Tag: Vatican Spring

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New documentary follows the Rev. James Martin ‘Building a Bridge’ to LGBTQ Catholics

‘I just hope that it helps LGBTQ Catholics see that there’s a place for them in their own church — it’s their church, too — and also for Catholic leaders to hear these voices,’ Martin said.

The Rev. James Martin at the Vatican in a scene from the documentary “Building A Bridge.”

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The Rev. James Martin never pictured himself managing a website aimed at helping resource LGBTQ Catholics.

He never saw himself starring in a documentary about the Roman Catholic Church’s relationship with its LGBTQ members.

He never set out to write or speak on issues related to LGBTQ people and the Catholic Church at all, he said.

And yet a film chronicling Martin’s ministry to LGBTQ Catholics — “Building a Bridge,” which was produced by Oscar-winning filmmaker Martin Scorsese and premiered last year at the Tribeca Film Festival — is streaming now on AMC+.

The documentary release comes as Martin launches an LGBTQ Catholic resource called Outreach, sponsored by America Media, where he is editor at large. Outreach includes a new website and a conference hosted in person for the first time this weekend at Fordham University in New York.

“I really feel like it’s been an invitation from the Holy Spirit to just continue to see where this goes,” Martin said.

The idea for the documentary about Martin’s ministry came to Brooklyn-based filmmaker Evan Mascagni not long after he moved to New York. Mascagni had grown up in a “really Catholic” community in Kentucky — so Catholic, he joked, he didn’t even realize there were other religions — but he had distanced himself from the church in college.

"Building A Bridge" film poster. Courtesy image
“Building A Bridge” film poster.

His mom kept sending him posts by “this cool priest she follows on Instagram,” who also was based in New York, he said.

When he finally attended a talk by the priest, who turned out to be Martin, Mascagni said he was “blown away.”

“I’d never felt energy like that in a Catholic church, honestly,” he said.

Mascagni also realized Martin’s story dovetailed with a story that co-director Shannon Post wanted to tell about a friend of hers who was among the 49 people killed when a gunman opened fire at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida.

Pulse was one of the city’s best-known gay clubs, and the 2016 shooting was the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history at the time.

The response to the shooting — or, rather, the lack of response — by the Catholic Church was one of the reasons Martin said he first felt “emboldened” to write and speak publicly about the church’s relationship with LGBTQ people, he said.

“I was a little disappointed with the church’s official response to the massacre. What struck me at the time was that even in death, this community is largely invisible to the Catholic Church,” he said.

“And so that led to a Facebook video, which led to some talks, which led to this book ‘Building a Bridge,’ which led to this ministry, which just keeps going in new directions.”

The filmmakers began following Martin not long after his book “Building a Bridge: How the Catholic Church and the LGBT Community Can Enter Into a Relationship of Respect, Compassion, and Sensitivity” was published in 2017.

A scene from the documentary "Building A Bridge." Photo courtesy Building A Bridge
A scene from the documentary “Building A Bridge.”

They filmed as some of the priest’s talks were canceled over fears of protest by conservative Catholic websites such as Church Militant, which also have organized social media campaigns against him. They kept rolling as he celebrated a Pre-Pride Mass at St. Francis of Assisi Church in New York and met at the Vatican with Pope Francis, who later wrote to Martin about the Outreach conference, previously held online.

“I pray for you to continue in this way, being close, compassionate and with great tenderness,” Francis wrote.

In that time, Martin said he’s become more confident — “primarily because I had that meeting with the pope.”

The priest’s message to the church has become “a little bolder,” he said.

“At the beginning, it was just like, ‘Treat these people with respect.’ Now it’s more, ‘Listen to them, accompany them, advocate for them,’ which is something I might not have said before.”

His message to the LGBTQ community has changed, too, as he’s been challenged by parish groups such as Out at St. Paul, featured in the “Building a Bridge” film. He’s realized the responsibility is on the church to reach out to the LGBTQ community, which has much less power, he said.

He sees the film as part of that work.

“I know that 1,000 times more people will see this movie than ever read my book or come to one of my talks. I understand the power of the media, and so, therefore, I wanted to support them as much as I could,” he said.

The Rev. James Martin in a scene from the documentary "Building A Bridge." Photo courtesy Building A Bridge
The Rev. James Martin in a scene from the documentary “Building A Bridge.”

Martin said he realized Mascagni and Post were serious about making a documentary about his ministry when they showed up in Dublin, where he was invited to speak to the World Meeting of Families organized by the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Laity, Family and Life.

Being followed by cameras was “a threat to humility” as a priest, he said. But it came at the same time opponents were bombarding him with messages he was going to hell, so, he joked, “it balanced.”

It isn’t his first brush with fame. Martin has appeared on “The Colbert Report” and “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert” as the unofficial chaplain of Colbert Nation. He also has worked with Scorsese on two previous films, appearing as a priest in “The Irishman” and offering insight as a consultant for “Silence.”

Scorsese ended up becoming executive producer of “Building a Bridge” after hearing the documentary was in the works and reaching out to Mascagni and Post.

“If Martin Scorsese is asking you to see a rough cut, you’re gonna work as hard and as fast as you can to get it done,” Mascagni said, laughing.

Alongside Martin, “Building a Bridge” shares the stories of LGBTQ Catholics, their families and their parish ministries as they intersect with the priest and with the church.

It also features Michael Voris, founder of Church Militant. Mascagni said he wanted to show the impact Voris and his followers have had as they’ve opposed Martin’s ministry.

Voris told Religion News Service he thought the documentary was a “fair representation” of himself and Church Militant.

People opposing the Rev. James Martin in the documentary "Building A Bridge." Photo courtesy Building A Bridge
People opposing the Rev. James Martin in the documentary “Building A Bridge.”

But, he said, “What sticks in my craw about it is that the church’s teaching doesn’t catch any real airtime.”

The Catechism of the Catholic Church refers to “homosexual tendencies” as “objectively disordered.” It also calls for LGBTQ people to be “accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity.”

The latter is the message Martin emphasizes, and the one the priest said he hopes audiences will take from “Building a Bridge.”

“I just hope that it helps LGBTQ Catholics see that there’s a place for them in their own church — it’s their church, too — and also for Catholic leaders to hear these voices,” Martin said.

“This is where Jesus not only wants us to be, but is. I mean, they are a part of the body of Christ.”

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Pope Sends More Mixed Messages on L.G.B.T.Q. Rights

An encouraging note from Pope Francis capped an especially disorienting week on the Vatican’s stance toward gay rights.

Pope Francis last month at the Vatican.

By Jason Horowitz

A leader in the Roman Catholic Church’s effort to reach out to L.G.B.T.Q. Catholics revealed on Sunday that Pope Francis had sent him a deeply encouraging note, capping an especially disorienting week on the Vatican’s attitude toward gay rights.

On Tuesday, the Vatican confirmed that it had tried to influence the affairs of the Italian state by expressing grave concerns about legislation currently in Parliament that increases protections for L.G.B.T.Q. people. And days later, the Vatican’s second in command insisted the church had nothing against gay rights, but was protecting itself from leaving the church’s core beliefs open to criminal charges of discrimination.

Nearly eight years after Pope Francis famously responded, “Who am I to judge?” on the issue of gay Catholics, it has become increasingly difficult to discern where he stands on the issue. A growing dissonance has developed between his inclusive language and the church’s actions.

