"Priests' heterosexually oriented eros"

Richard John Neuhaus quotes a letter to the Wall Street Journal written by Baylor prof Michael Foley in response to a column criticizing the recent instruction on homosexuality and the priesthood.  An excerpt from the letter:

In characterizing the Vatican’s instruction on homosexual candidates for the priesthood as “shoot first and ask questions later” (”Ungracious Instruction,” editorial page, Dec. 2), Kenneth Woodward paints a misleading picture of an important and fair-minded directive. We will never know how many ordained priests today have deep-seated homosexual tendencies, but we do know that 82% of the recent sexual abuse cases were not acts of pedophilia involving small children of both sexes but acts of homoerotic ephebophilia by priests attracted to teenage boys. Put simply, the clerical scandals were predominantly perpetrated by gay men, not clinical pedophiles. . . .

Moreover, Mr. Woodward fails to see that the priesthood requires more than “affective maturity.” It demands that the protective and procreative zeal that a man would have had toward his wife and children is transposed to his spiritual family, his parish. As early as the Council of Nicea (A.D. 325), which forbade the ordination of voluntary eunuchs, the church has very much relied on the spiritual exercise of its priests’ heterosexually oriented eros. For the priesthood is husbandry in the strict sense, not mere celibacy: it is spiritual fatherhood, not professional bachelorhood.

I've never heard the case for the instruction put in quite these terms; is it true that the Church has traditionally relied on priests' "heterosexually oriented eros?"  I understand the focus on spiritual fatherhood, but I'd welcome additional explanation of the heterosexual dimension of the role.

Rob