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December 20, 2023

On gay blessings, Pope Francis sows confusion

By Monica Showalter

According to much of what's read in the media and among some advocates, the Vatican's changed!

It's finally come around to embracing the LGBTQ agenda, and is now offering blessings for gay couples for inclusivity's sake, and who knows, soon may be offering gay marriages!

Here is some of the cheering from Christopher Lamb at CNN:

With five words, uttered right at the beginning of his pontificate, Pope Francis changed the Catholic conversation about LGBTQ people. In 2013, when asked by a journalist about gay priests, the pope famously replied: “Who am I to judge?”

Over the last decade the pope has shifted the church’s tone and approach to gay people, refusing to take a judgmental stance, something that church institutions and leaders had often been accused of doing in the past.

His decision to authorize the blessings of same-sex couples is the most significant development to take place in his pontificate in terms of his outreach to gay Catholics, and follows earlier, more gradual developments. Francis’ latest move will be welcomed by many who have long called for reform in this area, but it is also likely to face significant pushback from parts of the church deeply opposed to his vision.

Here is even more cheering from lefty Jesuit publication America, citing gay advocate priest (and senior editor) Rev. James Martin, S.J.:

Martin, who has plenty of pull with Pope Francis, couldn't conceal his enthusiasm:

 

Which is a kind of stretching things.

According to Democracy Now!, a more even-tempered lefty website:

Pope Francis has formally approved a document from the Vatican’s doctrinal office that for the first time allows priests to bless same-sex couples, so long as the blessing does not resemble a wedding. Advocates hailed the move as a major step toward ending the Catholic Church’s discrimination toward LGBTQ people, but warned the church still holds the official position that marriage is between “a man and a woman” — and that same-sex couples are living in “sin.” Marianne Duddy-Burke is director of DignityUSA, which focuses on LGBTQ rights and the Catholic Church.

Marianne Duddy-Burke: “Obviously, for same-sex couples, sacramental equality is what would put us on the same footing as any other Catholics seeking recognition of their relationships. We’re not there yet. This is an important step, but it is yet another step on a journey that still has probably miles and miles to go.”

That more closely describes what's in the Vatican document, which is more about style than substance and doesn't change Church doctrine a bit.

Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco, who's probably been hearing from people in his area, put out a tweet (that may have been deleted), wisely suggesting that everyone just read the document closely. 

It actually doesn't change anything, yet at the same time, it's not terrible news for gay people of reasonably good will.

That's because when has anyone ever heard of a gay person being denied a blessing? Most Catholics wouldn't want it that way. They would agree that altars shouldn't have the gay flag and gay marriages shouldn't be performed nor recognized nor hailed, and Catholic churches shouldn't follow Unitarian churches, but aside from that, gay individuals are no different from anyone else in the eyes of the Church, the rules are the same for everyone, so they shouldn't be denied blessings.

I have no idea what Ric Grennell's religion is, but if he and his partner (if he has one) asked for a blessing, shouldn't they get one? I don't even think anyone has to be Catholic to get one.

Shouldn't those two Sicilian guys who founded the Dolce & Gabbana line of beautiful designer dresses, who are gay and undoubtedly Catholic, and who took flak for speaking out against gay adoption, get a blessing if they ask for one? Nobody would want them not to.

On the other hand, should a pair of guys who claim to be "married" and spend their time trolling Hollywood Boulevard for a third partner each night, and who march naked in the local gay pride parade get blessings, too? Should a "throuple" get one, or a bigamist, or someone in a "relationship" with a barnyard animal? Can the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence demand one as a matter of civil rights? You know they will.

You can see the obvious problems. It's obviously going to require some discernment, as they say, from the priest giving the blessing, which is going to lead to some abuses.

Nor has anyone ever heard of people in irregular situations being denied. The pope is right to say he doesn't need a huge analysis of anyone's moral state before offering a blessing. That's because blessings are given regularly in all kinds of irregular situations and always have been. They are given to those on their deathbeds who didn't exactly lead perfect lives. They are given to others in, as the Vatican delicately puts it, in "irregular" marital situations, too.

When I was a college student, I remember that when one of my great professors, George Lerski, a lion-like Polish freedom fighter who brought news of the Holocaust to the world and was named "Righteous Among Nations" by Israel, died in the 1990s, he was given a full Catholic funeral at the Jesuit University of San Francisco's cathedral -- and his situation was irregular, having been divorced and remarried. It happens. It's the same with people who commit suicide, they get blessings, too. The Church rightly waves these things through on the assumption that people were out of their minds when they killed themselves and didn't realize what they were doing, so they get full blessings at the funeral, too. Except for in some harsh pockets of rigid doctrinaire thought, waving things through and offering blessings, always giving the benefit of the doubt, has been the way of the Church for decades.

So nothing has really changed. 

So why did Pope Francis do it? 

Very likely it was to get the gay lobby off his back, but also to annoy the traditionalist Catholics, with whom he has been at loggerheads. He can't change doctrine, not even if he tries, and he knows he can't.

As Martin cheered, African bishops who preside over rapidly growing churches cranked out documents warning Catholics not to misread this. And -- UPDATE here -- the bishop of Astana, in presumably Kazakhstant, has hurled verbal thunderbolts.

The end result has been a lot of confusion.

The biggest problem with this Vatican statement is that it appears to endorse the gay agenda, rather than gay people.

The New York Times, after all, hailed it as a historic "first" and featured a gay-couple blessing by Martin, who must have been easy to reach for this story, given that he solicited the gay couple for the blessing.

The Times began its piece this way:

As a Jesuit priest for more than two decades, the Rev. James Martin has bestowed thousands of blessings — on rosary beads, on babies, on homes, boats, and meals, on statues of saints, on the sick, on brides and on grooms.

Never before, though, was he permitted to bless a same-sex couple — not until Monday, when the pope said he would allow such blessings, an announcement that reverberated through the church.

Did Martin really deny these guys blessings because they were gay earlier? I have my doubts.

But what we do see is the public hailing of the event, the publicity, the appearance of the Vatican joining the gay agenda.

“It was really nice,” Father Martin said on Tuesday, “to be able to do that publicly.”

A money quote from the Times:

“It’s like you said,” Jason told his husband, “It’s like we’re claiming our space.”

That doesn't sound like God's space, and that's where it gets skeevy.

The Times tried to be thorough in its report as to what this was and wasn't, and cited the various prohibitions and allowances within the document:

In keeping with the Vatican’s admonition that such a blessing should not be performed with “any clothing, gestures, or words that are proper to a wedding,” Father Martin wore no robes, and read from no text. There is no blessing for same-sex couples in the thick book of blessings published by the U.S. Conference of Bishops. Instead he selected a favorite of his own from the Old Testament.

This too:

The decision does not overturn the church’s doctrine that marriage is between a man and a woman. It does not allow priests to perform same-sex marriages. It takes pains to differentiate between the sacrament of marriage — which must take place in a church — and a blessing, which is a more informal, even spontaneous, gesture. And, a priest’s blessing of a same-sex couple should not take place in connection with a civil marriage ceremony, it says.

It all sounds like the command is for the matter to be private and informal, not a trumpet-blast event in public like a wedding announced to the world.

What's Martin trying to do here, going against the spirit of the document to achieve his "historic first," the press at his side? He even tweeted it out to his substantial following on Twitter:

 

It sounds like vanity. That isn't exactly the right climate for a blessing, at least not one from God.

Why Pope Francis did this, having to know that Martin would run away with it like that, calling in the cameras, is rather a mystery. As he often does, the pope sows confusion. 

Image: Twitter screen shot

 

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