The result is confusion and frustration among some of the pope’s liberal supporters who wonder whether the 84-year-old Argentine remains committed to a more tolerant church and is simply struggling to grasp the rapidly shifting contours of a difficult issue, or is really a social conservative trying to please everyone.

What is clear is that the new note will serve as fresh fodder in a battle within the church between frustrated progressives who hope the pope’s inclusive message will finally lead to change and wary conservatives, who are hoping the church will maintain its traditions. The Vatican’s own news service later reported that the pope had sent the letter.

In the handwritten letter dated June 21 and made public on Sunday, Francis praised and thanked the Rev. James Martin, a prominent Jesuit and the author of a book about reaching out to L.G.B.T.Q. Catholics.

“I see that you are continually seeking to imitate this style of God,” the pope wrote. “You are a priest for all men and women, just as God is a Father for all men and women. I pray for you to continue in this way, being close, compassionate and with great tenderness.”

Those words will almost certainly give succor to Francis’ liberal supporters, many of whom were deeply disheartened by a March response by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the church’s top doctrinal office, to an inquiry about whether Catholic clergy have the authority to bless gay unions.

“Negative,” was the answer, which Francis approved.

Two people who support gay rights and are close to the pope say he told them that he relented under pressure from the congregation, a decision he regretted and hoped to rectify. The Vatican did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the accounts.

But Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller, whom Francis fired from his position as the chief doctrinal watchdog in 2017, said that idea was absurd.

“The pope is the pope,” he said, adding that Francis was clearly in charge on such matters.

Cardinal Müller and other prelates say that Francis, on a personal level, simply does not like to hurt people’s feelings.

“He wants to be pastoral and he wants to be close to the people. It’s his specialty,” Cardinal Müller said. “It’s easier to be everybody’s darling than to say the truth,” he added. “He doesn’t like direct confrontation.”

Father Martin, who is often attacked by church conservatives, made the letter public after revealing it at a virtual conference for pastors and laypeople who administer to L.G.B.T.Q. Catholics.

In the letter, Francis said the Jesuit priest echoed Jesus in that his teaching was “open to each and everyone.” He concluded with a promise to pray for Father Martin’s “flock.”

But that flock has been led this way and that by the pope’s mixed signals over the years.

Francis stunned the faithful and a secular audience more accustomed to scolding about homosexuality and gay marriage when asked by reporters about a priest who was said to be gay, he responded, “Who am I to judge?”

His landmark 2016 document on family — titled “The Joy of Love” — rejected same-sex marriage but called on priests to be welcoming to people in nontraditional relationships, like gay people.

More recently, Francis expressed support for same-sex civil unions. His comments did not change church doctrine but amounted to a significant break from his predecessors.

Francis had made the remarks in a 2019 interview with the Mexican broadcaster Televisa, but the Vatican censored the report, and the footage emerged only in an October 2020 documentary.

For liberals, all of that seemed to be building momentum to real progress on L.G.B.T.Q. people in the church, which made the Vatican’s March rejection of the blessing of gay unions so much harsher.

Juan Carlos Cruz, a Chilean sexual abuse survivor and gay person whom the pope befriended, wrote an opinion article in a Chilean newspaper that criticized the doctrinal watchdog’s rejection of blessings as insulting to L.G.B.T.Q. Catholics.

The church’s doctrinal office is led by Cardinal Luis Ladaria, who was handpicked by the pope and is seen as in lock step with him.

In an explanatory note, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said that while welcoming gay people, who have a right to be blessed, the church will not bless same-sex unions because God “does not and cannot bless sin.” Blessing a same-sex union, it added, could give the impression of putting it on the same level as marriage.

“This would be erroneous and misleading,” the note said.

Vatican officials with knowledge of the document said that the pope did not at any time oppose the decision, and that he was absolutely clear on questions of church doctrine.

The decision prompted widespread disappointment, even disgust, among gay Catholics and their advocates.

Liberal Catholics were disappointed again this past week when the Vatican confirmed that the Holy See’s foreign minister, Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher, had hand delivered a letter to the Italian ambassador to the Holy See expressing reservations about the bill that would add L.G.B.T. provisions to an existing law that makes discrimination, violence or incitement based on race or religion a crime punishable by up to four years in prison.

The church intervened early to change the bill because it feared the law might legally oblige it to conduct same-sex marriages or teach more liberal ideas about gender in Catholic schools, according to an official inside the church.

Alessandro Zan, the bill’s sponsor, said such concerns were outlandish and not reflected in the legislation.

But the pope clearly approved the intervention, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re told Rome’s Il Messaggero newspaper on Thursday.

The reaction was intense and angry from Italians who accused the Vatican of impinging on the state’s democratic process and from frustrated and confused gay Catholics who again saw the pope, despite everything he had said, as acting against them.

In an apparent effort at damage control, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Vatican’s secretary of state and the second highest-ranking official after the pope, released a statement on Thursday.

He said that the Vatican was not seeking to block the legislation but worried that the vague draft language, and the enormous latitude of Italian judges, could lead to criminal discrimination charges for basic church practices. He insisted that hostility toward gay people did not motivate the Vatican opposition.

“We oppose any behavior or gesture of intolerance or hate toward people because of their sexual orientation,” he said.

Liberal supporters of Francis argue that letters like the one revealed by Father Martin on Sunday give them space to push ahead in their outreach. But Cardinal Müller said nothing of substance had changed since he left, and if anything, Francis had become stronger in his defense of the church’s core beliefs.

“The last signs were a little bit significant,” he said.

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Breaking a bad habit

— the Catholic Church and LGBTQ+ rights

By Nick Alford

Director Evgeny Afineevsky’s latest film, ‘Francesco’, is about Pope Francis. It premiered at the Rome film festival in October 2020 and included an interview with the bishop of Rome himself. At some point during this interview, the pope said something extraordinary. Finally, after all these years, the Catholic Church would be accepting same-sex marriage. This was completely unexpected. People all over social media were shocked. Surely, this would mark the start of a new epoch in Catholicism.

Well, no. He hadn’t said that. According to The Independent, the comments were made in 2019 during an untelevised interview segment with a Mexican broadcaster and did not refer to same-sex marriage. It looks as if the pope was saying he was fine with states providing civil unions, and defended the right to a family, but that was all. The Vatican have claimed Francis was specifically telling parents of LGBTQ+ children not to treat them harshly, so there wasn’t even a defence of same-sex couples adopting either.

For LGBTQ+ Catholics, this appeared to be a sign that their Pope truly supported them. For conservative Catholics, it was proof that the Pope is dangerously revolutionary, and that they risk losing followers to more right wing religious groups

So why were so many people convinced Pope Francis had changed his mind? It is possible people simply misunderstood what he was trying to say and thought same-sex marriages were synonymous with civil unions. Once the interview had been translated and copied enough times it was inevitable people would begin to make this mistake. Alternatively, even though the story wasn’t true, it provokes strong feelings. For LGBTQ+ Catholics, this appeared to be a sign that their pope truly supported them. For conservative Catholics, it was proof that the Pope is dangerously revolutionary, and that they risk losing followers to more right wing religious groups. It didn’t particularly matter that the pope hadn’t said anything new, because it still remains one of the most controversial political questions within Catholicism. But perhaps the most interesting idea is that since Francis took over in 2013, the idea of a pope supporting same-sex marriage is, whilst untrue, not quite as implausible as it once was.

