.

The “biggest” app for the LGBT community

Grindr users, which touts itself as “the world’s largest dating network for gay, bisexual, trans and queer people,” create a profile with their partner’s preferences and receive notifications when another user is found. near.

Appointed Assistant Secretary General of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops in 2016, and Secretary General two years later, Burrill was responsible for coordinating the Church’s response to allegations of sexual abuse cagainst US Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, revealed in June 2018.

The influential retired cardinal was finally fired in 2019.

The editor-in-chief of The pillar, JD Flynn, defended the article’s publication on Wednesday, although Burrill apparently did not violate US law.

The disclosure of private information about Bishop Burrill was “in the public interest”, he argued.

“Church leaders have recognized in recent years that inconsistencies between the behavior of church leaders and the expectation of celibacy can contribute to an unhealthy and harmful culture of secrecy and cover-up,” he said. in a press release.

Jesuit priest James Martin, who advocates for greater inclusion of LGBTI people in the Church, criticized the article by The pillar.

“Priests must obviously keep their promises of celibacy. But Catholic journalists must not use immoral methods to spy on priests,” he said.

” , did he declare .

Source: AFP and La Vanguardia

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