Coming to the Catholic Church was not so much a radical departure from everything I had known before; it was a new chapter that allowed me to embrace and build upon it.
LGBT
Posted inFaith, News
Two Catholic bishops join LGBT group to condemn discrimination against transgender people
Archbishop John Wester, Bishop John Stowe and other Catholic leaders declared, “We, Bishops, religious and lay leaders of the Roman Catholic Church join with the Human Rights Campaign in calling for an end to the epidemic of violence against transgender individuals.”
Posted inFaith, News
Vienna cardinal ‘not happy’ with Vatican statement on same sex unions
Austria’s Cardinal Christoph Schönborn has said he cannot deny same-sex couples a blessing if they request one and that he was “not happy” with the Vatican’s mid-March statement on same-sex unions.
Posted inDispatches, Politics & Society
‘It is our duty to love and defend’ LGBT Americans: Bishop Stowe breaks with U.S. bishops on the Equality Act
The U.S. bishops’ conference has made defeating the Equality Act a priority, citing concerns over religious freedom.
Posted inFaith, Podcasts
Podcast: Did Pope Francis distance himself from the CDF document on same-sex unions?
This week on “Inside the Vatican,” Vatican correspondent Gerard O’Connell and host Colleen Dulle discuss the pope’s comments and why Vaticanistas use anonymous sources so often.
Posted inFaith, News
More than 230 German theologians protest Vatican statement against blessings for same-sex unions
More than 230 professors of Catholic theology have signed a statement protesting the Vatican’s recent pronouncement that priests cannot bless same-sex unions, adding to dissent over the document.
Posted inFaith, Vatican Dispatch
Vatican sources suspect Pope Francis was distancing himself from CDF statement on same-sex unions in address
According to three sources, it was significant that Francis called on Christians and the church to give witness to Jesus “not with theoretical condemnations but with gestures of love.”
Posted inFaith, Podcasts
Podcast: The Vatican statement on gay unions may have been rushed past the pope
This week on “Inside the Vatican,” America’s Rome correspondent Gerard O’Connell reveals that the document was drafted by a much smaller group of people than would ordinarily be involved in writing this type of statement and that Pope Francis reviewed it just before his Iraq trip.
Posted inDispatches, Faith
‘It just hurts’: Catholics react to Vatican ban on blessings for same-sex couples
L.G.B.T. Catholics and their allies are reacting with dismay to a statement released Monday by the Vatican prohibiting priests from blessing same-sex unions, in which church officials assert that God “does not and cannot bless sin.”
Posted inFaith, Vatican Dispatch
Vatican, with Pope Francis’ approval, says priests cannot bless same-sex couples
The Vatican has issued a statement in which it declares that “the church does not have, and cannot have, the power to give the blessing to unions of persons of the same sex.” It said Pope Francis “was informed and gave his assent” to its publication.