Pope Francis Suggests Church Open To Blessing Gay Couples

Pope Francis has signalled that gay couples could be blessed, possibly reversing the Vatican’s 2021 stand via its Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith that the Catholic Church could not bless gay unions as ‘God cannot bless sin’. 

The Pope’s response was published by the Vatican after five Conservative Cardinals called on the Pope to condemn some churches in Europe blessing gay couples. This comes ahead of the upcoming Synod on Synodality which has pastoral care for LGBTQI Catholics on its agenda. 

New Ways Ministry, an advocacy group for LGBTQI Catholics welcomed the Pope’s statement.  

“Though the Vatican’s latest statement about same-gender couples does not provide a full-fledged, ringing endorsement of blessing their unions, the document significantly advances Pope Francis’ work to include and affirm LGBTQ+ people,” the group said in a statement. 

Pastoral Prudence

The Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith published on October 2 says that while the blessing of gay couples could not be institutionalised, it could be done on a case-by-case basis. 

The document advised church leaders to be guided by “pastoral prudence” and “pastoral charity”. 

“Pastoral prudence must adequately discern whether there are forms of blessing, requested by one or several people, that do not transmit a mistaken conception of marriage,” the Pope said in the letter. 

The Pope reiterated the Church’s stand on marriage as being between a man and a woman but said that the church should not “lose pastoral charity, which must be part of all our decisions and attitudes.” The Pope added that the pursuit of objective truth did not mean church leaders “become judges who only deny, reject, exclude.”

Inclusion Of LGBTQI Catholics

New Ways Ministry said the Pope’s letter offered hope to LGBTQI Catholics. “The allowance for pastoral ministers to bless same-gender couples implies that the church does indeed recognize that holy love can exist between same-gender couples, and the love of these couples mirrors the love of God,” the group said, adding, “Those recognitions, while not completely what LGBTQ+ Catholics would want, are an enormous advance towards fuller and more comprehensive equality.  This statement is one big straw towards breaking the camel’s back of the marginalised treatment LGBTQ+ people experience in the Church.”

The group said the Pope’s decision to release the letter, instead of condemning gay couples as demanded by the five Conservative Cardinals “shows more clearly that the Pope wants discussion on greater pastoral inclusion of LGBTQ+ people.”