Compared to his predecessors, Francis is progressive. The previous pontiff for example, Pope Benedict XVI, argued against even celibate gay men joining the priesthood. By contrast, Francis has claimed the Church should apologise to gay people for the discrimination they have faced, has argued against judging gay Catholics and has supported civil unions since his time as Archbishop of Buenos Aires. That seems remarkably liberal when compared to say, Bishop Tobin of Providence, Rhode Island, who has argued that same-sex unions are “objectively immoral”.

Considering how different Pope Francis is to not only those who came before him but to those around him presently, the idea that he one day might support same-sex marriage is understandable. A poll in the United States revealed that most Catholics view him favourably, and think that he has worked at least somewhat to change the Church’s position on homosexuality, and indeed the majority think he has changed the Church for the better. However, there is a growing share of US Catholics, particularly those who identify themselves as part of or leaning towards the Republican Party, who believe he is too liberal. But is this really the full story? One could paint Francis as a popular liberal figure who’s bringing in sweeping changes to the annoyance of more conservative Catholics, but the truth is far more complicated than that.

The official position of the Catholic Church remains that homosexuality is not sinful, but that homosexual acts are

The official position of the Catholic Church remains that homosexuality is not sinful, but that homosexual acts are. The Church argues these are “intrinsically disordered”. Francis has not changed this position. As Paul Elie put so succinctly in The New Yorker, “Francis, like his predecessors, made a distinction between gay people (good) and the way that they express passion and love (not good)”. Sexually active gay and bisexual people understandably might take offence at the idea that while they deserve respect and are owed an apology, part of their relationships are still being judged. Of course, sex and romance are not the same, but for many sex is an expression of romantic feeling. To be told this is wrong means the Catholic Church is maybe not as liberal as its LGBTQ+ members would like, nor as its more conservative members fear. Likewise, LGBTQ+ people might be doubly insulted as whilst their consensual relationships are constantly up for debate, the Church has a shameful history of covering up sexual abuse towards its members, including children.

Returning to marriage, in February 2015, Slovakia held a referendum that would, if passed, have banned same-sex marriage, though it was not recognised domestically anyway. It also would have prohibited adoption by same-sex couples. When visited by pilgrims from Slovakia, Francis commented “I wish to express my appreciation to the entire Slovak church, encouraging everyone to continue their efforts in defence of the family, the vital cell of society”. In 2014 he explicitly stated in an interview that marriage is “between a man and a woman”. Whilst the pope might be open to civil unions by states, he is clearly no supporter of marriage. He might have told a gay man in 2018 that “God made you like this”, but he remains unwilling to allow the same man to marry someone he loves. In fact, just before his native Argentina granted marriage rights in 2010 the then-Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio claimed supporters of the new law were inspired by Satan.

Despite some inclusive language, Francis is still running a church that is not truly accepting of transgender and gender non-conforming people

On transgender issues, the pope seems to be taking a similar stance to his one on homosexuality. Although he has argued against abandoning trans Catholics, and perhaps surprisingly used the pronoun ‘he’ when describing a trans man, he has also argued against “gender theory, that does not recognize the order of creation” and compared it to “nuclear arms”. Like homosexuality, he argued that a person could have “tendencies” but argued spreading awareness in schools could be “ideological colonization” or “indoctrination”. The pope appears concerned that discussion of transgender issues could be used in a war on marriage. Despite some inclusive language, Francis is still running a church that is not truly accepting of transgender and gender non-conforming people. He might be more liberal than one might expect, but he is hardly a great ally either. This has frustrated many, such as Rev. Rodney McKenzie, Jr. of the National LGBTQ Task Force, who said such a position would “reject and dehumanize” rather than “welcome and affirm” trans people.

There is also the question of how much the Catholic Church is changing because of Francis, and how much it is changing to survive. Several Christian denominations already allow same-sex marriage, so the Catholic Church is hardly a trailblazer. Likewise, of the American Catholics mentioned earlier, 61% support same-sex marriage. It’s easy to say Francis is a liberal pope when compared to some of his bishops but compared to his followers in the USA he is more conservative. In Britain, a 2015 study by YouGov discovered that religious Catholics support gay marriage by 50% to 40%, unlike British religious Protestants who opposed it by 47% to 45%. A study in 2013 also discovered that more Catholics in Britain between the ages of 18 and 44 thought same-sex marriage was right than wrong. Additionally, in several countries across the world, fewer and fewer people are identifying as Catholic. In Argentina, despite remaining a majority of the population, the proportion of the population that identified as Catholic dropped by over 13% since 2008. Noticeable drops were also recorded in Italy, Switzerland, and the United States. Is Francis’ use of inclusive language an attempt to encourage younger, more tolerant Catholics to stay, whilst not changing Church positions in a way that would upset senior religious figures? That is not to say the pope is being insincere, as he has supported civil unions since before his time as pope. However, if figures around the world continue to drop, is it possible that Catholic Church positions could change its positions to seem more appealing to younger Christians? It seems only time may tell.

Pope Francis is an unusual figure. He has angered more conservative Catholics with some of his words, yet his positions on LGBTQ+ issues are not so dissimilar from that of his predecessors. He is more tolerant than many clerics, and yet less so than most British or American Catholics. He is also a man with tremendous power and influence. Take for instance the creation of anti-LGBT zones in Poland, a country that is overwhelming Roman Catholic and where lawmakers will openly say their values are shaped by the Church.

The Church’s positions have directly led to LGBTQ+ people feeling fearful. The pope’s views, and the Church’s positions, matter not just to Catholics but to people of other faiths and non-believers too.  When the pope speaks, the world listens. Even the suggestion that Francis is supportive of same-sex marriage is enough to get people’s attention. As for what the future holds, that remains to be seen. A more LGBTQ+ friendly Catholic Church might happen one day, but for all he has said it is unlikely to happen under Pope Francis.

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In supporting same-sex civil unions, Pope Francis is showing how the Catholic definition of what constitutes a family is changing


Young people at the University of Santo Tomas in Manila, Philippines, cheer Pope Francis in 2015, following his comments endorsing same-sex civil unions.

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Pope Francis referred to gay people as “children of God” in a recently released documentary, “Francesco.” He further noted that “a civil union law” needs to be created so gays are “legally covered.” The Vatican later confirmed the pope’s comments, but clarified that the church doctrine remained unchanged.

Public support for civil unions from Pope Francis is not entirely new. When he was archbishop of Buenos Aires, and again in a 2014 interview, he spoke about civil unions for same-sex couples.

While the Vatican is right in saying that church doctrine remains the same, as a theologian who has been writing about Catholicism and family for over two decades, I see in the pope’s comments evidence that Catholic understanding of who counts as family is evolving.

From judgment to mercy

Traditional Catholic doctrine holds that marriage between a man and a woman is the foundation of the family. Sex outside of marriage is judged to be immoral and, while gay people are not seen as inherently sinful, their sexual actions are. Same-sex marriages and civil unions, the Vatican says, are harmful to society and “in no way similar” to heterosexual marriages.

Yet in his comments made public on Oct. 21, the pope framed his support for civil unions in the context of family. “They’re children of God and have a right to a family. Nobody should be thrown out or be made miserable because of it,” he said in a news-breaking interview used in the documentary.

In researching for a book on Pope Francis, I found that he has consistently offered compassion for Catholics without traditional families. Soon after becoming pope in 2013, in response to a journalist’s question about a gay person, he famously said, “Who am I to judge?”

