Pope Francis has invited LGBTQ advocates to the Vatican and spoke highly about gays in the Church. Last week, Pope Francis signed off on a Vatican decree that reaffirms old church teaching and bars priests from blessing same-sex unions.
The Catholic Church expressed their decision-making process in a lengthy account on Monday. The “Holy See” referred to same-sex unions as a “choice,” and interpreted them as sinful. The bearing has undoubtedly broken the hope of millions of gay and lesbian Catholics worldwide.
It is a stumbling block for Catholics who anticipated that the institution would modernize its stance on homosexuality. Especially since many countries in Europe have legalized same-sex marriages, and the Church’s restraint to acknowledge the LGBTQ community has saddened many of its younger followers.
“The blessing of homosexual unions cannot be considered licit.”
A statement said by Vatican’s top doctrinal office, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
The recent statement from the Catholic Church voices that gays and lesbians, as human beings, may receive a blessing if they live according to the Church’s teachings. However, the blessing of same-sex unions would send a suggestion that the Catholic Church approves and encourages “a choice and a way of life that cannot be recognized as objectively ordered to the revealed plans of God.”
Last year, it was presumed that Pope Francis believed same-sex couples should be allowed to have “civil unions.”
“Homosexual people have a right to be in a family. They’re children of God and have a right to a family. Nobody should be thrown out or be made miserable over it, what we have to create is a civil union law. That way they are legally covered.”
A statement from Pope Francis in a documentary.
Social Media Reactions
In response, couples posted photos from their same-sex weddings, including Chasten Buttigieg—husband of 2020 US presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg.
Charlotte Clymer, from Catholics for Choice, tweeted: “Being LGBTQ is not a choice. LGBTQ people are wonderfully made by God. We are born this way and perfectly so, regardless of what the Vatican or any other religious authority might claim.”
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