Pope Francis has defended his controversial decision to let priests bless same-sex couples but admitted that “solitude is a price you have to pay” when you make difficult decisions.
Francis doubled down and insisted that the “Lord blesses everyone,” during a Sunday interview with an Italian talk show. But he acknowledged the remarkable opposition his decision has sparked — Africa’s bishops have united in a continent-wide refusal to implement the Vatican declaration and individual bishops in Eastern Europe, Latin America and elsewhere have also voiced opposition.
Vatican’s Dec. 18 declaration restated traditional church teaching that marriage is a lifelong union between a man and woman. But it allowed priests to offer spontaneous, non-liturgical blessings to same-sex couples seeking God’s grace in their lives, provided such blessings aren’t confused with the rites and rituals of a wedding.
During an appearance on “Che Tempo Che Fa,” Frances acknowledged, in his first comments since the uproar, the “resistance” the decision has generated. He blamed it on bishops not really understanding the issue and refusing to open a dialogue about it.
Or, he was realistic and practical about how far he could push change. In fact, considering the response, he might have gone a bit too fast. From a practical perspective, if he wants to change church policy, the best way to do it would be via the boiling frog method. Having an entire continent of the church potentially splinter away into a new extremist faction will not help the progressive cause
There is no pace at which he could have gone that wouldn’t have created some backlash.
If he had waited a hundred more years, there would still have been backlash.
The catholic church is an organization that is built around stability first and foremost. It changes, of course, but very, very slowly. That is very much by design.
That design has helped them “survive” for as long as they did, but it might end up being what eventually leads them into irrelevancy.
There would have been backlash, yes. The line he has to walk is in managing that backlash to avoid a schism in the church.
The Pope is the infallible word of God - Catholicism isn’t a democracy. And religion is all about what should be instead of what is, so there shouldn’t be any precedence for being practical. Letting gay people be murdered so the church might splinter doesn’t seem like a fair trade. He sounds like a coward for either not taking a stand for gay people, or for just doing this to get some press in more liberal outlets.
I should say I’m nowhere near unbiased - my perspective is that religious belief is a mental illness and Catholicism has enabled genocide from its inception to today.
I think we all know better. I’m sure the bishops do.
How did we get from blessing gay marriage to letting gay people be murdered?
That’s funny, because it certainly seems like he is taking a stand
No argument there. That doesn’t mean that the current change is not for the better, and one of the best steps forward he could be taking.
Well. Yes and no. The Pope has the capacity to provide infallible words according to church law. But that ability is used surprisingly rarely.
Just because he uttered “man, that’s the best bagle ever” during breakfast doesn’t mean that it’s suddenly sacrilegious to claim any other bagle is/was better.
The pope has to be speaking “ex cathedra” for it to be considered infallible and there’s some pretty severe limits on what that means and what topics that can be about. The last two times this power was used were 1854 and 1950, so not really a frequent thing.
I just find that an interesting detail.
I agree. But this isn’t about religion per se. This is about the church. And church and religion are two very different beasts. And in matters of the church they are required to take practicality into consideration.
Note that I’m by no means defending the catholic church here, I too think they did many, many harmful things and suspect their overall effect on the world is net-negative by many metrics.
religious belief is a coping mechanism. it helps people cope with uncertainty and the unknown, creating a community. It has been in decline because there is much less unknown now that before, although it will probably always exist; since we will never know what happens after death, there will always be some unknown
Organized religion like Catholicism is a instrument of power, and it has definitely enabled genocide