Mercy over judgment has been the mark of his papacy. The pope’s priority on extending mercy, theologian Cardinal Walter Kasper explains, especially pertains to families.

Surveys commissioned by the Vatican in 2015 found that Catholics desire more acceptance from the church for people who are single parents, divorced or have live-in relationships. Knowing that people often feel judged because their families aren’t perfect, Francis has tried to make them feel welcome. He has stressed that the doors of churches must be open to all.

When, in discussing same-sex civil unions, Francis said that gay people have “a right to a family,” he seems to have implied that civil unions create a family. Though he is not changing Catholic moral teaching, I argue that he is departing from traditional Catholic rhetoric on the family and offering an inclusive, merciful vision to guide church practice.

From family structure to family action

Changes in Catholic teaching in the 20th century paved the way for Francis’ recent moves.

In a 1930 Vatican document on marriage, Pope Pius XI defended the traditional family structure against perceived threats of cohabitation, divorce and “false teachers” who asserted the equality of men and women.

Three decades later, at Vatican II, a meeting of the world’s bishops from 1962 to 1965 that led to sweeping reforms in the Catholic Church, emphasis shifted to the role families could play in shaping society. Marriage was defined as an “intimate partnership of life and love,” and the family was praised as “a school of deeper humanity” where parents and children learn how to be better human beings.

Pope John Paul II, who was pope from 1978 to 2005, is often viewed as a foil to Pope Francis. In his writings, he defended heterosexual marriage and traditional gender roles, as well as rules against divorce, contraception and same-sex relationships. Yet the former pope contributed to shifting the Catholic conversation to ethical actions families can take.

In this regard, John Paul II’s most important document on the family Familiaris Consortio, 1981, gave families four tasks: growing in love, raising children, contributing to society and praying in their home. He taught that being a family means engaging in actions related to these tasks.

Catholic scholars like Mary Doyle Roche have since built on his framework to urge families to become “schools of solidarity” in which parents and children learn compassion for others.

Though same-sex couples remain excluded from official Catholic teaching, Catholic theologians such as Margaret A. Farley have suggested that these families, too, could prioritize love, social action and spirituality. Gay couples, she argued, “deserve the same protection under the law” as heterosexual couples. They also have the same moral obligations to each other and to the common good.

Pope Francis on inclusion

Pope Francis built on work done at Vatican II and the decades following it. One of his favorite ways of describing the church is as a “field hospital” that goes where people are hurting.

Though he has addressed many important social issues during his papacy, including economic inequality and climate change, he called the world’s bishops to special meetings in Rome only to discuss families. He urged them to find creative ways of ministering to people who feel excluded because they are not living in line with Catholic doctrine on marriage.

Themes of welcome and inclusion for single parents, divorced and remarried people and cohabiting unmarried couples were amplified in the document Francis wrote in 2016, “Amoris Laetitia,” or “The Joy of Love.”

For instance, theologian Mary Catherine O’Reilly-Gindhart sees Francis saying that cohabiting unmarried couples “need to be welcomed and guided patiently and discreetly.” This allows priests to meet couples where they are rather than shaming them or forcing them to hide their living situations.

What’s the future of the church?

Francis’ critics worry that the pope is watering down Catholic doctrine on marriage and family. But what I argue is that Francis is not changing doctrine. He is encouraging a broader view of who counts as families inside and outside the church.

In the same documentary in which Francis made his remarks on same-sex civil unions, he also criticized countries with overly restrictive immigration policies, saying, “It’s cruelty, and separating parents from kids goes against natural rights.” He was referring to the right to family, which “exists prior to the State or any other community.”

The comments in the documentary show a persistent move toward welcoming families in contemporary Catholic thought. Francis proposes that a welcoming church should support all families, especially those who are hurting. Similarly, as he says, governments should do the same – including supporting gay and lesbian couples.

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Pope Francis, the Revolutionary, Takes On the Traditionalists

A three-week conference that prioritized the environment highlights a culture war in the Catholic Church.

Pope Francis leads a Mass to close a three-week synod of Amazonian bishops at the Vatican, October 27, 2019.

By Rachel Donadio

Pope Francis has helped open the door to allowing married men to become priests, albeit in just one region of the Amazon for now. He has made environmentalism a major focus of his papacy. Yesterday he gave a shout-out to Greta Thunberg and thanked journalists for doing their jobs, rather than calling them enemies of the people. He’s decried income inequality and nationalism and spoken out on behalf of gay people, Muslims, immigrants, and the poor.

This pastoral approach has made him one of the clearest and most humane voices crying out in the wilderness today. Has it also made him a revolutionary?

Yesterday, Francis wrapped up a month-long synod, or meeting of bishops, at the Vatican dedicated to the Amazon, a region the bishops called “a wounded and deformed beauty, a place of suffering and violence.” Their list of recommendations to the pope is nothing less than an environmentalist manifesto, in which they recommended that destroying the environment should be considered a sin. (Their requests are nonbinding but set a tone; Francis said he will try to respond to them before the end of the year.)

The bishops also asked Francis to lift the 1,000-year-old ban on priestly celibacy to allow married men who are already ordained as deacons to become priests in some areas of the Amazon. There, a priest shortage means the faithful can go for long stretches without receiving Communion and other sacraments that only priests can deliver. This could very well revolutionize the Church worldwide. If a door opens in one country, it might open in another. (Or it could be limited to the Amazon.)

Francis’s method, and the method of the synod, is one of listening and reflection, then some consensus, and charting a path forward through discernment. The path Francis has been taking, though, leads directly into a larger culture war, one that pits progressives against traditionalists.

And so the synod offered ample opportunity for Francis’s many vocal critics—including conservative Catholics in the United States, who are intertwined with the political right—to accuse the pope of breaking orthodoxy and watering down Church doctrine, such as the bishops’ recommendations to allow more room for indigenous traditions in Catholic ritual. These critics also see Francis’s papacy as flirting dangerously with paganism, pantheism, and even Marxism, because they view the pope’s emphasis on attending to the poor as often at odds with the exigencies of global capitalism.

The environment was the central focus of the meeting. In their final document, the bishops warned of the risks of deforestation, which they said now put almost 17 percent of the Amazon forest in danger, and also of the displacement of indigenous groups because of the deforestation. “Attacks on nature have consequences for the lives of peoples,” they wrote.

They defined what they called “ecological sins of commission or omission against God, against one’s neighbor, the community and the environment.” They called these “sins against future generations … manifest in acts and habits of pollution and destruction of the harmony of the environment, transgressions against the principles of interdependence and the ripping of network of solidarity among creatures and against the virtue of justice.”

In practical terms that means better coordination in the region for advocacy against environmental catastrophes, such as toxic spills related to mining, Bishop David M. De Aguirre Guinea, one of two special secretaries overseeing the synod, said at a news conference yesterday. “This has become part of the social doctrine of the Church, taking care of our common home,” he said.

Francis set the Amazon as the theme for the meeting three years ago, long before the devastating fires that swept through the region in August, the result of targeted deforestation to clear farmland. “The fires brought the thing home to us in a way that graphs or other visuals didn’t,” Cardinal Michael Czerny, a Canadian Jesuit and the other special secretary behind the synod, said. “If we insist on tearing up the trees and digging up the land because we can’t live without the metals and the gold and the wood for our fancy furniture, you can fill out the rest.”

