According to the Associated Press,ABOARD THE PAPAL AIRCRAFT
— Pope Francis reached out to gays on Monday, saying he wouldn't judge even
catholic priests for their sexual orientation. This was done in a remarkably
open and wide-ranging news conference as he returned from his first foreign
trip.
"If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?" Francis asked.
His predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, signed a document in
2005 that said men with deep-rooted homosexual tendencies should not be
priests, but the new Pontiff, Pope Francis thinks otherwise saying gay
clergymen should be forgiven and their sins forgotten.
"When I meet a gay person, I have to distinguish between their being gay and being part of a lobby. If they accept the Lord and have good will, who am I to judge them? They shouldn’t be marginalized. The tendency [to homosexuality] is not the problem...they’re our brothers.”
When quizzed by a journalist who raised allegations reported
by an Italian newsmagazine that one of his trusted monsignors was involved in a
scandalous gay tryst, Pope Francis said he investigated and found nothing to
back up the allegations. But he took journalists to task for reporting on the
matter, saying the allegations concerned matters of sin, not crimes like
sexually abusing children. And when someone sins and confesses, he said, God
not only forgives but forgets.
"We don't have the right to not forget," he said.
No comments:
Post a Comment