By Chantelle Billson
Copyright thepinknews
Pope Leo has said the LGBTQ+ community “aren’t bad people”, while also criticising same-sex blessings.
The Pope has previously said that family is “founded upon the stable union between a man and a woman”, adding: “No one is exempted from striving to ensure respect for the dignity of every person, especially the most frail and vulnerable, from the unborn to the elderly, from the sick to the unemployed, citizens and immigrants alike.”
In a new interview with online newspaper Crux, Pope Leo spoke about the LGBTQ+ community, stating that “everyone’s invited in” because “they are a son or daughter of God”.
However, speaking of marriage, he said: “I’ve already spoken about marriage, as did Pope Francis when he was pope, about a family being a man and a woman in solemn commitment, blessed in the sacrament of marriage. But even to say that, I understand some people will take that badly.
“In Northern Europe they are already publishing rituals of blessing ‘people who love one another’, is the way they express it, which goes specifically against the document that Pope Francis approved, Fiducia Supplicans, which basically says, of course we can bless all people, but it doesn’t look for a way of ritualizing some kind of blessing because that’s not what the Church teaches.”
He added of LGBTQ+ people: “That doesn’t mean those people are bad people, but I think it’s very important, again, to understand how to accept others who are different than we are, how to accept people who make choices in their life and to respect them.”
“The family is father, mother, and children”
Pope Leo added that he believes the “church’s teaching will continue as it is,” in regard to same-sex marriage.
He also reiterated that he believes marriage is between a man and a woman: “Families need to be supported, what they call the traditional family. The family is father, mother, and children.”
Pope Leo XIV, who is the 267th pontiff, was elected on 8 May after a two-day papal conclave following the death of Pope Francis in April at the age of 88.
Prior to his passing, Pope Francis described being gay as a “human fact”, clarifying that he supports blessings for individual LGBTQ+ people, but not their unions.
He previously told Italian magazine Credere: “I do not bless a homosexual marriage. I bless two people who care for each other, and I also ask them to pray for me. The blessing is not to be denied to anyone. Everyone, everyone. Mind you, I am talking about those who are capable of receiving baptism.”
Share your thoughts! Let us know in the comments below, and remember to keep the conversation respectful.