Czerny is one of 13 new cardinals whom Francis appointed this month and who will one day elect his successor, the clearest way any pope shapes the future of the Church. Czerny, for instance, runs a Vatican office dedicated to migrants and refugees at the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, and his promotion is a clear sign of the importance Francis places on migration.

The pope also appointed other cardinals from the global South, making the College of Cardinals less white and less Italian. (One of the constant tensions of the Catholic Church is that it’s a global community of a billion souls governed at the top by an Italian village.)

Francis isn’t the first pope to open the door to some married priests. A decade ago, his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, created a special structure to allow married Anglican priests to join the Catholic Church. It was aimed at attracting Anglicans distressed by that Church’s ordination of women and gay priests, and it infuriated the then–Archbishop of Canterbury.

For the synod, Francis and the bishops framed the issue of married priests as stemming from a ground-up desire from some communities in the Amazon, not a top-down rule imposed by Rome, Alberto Melloni, the director of the John XXIII Foundation for Religious Studies in Bologna, told me. “It’s not a revolution,” he said. “It’s a late remedy to an evident call.”

The bishops didn’t vote to allow women to be ordained as deacons, but Francis, in his concluding remarks yesterday, said the Vatican would study the role of women in the early Church. “Women put out a sign that says, ‘Please listen to us, may we be heard,’ and I pick up that gauntlet,” the pope said to applause.

Francis also gave a special mention to Greta Thunberg, who has already become a kind of Joan of Arc for her time, and drawn no shortage of hatred—this month, police removed an effigy of Thunberg that had been hung from a bridge in Rome. In his concluding remarks yesterday, the pope spoke about the recent climate strikes by students around the world. “We’ve seen the demonstrations of young people, Greta and others, and they walk around saying ‘The future is ours, you can’t gamble with our future.’”

In one of the stranger sideshows of the synod, a handheld video circulated on a traditionalist Catholic website showing unidentified men removing several wooden figurines representing an Amazonian fertility figure from a Roman church and tossing the statuettes into the Tiber from the Ponte Sant’Angelo, lined with statues of angels and saints, against a perfect Roman sunrise. Some of Francis’s critics, such as Cardinal Gerhard Müller, a former head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican’s doctrinal office, seized on the video, and called the statuettes tantamount to idolatry. “The great mistake was to bring the idols into the church, not to put them out,” Müller said in an interview with an American conservative-Catholic TV channel, EWTN.

Francis, as bishop of Rome, apologized to his fellow bishops for the vandalism, and one of the statuettes was on view in the synod hall during the pope’s concluding remarks. A Mass today ending the synod included indigenous peoples from the Amazon. Francis’s approach to indigenous rites is “a very profound characteristic of the Jesuit missionary attitude,” Melloni told me, in which the Jesuits would try to convert native populations to Catholicism while also respecting the native traditions. “These rites express a culture and not a religion,” Melloni said.

But for Francis’s many critics, the statuettes, and the pope’s posing for photos in a feathered headdress, were further signs that the pope was watering down Church doctrine. These critics tend to be defenders of Benedict, a brainy disciplinarian who advocated a smaller, more doctrinally pure Church, rather than a more flexible and inclusive one.

“This synod is truly the most politically correct meeting of all time. It’s a relief that Greta Thunberg has not yet been chosen to be a cardinal,” Bishop Robert Mutsaerts of the Netherlands wrote in a blog post translated by LifeSite News, a conservative Catholic website that has been fiercely critical of Francis. “Is there anyone left who is actually worried about saving souls? But isn’t that why Christ died on the cross?”

“The bishops and cardinals are discussing the environment, the rise of the sea level; they are saying that above all, we should listen. They speak like politicians, using the same slogans, the same cheap rhetoric,” Mutsaerts wrote. Why? he asked. “It is not the specialty of the Church, it is not our core business and it is not our perspective.”

In the culture war between traditionalists and progressives over the future of the Church, the pope may be on the progressive, inclusive side, but his traditionalist critics have access to social media, which has an outsize influence in shaping perceptions. “We have a small, noisy minority and a large silent majority,” Melloni told me. “The noisy minority is struggling, with a certain success, to represent themselves as half of the Church, and they are not. They’re not even half the College of Cardinals, not even half the episcopate.”

In short, the Catholic Church on Twitter may not be the same as the Catholic Church writ large. Francis seems confident that he has the latter on his side, but will his efforts—on married priests, on environmentalism—spread beyond the Amazon?

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Pope Francis May Not Change the World. But He Is Reshaping the Church.

Pope Francis at the Vatican in September. In a ceremony at St. Peter’s Basilica on Saturday, he will create 13 new cardinals who reflect his pastoral style and priorities.

By Jason Horowitz

Pope Francis and his push for openness — toward migrants, Muslims and gay people — may no longer have influence on a global stage where nationalists, populists and the far right dominate the political conversation.

But inside the church is another story.

In a ceremony at St. Peter’s Basilica on Saturday, Francis will create 13 new cardinals who reflect his pastoral style and priorities on a range of issues, including migration, climate change, the inclusion of gay Catholics, interreligious dialogue and shifting church power away from Rome to bishops in Africa, Asia and South America.

The appointments are a landmark for Francis, who now reaches a tipping point of influence to shape the future church in his image. After Saturday, Francis will have named more than half of the voters within the College of Cardinals, where a two-thirds majority of those under the age of 80 are required to elect his successor.

The longer Francis lives, the more his pontificate matters.

“The longer it lasts, the more there will be cardinals in the spirit of Pope Francis,” said Archbishop Jean-Claude Hollerich of Luxembourg, who will be one of those made a cardinal this weekend.

Francis has by now made his agenda abundantly clear. Unlike his predecessors, who cracked down on dissent and promoted bishops and cardinals who emphasized fealty to church doctrine, Francis wants an inclusive church that welcomes back into the fold Catholics who felt geographically, pastorally and ideologically alienated. That mission has earned him the enmity of church conservatives, especially in the United States, who feel he is diluting the church’s teaching for the sake of a cheap embrace.

Francis will be 83 in December, and given his age, he has from the start of his papacy six years ago approached the role with a certain urgency, often acknowledging his own mortality.

Though his voice does not seem to carry as far in the world as it once did in an era of populist and right-wing politics, his effect within the church may be lasting.

“The longer it lasts, the more there will be cardinals in the spirit of Pope Francis,” said Archbishop Jean-Claude Hollerich of Luxembourg, who will be made a cardinal on Saturday.

By appointing cardinals and more than a thousand bishops on the front lines of the faith, Francis is reconstituting a church in his image. It is one that decentralizes power from Rome to the bishops around the world, that is willing to work through the challenges of the modern world together with other faiths, and with atheists.

While liberal critics argue he has not moved fast enough to reform the church — especially when it comes to the role of women — his supporters note that he is at the least willing to talk about and reconsider church policy on married priests, and its stance toward homosexuality and celibacy.

More concretely, he has reshaped the College of Cardinals, making it less white, less Italian and less representative of the Roman curia, the bureaucracy that governs the church.

Instead, he has looked to the church’s newer franchises. He has made it more Latin American, Asian and African. The new appointees among the cardinals will include prelates from Morocco, Indonesia, Guatemala and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

And tellingly for a pontiff with a tense relationship with conservative opponents in the United States, he has again passed over America’s traditional feeder schools for the College of Cardinals, especially those occupied by conservatives.

Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia, a vocal critic of Francis, reached the retirement age of 75 in September without receiving a cardinal’s red hat. He is not expected to be asked to stay on for much longer.

Conservatives in the powerful American church have argued that Francis’ emphasis on pastoral openness is eroding the doctrine of the faith.

His backers say that at least he lets them speak out, and that under John Paul II and Benedict XVI, his conservative predecessors, theological critics were censored.

Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia, right, a vocal critic of Francis, reached the retirement age of 75 this week without receiving a cardinal’s red hat.

Francis has instead moved them out of power, ignored their complaints and mostly shrugged off their threats to break away.

“I pray that there are no schisms,” he said last month. “But I am not scared.”

Archbishop Hollerich, 61 and a Jesuit, like Francis, is president of the Commission of the Bishops’ Conferences of the European Union and is one of the church’s most vocal opponents of nationalism.

When it comes to Francis’ vision, he and his fellow new cardinals, “follow the same line,” he said.

He said that Francis was clearly against the traditionalist efforts to restore a Catholic society separate from the world. The attempts by his opponents to slow Francis down, he said, would backfire.

“The more he gets attacked,” Archbishop Hollerich said of Francis, “the more free he becomes.”

The day after Francis elevates the new cardinals, he will inaugurate a major meeting of bishops on the subject of the Amazon.

One of the major questions is whether to allow older married men with grown children and a strong standing in the Church — known as “viri probati” or proven men — to join the priesthood and administer sacraments to Catholics in remote areas that hardly ever see a priest.

Some conservatives worry it is a step on a slippery slope toward undoing priestly celibacy.

One of those running the conference on the Amazon is the Rev. Michael Czerny, 73, a Czech-born Canadian Jesuit that Francis will make a cardinal on Saturday.

Father Czerny, a close collaborator of Francis, declined to talk about the substance of the Amazon synod, except to say that “everything is on the table.”

But broadly speaking, he said the result of a College of Cardinals shaped by Francis was a willingness to take up difficult issues “in a way, in a style, in a spirit” consistent with the Second Vatican Council.

The Second Vatican Council in the 1960s spurred a spirit of openness in the church.

That landmark meeting of the world’s bishops in the 1960s spurred a spirit of openness in the church. It re-examined issues like its liturgy, the language in which people pray and priestly celibacy, which is not a question of doctrine but of church tradition dating back nearly 1,000 years.

But that opening triggered a backlash from conservatives that has lasted nearly a half-century.

Now, speaking about the possibility of ordaining married men, Archbishop Hollerich said if bishops in one part of the world say they need it, “I think the universal church should consider that request.”

While he personally considered celibacy a “great gift” for the priesthood, he added, that “does not mean it should be perhaps the only way.” He said he was far from alone in such views.

And Francis elevated other bishops considered open to change.

Archbishop Matteo Zuppi of Bologna, 64, is the only new Italian cardinal in a college Italy once dominated. His grand uncle was a cardinal once considered a candidate for pope, but the archbishop takes after Francis, dedicating much of his time to the poor.

In 2015 the pope chose him to replace Cardinal Carlo Caffarra in Bologna, a stalwart of Catholic conservatism who publicly doubted Francis’ teaching.

Archbishop Zuppi has come under criticism from the conservative wing of the church for writing an introduction to a book about reaching out to gay Catholics. On Monday, Francis infuriated those conservatives by granting a private audience to the book’s author, the Rev. James Martin, who later said the meeting showed Francis’ “deep pastoral care for L.G.B.T. Catholics.”

In an interview, Archbishop Zuppi said the pope’s new cardinals showed that Francis wanted a “missionary” church that “doesn’t close in on itself.”

The new cardinals, he said, will help the church live “in our present.”

What he and the other cardinals do now will be critical for success in the future, which the church believes lies in Africa, Asia and South America, where the competition with evangelical Christians is fierce. Francis, history’s first South American pope, has consistently sought to elevate cardinals in the global south.

Archbishop Matteo Zuppi of Bologna, 64, is the only new Italian cardinal in a College of Cardinals once dominated by Italians.

“The pope wants to give his priority to the peripheries,” Bishop Fabien Raharilamboniaina of Madagascar said in Antananarivo, the capital, where Francis appointed a cardinal last year. “Because this is the future of the church.”

Francis’ visit to Africa, like much of his recent travel, has generated less interest than his earlier trips. Archbishop Zuppi acknowledged that Francis was perhaps having less effect on the global stage.

“The pope is often, unfortunately, not listened to” in the secular world, he said. “This is a problem.”

But he argued that Francis’ influence may be more long term than immediate.

Father Czerny did, too. He said that while the pope stayed committed to his core issues, as the unveiling of a new sculpture of migrants in St. Peter’s Square attested, on a global scale it was hard to see Francis’ impact.

The problems the world faced required a grass-roots mobilization that the pope led among his flock of 1.3 billion, he added.

On the issue of climate change, for example, he said churches around the world had heard the pope’s message and were changing their behavior, whether it be recycling or planting trees or saving water.

“There is more good news than appears,” he said.

But the spiritual realm remains the one where Francis has the most influence. Some analysts suggested he would change as much as he could in the church while he held office, given that, no matter how many cardinals he appointed, there was no guarantee that the next pope would follow in his footsteps.

Some of the new cardinals hail from a much more conservative African and Asian culture.

“It’s not automatic that a conservative College of Cardinals elects a conservative pope or vice versa,” said Sandro Magister, a veteran Vatican expert. “Francis was elected by cardinals who were appointed by two conservatives like John Paul II and Benedict XVI.”

Even Father Czerny, who gets his own vote next week, agreed.

“The person who is elected by the last conclave chooses the people who are probably going to be the majority of electors in the next one,” he said. “This has happened for 2,000 years and the popes don’t all turn out the same. As we’ve noticed.”

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Pope Francis tells gay man: ‘God made you like this’

Juan Carlos Cruz, who was sexually abused, says pontiff told him God did not mind that he was gay

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A survivor of clerical sexual abuse has said Pope Francis told him that God had made him gay and loved him, in arguably the most strikingly accepting comments about homosexuality to be uttered by the leader of the Roman Catholic church.

Juan Carlos Cruz, who spoke privately with the pope two weeks ago about the abuse he suffered at the hands of one of Chile’s most notorious paedophiles, said the issue of his sexuality had arisen because some of the Latin American country’s bishops had sought to depict him as a pervert as they accused him of lying about the abuse.

“He told me, ‘Juan Carlos, that you are gay does not matter. God made you like this and loves you like this and I don’t care. The pope loves you like this. You have to be happy with who you are,’” Cruz told Spanish newspaper El País.

Now 87, Fernando Karadima, the man who abused Cruz, was found guilty of abuse by the Vatican in 2011.

Greg Burke, the Vatican’s chief spokesman, did not respond to questions about whether Cruz’s statement accurately reflected his conversation with the pope.

It is not the first time it has been suggested Francis has an open and tolerant attitude toward homosexuality, despite the Catholic church’s teaching that gay sex – and all sex outside of heterosexual marriage – is a sin. In July 2013, in response to a reporter’s question about the existence of an alleged “gay lobby” within the Vatican, Francis said: “Who am I to judge?”

The new remarks appear to go much further in embracing homosexuality as a sexual orientation that is designed and bestowed by God. It suggests that Francis does not believe that individuals choose to be gay or lesbian, as some religious conservatives argue.

