ROME – The Vatican on Monday banned the blessings of same-sex relations, contradicting petitions for the practice of progressive bishops in Germany and elsewhere, and setting a limit on the pontifical approach to gays marked by the pontificate of Pope Francis.
The Vatican’s doctrinal office, in a document personally approved by Pope Francis, said the clergy were not allowed to pronounce blessings on any sexual intercourse outside of marriage between a man and a woman.
The document reaffirms Catholic teaching on marriage and sexuality when several liberal bishops, including the head of the conference of German Catholic bishops, have called for the blessing of same-sex couples in engaged relationships. Priests in Germany have widely blessed these couples for years, as have clerics in some other parts of northern Europe.
These blessings are wrong, the Vatican said Monday, because they would seem to “approve and encourage a choice and a lifestyle that cannot be objectively recognized ordered in God’s revealed plans,” and added that God “does not and does not he can do “bless sin.”
German bishops have become entangled with the Vatican in other matters, including the issue of giving communion to Lutherans, and are unlikely to back down in their stance of blessing gay unions. Currently, German bishops and lay Catholics are participating in a national synod that is studying changes in aspects of church life, including the possibility of women clergy and teachings on sexuality.
A move by German bishops to approve the blessings of same-sex unions would aggravate tensions with more conservative parts of the church, including in Africa, and conservative U.S. bishops in the United States have been critical of what they see as an excessively progressive departure from traditional tradition. teachings, with the Archbishop of Denver warning in 2019 that German bishops are moving toward a schism.
Pope Francis has taken a more liberal approach than his predecessors on some issues related to marriage and sexuality, including divorce and homosexuality. In one of his pontificate’s most famous statements, he answered a question about the gay clergy in 2013: “Who am I to judge?” During her 2015 visit to the US, she met privately with a gay couple in Washington, DC
In comments published last year, the pope expressed support for same-sex civil unions, saying gay couples “have a right to be legally covered,” a stance he had held as archbishop of Buenos Aires.
But the pope has also written that “there is absolutely no reason to consider homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even remote analogous to God’s plan for marriage and the family.”
Monday’s document at the Vatican acknowledged “the presence in these relations of positive elements, which in themselves must be valued and appreciated,” but said that these elements “cannot justify these relations and turn them into legitimate objects of ‘an ecclesial blessing, since the positive elements exist within the context of an unordered union in the Creator’s plan’.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church, an official teaching manual, states that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered,” the inclination to perform them is “objectively disordered,” and “in no case can they be approved.” But the catechism also states that gays “must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Any sign of unfair discrimination in this regard must be avoided. “
Monday’s reaffirmation of traditional teaching will likely disappoint progressive Catholics who expect a new change and encourage conservatives, just as the pope made the decision last February not to facilitate the ordination of married men to the priesthood.
“It’s not surprising yet disappointing,” said Francis DeBernardo, executive director of the New Ways Ministry, which advocates for LGBT Catholics. “This decision, however, is powerless, as it will not stop the Catholic people in the banks, nor will many Catholic leaders, who want these blessings to occur.”
The issue of homosexuality has swept away other Christian denominations, encouraging division with the worldwide Anglican Communion between liberal churches in Europe and North America and more conservative churches in Africa. Last year, the United Methodist Church agreed in principle to separate due to disagreements over gay marriage and the gay clergy, although the meeting to approve the measure has been delayed due to the pandemic.
Write to Francesc X. Rocca at [email protected]
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