“They have gifts and qualities to offer the church” – Vatican says gays should be given a chance

        

Catholic bishops have on Monday released a document saying that homosexuals had “gifts and qualities to offer.” This is coming after a week of discussions at an assembly of 200 bishops.

The document said the Church should challenge itself to find “a fraternal space” for homosexuals without compromising Catholic doctrine on family and matrimony.

Gay rights groups of the Roman Catholic around the world have commended the paper, saying it was a good development; however, Church conservatives called it a betrayal of traditional family values.

The document known by its Latin name “relatio” used less judgmental and more compassionate language than that seen in Vatican statements prior to the 2013 election of Pope Francis, however it did not indicate any change in the Church’s condemnation of homosexual acts or gay marriage.

“Homosexuals have gifts and qualities to offer the Christian community: are we capable of welcoming these people, guaranteeing to them a further space in our communities? Often, they wish to encounter a Church that offers them a welcoming home,” said the document.

“Are our communities capable of proving that, accepting and valuing their sexual orientation, without compromising Catholic doctrine on the family and matrimony?” it asked.

New Ways Ministry, a leading US Catholic gay rights group, called it a “major step forward”, praising it for being devoid of the “major gloom and doom and apocalyptic horror” that accompanied previous Vatican pronouncements on gay people.

QUEST, a London-based Catholic gay rights group also called parts of it a “breakthrough” in that they “acknowledge that such unions have an intrinsic goodness and constitute a valuable contribution to wider society and the common good.”

However, John Smeaton, co-founder of the conservative group Voice of the Family, had this to say about the Vatican’s apparent change in direction.

“Those who are controlling the synod have betrayed Catholic parents worldwide,” he said, calling it “one of the worst official documents drafted in Church history.”

The Vatican document will be the basis for discussion for the second and final week of the bishops’ assembly, which is called synod.
A good number of the persons who participated at the synod are of the opinion the Church should tone down its judgemental language when referring to gay couples and avoid phrases such as “intrinsically disordered” when speaking of homosexuals as this was the phrase used by former Pope Benedict in a document written before his election, when he was still Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger and head of the Vatican’s doctrinal department.

This led to the tone down of Monday’s document which was read to the assembly in the presence of Pope Francis.
It said that the 1.2 billion-member Church should see the development of its position on homosexuals as “an important educational challenge” for the global institution.

While the Church continued to affirm that same-sex unions “cannot be considered on the same level as matrimony between man and woman”, it should recognise that there could be positive aspects to relationships in same-sex couples.

“Without denying the moral problems connected to homosexual unions it has to be noted that there are cases in which mutual aid to the point of sacrifice constitutes a precious support in the life of the partners,” the document said.

The paper also said there were “constructive elements” to heterosexual couples who were married only in civil services or who were living together, but stressed that Church marriages were “the ideal”.

According to Pope Francis, the church must be compassionate when talking about homosexuality. In his words last year, he said “If a person is gay and seeks God and has good will, who am I to judge?.”