Austen Ivereigh, who has written a biography of the pope, said Francis had likely made similar comments in private in the past, when he served as a spiritual director to gay people in Buenos Aires, but that Cruz’s public discussion of his conversation with Francis represented the most “forceful” remarks on the subject since 2013.

It did not, however, represent a shift in church teaching, Ivereigh said, since the church had never formally made any pronouncements on why individuals were gay.

Christopher Lamb, the Vatican correspondent for the Tablet, said the comments were remarkable and a sign of a shift in attitudes taking place. “It goes beyond ‘who am I to judge?’ to ‘you are loved by God,’” said Lamb. “I don’t think he has changed church teaching but he’s demonstrating an affirmation of gay Catholics, something that has been missing over the years in Rome.”

The remarks come as several high profile members of the clergy have sought to publicly make inroads with gay Catholics, many of whom have felt shunned and unwelcome in the church and have been ostracised.

Father James Martin, a Jesuit priest in New York who has nearly 200,000 Twitter followers, has led the outreach effort and was chosen last month to serve as a consultor to the Vatican’s secretariat for communications.

Martin has argued in his book Building a Bridge that the onus is on the church to make LGBT Catholics feel welcome in the church and to stop discriminating against people based on their “sexual morality”.

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Vatican Expert Says Its Homophobia Is Partly Due to So Many Priests Being Gay

by Daniel Villarreal

In the most recent episode of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation podcast The Current, hostess Anna Maria Tremonti spoke with former seminarian and Vatican expert Robert Mickens who said, “There are a large number … of people in the priesthood and in religious life who have homosexual orientation,” adding “What you end up having are a lot of self-loathing, homophobic homosexuals in the priesthood.”

The Vatican and entire Catholic priesthood are apparently very, very gay

Mickens himself chose to leave the seminary when he fell in love with a fellow male seminarian. He lived in Rome at the time, and spoke to Tremonti about what he saw when he started going to Rome’s gay nightclubs and hotspots:

“Starting to go to gay places, you know, clubs and the beach … and I was running into all kinds of priests and even seminarians, people who worked at the Vatican. Gay bathhouses, I’d meet priests there. I met people who are bishops today. I pity these people because I know they must live double-lives. I don’t know how they do it. I think people end up self-destructing.

“I know a number of priests who have partners or who have ‘special friends’ from various stages of platonic to full-blown almost husband-and-husband relationships. The church and certainly the Vatican is certainly a homoerotic place. Take a look or walk through the Vatican museums. It’s all genitalia all over the place….

“And look at the rituals, the young men who sing at these things — it’s all men up there. The bring out the pretty ones, you know. Look at the bishops, look at who their secretaries are — it’s always the pretty one. And they’re blind to it. There’s nothing going on, but it’s eye candy; they love surrounding themselves. They wear dresses for God’s sake.

“In the Vatican, it’s basically as long as you’re discreet, you don’t get caught. But once you do, you’re all on your own. We’re not going to help you.”

According to Tremonti, a 2002 poll by The L.A. Times revealed that 15% of American priests identify as gay or “somewhere in between leaning on the homosexual side” — 23% of younger priests identify the same way. However, she also said that many gay priests that she has talked to say that the percentage is much higher, as high as 70%.

Mickens thinks the church wants to keep homosexuality a taboo so that “those pious young men” will continue to think of priesthood as a noble profession rather than simply as way to live a gay life. He also says that if the church began openly accepting its gay clergy and laymen, it would lose a great deal of support from its larger worldwide ministry. Put another way, the power of homophobia fuels the church, even though large numbers of homosexuals help run it.

Here’s the podcast where Mickens talks about the Vatican’s gay priests:

 

The story of a closeted Vatican insider who stood up to its homophobia

In the same podcast, Krzysztof Charamsa, a gay defrocked Polish priest (pictured in the featured image at top) said, “The Catholic Church is the principal political agency of homophobic position in the world. Very powerful.”

From 2003 until 2015, Charamsa worked as a senior add at the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican office that writes and enforces Catholic rules. For most of his time there, his boss was Joseph Ratzinger, the cardinal who would later become Pope Benedict XVI (or as we liked to call him, Papa Ratzi), a pope who issued numerous statements against LGBTQ people including one calling them “intrinsically disordered” and calling homosexuality an “inherent moral evil.“

When asked of his opinion about the church’s stance on homosexuality, Charamsa (who was painfully closeted and still working at the Vatican) affirmed its goodness and then privately cried in his office afterwards.

He eventually fell in love with a man from Barcelona named Eduard. “When I discovered that I love this man,” Charamsa told the podcast in broken English, “I think ‘You must say who you are.’ For us there was no possibility to double-life. For me, for my partner, it was impossible.”

Charamsa’s friends recommended against his coming out in fear that it would jeopardize his career, financial stability, pension and influential standing in the church, but he came out in October 2015 anyway, introducing his partner to international journalists. During the announcement, he slammed the Vatican for its “paranoid homophobia” and apologized for his own complicity in the church’s demonization of gay people.

Though he issued his resignation, the Vatican formally fired and defrocked him soon after. He lost his pension, his status and is now forbidden from teaching in any Catholic university. He has since become an advocate for LGBTQ rights and Catholic reform. He also says that living with Eduard in Barcelona has helped him understand the love of family, feeling that people now love him completely because he is whole.

However, in his home country of Poland, Charamsa says, Catholic homophobia looms large, making LGBTQ people and even his family (who sometimes get ridiculed for his famous coming out) miserable. He recently appeared in Article 18, a documentary about Poland’s refusal of same-sex marriage.

Though he appreciates that the current Pope has encouraged Catholics to embrace LGBTQ people rather than demonize them, Charamsa says, “If the Church can’t make a serious, scientific reflection on homosexuality and include it in its teachings, even the Holy Father’s openings and warm words on gays are empty.”

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As Church Shifts, a Cardinal Welcomes Gays; They Embrace a ‘Miracle’

The Rev. Francis Gargani during a Mass last month that welcomed gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Catholics at the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart in Newark.

By SHARON OTTERMAN

The word “pilgrimage” usually evokes visions of far-off, exotic places, but for some 100 gay and lesbian Catholics and their families, a pilgrimage to the Cathedral Basilica of the Sacred Heart here on a recent Sunday was more like a homecoming.

The doors to the cathedral were opened to them, and they were welcomed personally by the leader of the Archdiocese of Newark, Cardinal Joseph W. Tobin. They were seated on folding chairs at the cathedral’s center, in front of the altar in the towering sanctuary, under the blue-tinted glow of stained glass.

“I am Joseph, your brother,” Cardinal Tobin told the group, which included lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Catholics from around New York and the five dioceses in New Jersey. “I am your brother, as a disciple of Jesus. I am your brother, as a sinner who finds mercy with the Lord.”

The welcoming of a group of openly gay people to Mass by a leader of Cardinal Tobin’s standing in the Roman Catholic Church in this country would have been unthinkable even five years ago. But Cardinal Tobin, whom Pope Francis appointed to Newark last year, is among a small but growing group of bishops changing how the American church relates to its gay members. They are seeking to be more inclusive and signaling to subordinate priests that they should do the same.

