Biography

Bernárd Lynch is an “out” gay Irish born Roman Catholic priest, author, and activist who has worked for the rights of LGBTQIA+ people and people with HIV/AIDS for almost fifty years. He has an interdisciplinary Doctorate in counselling psychology and theology from New York Theological Seminary and Fordham University.  

In 1982, he founded the first AIDS ministry in New York City and was drafted onto the Mayor of New York’s Task Force on AIDS. This was documented by Channel 4 U.K. in two documentaries, AIDS: A Priest’s Testament in 1987 and Soul Survivor in 1990. He publicly backed Mayor Ed Koch in supporting Executive Order 50 in 1984, which compelled City contractors not to discriminate based on sexual orientation.

Bernárd publicly testified in favour of New York City’s lesbian and gay rights bill that bans discrimination based on sexual orientation in jobs and public accommodations, seeing it through to passage by New York City Council in 1986.

As documented in the documentary film by Channel 4 A Priest on Trial in 1990, his support for LGBT+ rights brought down on him a false prosecution perpetrated by church and government officials. He won total exoneration and was declared ‘fiercely innocent' by Justice Burton Roberts in the Bronx Supreme Court on April 21st,1989. 

Bernárd, became the first priest of a mainline Church to march publicly in London’s Pride parade in 1992. That same year he founded a support group for Catholic gay priests which operates to the present day. In 2014 he led the first Irish LGBT+ participants in the St. Patrick’s Day parade in London.

Bernárd’s numerous television/radio appearances include the Late Late Show, the Pat Kenny Show and BBC HARDtalk.

He was honoured with the Magnus Hirschfeld Award in 1988 for outstanding service to the cause of Irish LGBT+ civil rights. He was given the AIDS Interfaith Network U.S.A. award in 1990 and the Moral Leadership Award that same year.

In 2006, he became the first Catholic priest in the world to have a civil partnership marrying his partner Billy Desmond in Ireland in 2017. This was the first gay marriage in County Clare, the County of his birth.

In 2012, after forty years, he was expelled from his Religious Order the Society of African Missions. In 2017 Bernárd received a Proclamation from New York City Council, honouring his more than forty years of service to the LGBT and AIDS communities in the city. In 2019 he was awarded the Presidential Distinguished Service Award for the Irish Abroad, by the President of Ireland, Michael D. Higgins. In October 2020 he was made an ‘Icon’ of the Equality Forum’s U.S.A. LGBT History Month. 

Most recently, Clare FM broadcast a stunning documentary by Padraic Flaherty called ‘Falsely Accused.’ The documentary won Gold at the New York Radio Awards in April 2023. 

Bernárd, although stepping back from all leadership positions, continues his advocacy for justice through working with CAB, the Mayor of London’s Community Advisory Board and support for those in ministry and outside of ministry. The world is his Church and his closet.