Now that John Paul II has passed on, it seems that it has come to be regarded as extremely bad form to criticize, or even question, his decisions. It will probably be years before people can seriously begin to explore your question.
*It has taken me three seconds. There WAS a law against this. In 1961. AmChurch queers ignored it.
Vatican has confirmed that men with homosexual sexual orientations should not be ordained. The December bulletin of the Vatican's Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments contains a letter indicating that men who have homosexual tendencies should not be ordained priests.
Catholic News Service reports that the letter written last May was signed by Cardinal Jorge Medina Estevez who retired as the head of the Congregation in October. The letter was in response to a query on the matter from an unidentified bishop. The letter said ordaining such men would be imprudent and "very risky."
While a new document on the matter is set to be released soon, a prominent Vatican document dealing with the issue was released as early as 1961. The 1961 document from the Sacred Congregation for Religious prohibits the admission of homosexuals to the diocesan priesthood and religious orders. The document states: "Those affected by the perverse inclination to homosexuality or pederasty should be excluded from religious vows and ordination," because priestly ministry would place such persons in "grave danger".
Earlier this year in the midst of the exploding scandal around sexual abuse, Pope John Paul II's official spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls cited canon law on homosexuality and said, "People with these inclinations just cannot be ordained."
"It has taken me three seconds. There WAS a law against this. In 1961. AmChurch queers ignored it."
Yes, but when John Paul II was still with us, a lot of us wondered why he let them get away with it. People seem awfully sensitive about such things today.