Inside the Newark cathedral. Cardinal Joseph W. Tobin’s welcome to Mass was particularly powerful for those there from his own diocese, because his predecessor had emphasized the immorality of homosexuality during his tenure.
Cardinal Tobin greeting parishioners before Mass. He is among a small but growing group of bishops changing how the American church relates to its gay members.

“The word I use is ‘welcome,’” Cardinal Tobin said in an interview just before the Mass last month. “These are people that have not felt welcome in other places. My prayer for them is that they do. Today in the Catholic Church, we read a passage that says you have to be able to give a reason for your hope. And I’m praying that this pilgrimage for them, and really for the whole church, is a reason for hope.”

Four years ago, Pope Francis amazed the Catholic world with his comment about gay priests seeking the Lord: “Who am I to judge?” But it was unclear how his words would affect Catholics seeking acceptance in the pews.

After all, the church teaches in its catechism that homosexual acts are “intrinsically disordered.” Men who “present deep-seated homosexual tendencies or support the so-called gay culture” are not to become priests, according to Vatican instructions renewed in 2016. Catholic bishops in America have strongly opposed same-sex marriage. More than 100 employees of Catholic institutions across the nation have lost their posts in the past three years for being gay or for marrying a same-sex spouse, according to Marianne Duddy-Burke, executive director of DignityUSA, an organization of Catholics that advocates equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.

But gestures like Cardinal Tobin’s are evidence that Pope Francis’ words are having an impact. Bishops now have latitude to focus on the more inclusive parts of the church’s catechism on homosexuals, such as the call to accept them with “respect, compassion and sensitivity.” They can follow the principle of accompaniment, meaning they can meet people where they are spiritually and build relationships that help them deepen their faith.

“It’s the beginning of a dialogue,” said Francis DeBernardo, the executive director of New Ways Ministry, a group that ministers to and is an advocate for gay Catholics. “The church leadership, for the past 40 years, has just been so silent, and unwilling to dialogue, and unwilling to pray with L.G.B.T. Catholics that, even though this isn’t the ultimate step, it’s a first step,” he said of Cardinal Tobin’s welcome.

Some church conservatives were wary, however. The problem, they said, was not the idea of welcoming — after all, Jesus welcomed all — but that the public embrace of such a group could be interpreted as the church’s acceptance of a homosexual lifestyle, which church teaching bans.

“Everyone is welcome in the church, but no one is accepted as they are,” said the Rev. Robert Gahl, a professor of ethics at Opus Dei’s Pontifical University of the Holy Cross in Rome. “While I am delighted that they went to Mass in the cathedral, I hope that Cardinal Tobin challenged them, as all good shepherds should, to live according to the teachings of Jesus.”

But Cardinal Tobin said in an interview last week that to combine his welcome with a criticism would not have been a full welcome at all.

“That sounds a little backhanded to me,” he said. “It was appropriate to welcome people to come and pray and call them who they were. And later on, we can talk.”

Showing just how sensitive the simple act of welcome could be, he said that after the Mass he had received a fair amount of visceral hate mail from fellow Catholics. Someone was even organizing a letter-writing campaign to call on other bishops to correct him.

“And there’s a lot to correct in me, without a doubt,” Cardinal Tobin said. “But not for welcoming people. No.”

Individual parishes across the country have for decades had ministries to gay and lesbian Catholics. But more traditional forces prevailed among the church hierarchy, guided by a 1986 Vatican letter written by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the future Pope Benedict XVI, that warned against any acceptance of homosexuality.

Gay Catholics became among the most marginalized groups in the church. After the nightclub shooting in Orlando, Fla., last June, for example, only a handful of American bishops made public statements of support for the gay and lesbian community that had been targeted.

The Rev. James Martin, a Jesuit priest and author, said he found the bishops’ silence revelatory. He has written a book calling for small steps forward that was released on Tuesday, “Building a Bridge: How the Catholic Church and the L.G.B.T. Community Can Enter Into a Relationship of Respect, Compassion and Sensitivity.”

Ed Poliandro, who attended the Mass, said: “It was a miracle to have church leaders say, ‘You are welcome; you belong.’ And I felt, after a lifetime of struggle, that we are home.”

In it, he calls on church leaders to show respect by using terms like “gay” and “L.G.B.T.,” instead of phrases like “afflicted with same-sex attraction.” He also argues that to expect a sinless lifestyle from gay Catholics, but not from any other group, is a form of “unjust discrimination” and that gay people should not be fired for marrying a same-sex spouse.

“Pretty much everyone’s lifestyle is sinful,” Father Martin said. “Unless the Blessed Mother shows up in the communion line, there is no one sinless in our church.”

Across the country, there have been recent glimmers of openness that would not have been possible under previous popes, Mr. DeBernardo said.

The diocese of Jefferson City, Mo., for example, said last month that it would permit transgender students in its Catholic schools. In October, Bishop Robert McElroy of San Diego held a diocesan synod on the family that called for improved ministry toward gay and lesbian Catholics. At a New Ways Ministry national conference in April, Bishop John Stowe of Lexington, Ky., said he admired and respected lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people who remained steadfast to the church even though the church had not always been as welcoming.

Both Cardinal Tobin and Cardinal Kevin Farrell, the prefect of the Vatican’s dicastery for laity, family and life, who was appointed by Pope Francis, wrote positive blurbs for Father Martin’s book. Cardinal Farrell, who was previously the bishop of Dallas, wrote that he thought it would “help L.G.B.T. Catholics feel more at home in what is, after all, their church.”

But Cardinal Tobin’s welcome to Mass on May 21 has been the most significant of such recent gestures, because of the symbolism of a cardinal welcoming a group of gay Catholics, some of whom were married to same-sex spouses, to participate in the Sacrament of Holy Communion at the center of a cathedral, no questions asked.

The “L.G.B.T. pilgrimage” was organized by gay ministries within the Church of the Sacred Heart in South Plainfield, N.J., and the Church of the Precious Blood in Monmouth Beach, N.J. It stemmed from a conversation between David Harvie, of the South Plainfield parish group, and the Rev. Francis Gargani, a Brooklyn priest who, like Cardinal Tobin, belongs to the Redemptorist order, and took the idea to him.

Though Cardinal Tobin left soon after greeting the Mass attendees, citing a previous engagement, eight priests concelebrated it with Father Gargani. The group was also welcomed by the rector of the cathedral, Bishop Manuel Cruz, who told the people that the cathedral doors were always open to them “because we are children of God and our identity is that we all belong to him.”

Many of those in attendance were moved to tears.

“It felt like a miracle,” Ed Poliandro, a member of St. Francis Xavier Parish in Manhattan and a clinical social worker. “It was a miracle to have church leaders say, ‘You are welcome; you belong.’ And I felt, after a lifetime of struggle, that we are home.”

Some of the parishioners who attended the Mass gathered for dinner afterward.

Cardinal Tobin’s predecessor in Newark, Archbishop John J. Myers, emphasized the immorality of homosexuality during his tenure, supporting, for example, the 2016 dismissal of a dean of a Catholic high school in Paramus, N.J., for marrying her lesbian partner. So Cardinal Tobin’s welcome to Mass was particularly powerful for those there from his own diocese.

“He brought Francis to us,” said Thomas M. Smith, 66, a deacon who serves the deaf community at the Newark cathedral. “I’ve been waiting 25 years for this. I’m a deacon in the church, and I’ve had to be careful. And afraid.”

He teared up, remembering how his parents had died thinking he would go to hell if he found someone to love. “This is amazing to me,” he said.

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