Thursday November 2, 2000
Pedophilia Advocate Featured In Catholic Church Concert
TORONTO, Nov. 2 (LSN.ca) – LifeSite has learned that an Oct. 27 concert at St. Basil’s Catholic Church in Toronto featured a composition by Gerald Hannon, Canada’s leading advocate of “intergenerational sex,” or pedophilia. Hannon was part of the choir and he was applauded separately after the piece by the musicians and those in attendance.
The event was the inaugural concert of Kammermusik Toronto, a choir and orchestra under the direction of Keith Muller, who is also the music director of St. Basil’s Church. The programme noted that St. Basil’s, connected to St. Michael’s College at the University of Toronto, is Kammermusik’s home venue.
The concert featured a “Kyrie” composed by Hannon, who is a member of the choir. The Kyrie, or Lord Have Mercy, is one of the parts of the Catholic Mass.
LifeSite interviewed Hannon to confirm that he is indeed the same Gerald Hannon known for promoting pedophilia. Hannon told LifeSite that he is the infamous “prostitute professor,” referring to the fact that he is the former Ryerson University professor, who, in the midst of a controversy over his support for pedophilia, revealed he was moonlighting as a homosexual prostitute. In 1996, Ryerson offered Hannon an undisclosed cash settlement for a guarantee that he would leave the university and not apply for his position again.
Hannon also told LifeSite that although he was raised a Catholic, “I no longer am.” His recent writings indicate that he still works as a prostitute.
Hannon is one of Canada’s most outspoken defenders of pedophilia. In Dec. 1977 he published an article, entitled “Men Loving Boys Loving Men,” wherein he discussed favourably and explicitly homosexual sex acts with boys as young as seven years of age. The article led to criminal charges, but Hannon was acquitted.
Hannon is also known for his Mar. 11, 1995 Globe and Mail article which ridiculed then-London, Ont. police chief Julian Fantino’s pedophilia investigation, Project Guardian. Fantino, now police chief in Toronto, denounced the article to the Ontario Press Council as “a distorted, self-serving and dishonest portrayal of the investigation.”
The Press Council ruled the article should have been labelled opinion rather than news. The October 2000 Toronto Life magazine reports that through Project Guardian, 61 men were charged and the conviction rate was 86 per cent, indicating that Hannon’s objections were ill-founded.
In a CTV Canada AM interview in January 1999 Hannon defended child pornography. Asked on the show: “So, you mean if there was a guardian on the set of a pornography movie involving eight-year-olds that would make it okay?”, Hannon responded: “It might well make it okay. We have guardians on the set for movies in which all sorts of violent things happen and children are involved in the acting. It’s just an acting job.” When asked, “is there such a thing as acceptable child porn?”, he responded, “I think so. It’s another kind of artistic expression.”
In an interview with LifeSite, Fr. George LaPierre, the pastor of St. Basil’s, said he was unaware of Hannon’s background, but that the reporter was “the only person who’s complained about it” and that he has “no intention of being swayed by one complaint.”
Kammermusik director Keith Muller, who was appointed music director of St. Basil’s by Fr. LaPierre, could not be reached for comment.
The next Kammermusik concert will take place at St. Basil’s Dec. 2 at 7:30 p.m.