Pope Francis has endorsed same-sex unions.

I know there have been rumblings on this for quite some time, but it was vague and evasive before. Now it is open and unambiguous. The Pope of the Roman Catholic Church has embraced same-sex unions.

Pope supports same-sex civil unions in ‘apocalyptically scandalous’ interview

 

So he is ok with a state supporting a sinful behavior that mimics marriage. Now that is sad as he is the head of the Catholic Church. Although I don't think we will ever get that horse back in so we might as well start to detach our idea of marriage from the idea of the state's idea of marriage

 

I think that’s been the case for a very long time. What the U.S. had prior to 2015 or 1996 was certainly not “Christian marriage.” If law is going to be secular (because society is pluralistic and the State is representative), I don’t see how this is avoidable. For non-State, voluntary organizations like Churches to have their own definitions that determine how their own officials will behave, within and toward the membership of their own respective Churches, I don’t see as problematic. Religious organizations ought to be able to recognize as marriage - for their own, non-coercive purposes - what the State does not, and to be able to non-coercively refuse recognition to arrangements the State endorses. If the population as a whole ever moves in the opposite direction, the law will eventually change in order to reflect this.

 

Everyone saw this coming from miles away. It's not "apocalyptically scandalous" to anybody who's been paying attention -- it was an inevitable outcome of Francis' relentless Jesuit leftist worldview.

I'm just waiting for Bishop Barron to go on YouTube and explain how all this is very much in accord with Vatican II and really nothing unorthodox so don't worry about it.

 

Thank God I'm a Protestant.

 

very tragic... I had not seen this news

catholics unite

Just shows the Romans are not really the catholic church

 

Or, at least not all of it.

 

Come to Rome, they said. We have true unity through clarity of doctrine, they said.

heh.

 

You reminded me of Fr. Mark, who hasn't poked in over here in a while.

 

The vicar of Christ on earth is a blatant moral hippy. But don’t worry because even if he’s a heretic he’s still infallible ex cathedra!

 

Why is any of this news? Same-sex civil unions aren’t the same thing as same-sex marriage in a religious, sacramental context. And these were remarks given in an interview. It’s not an official pronouncement of the Roman Catholic Church or tantamount to a change in its teaching.

 

It can change the teaching because Francis can fill the Vatican with all his buddies and finally it will be updated as the newest teaching in the catechism in a few decades. Trad caths freak out because of how much power the pope has. Knowing jesuits there is some way to employ sophistry to make homosexual marriage accepted in the church without it ever changing the doctrinal teaching. Just like they changed the 2000 year old teaching on death penalty and they say it’s not a contradiction, they can do the same now. Honestly I feel bad for them

 

I think it’s a little more complicated than that, but I understand what you’re saying. He’s certainly not adhering to the traditional unspoken norms. There’s a lot of that going around unfortunately.

 

lol I know I’m being dramatic. But it really is a possibility for things to start changing in the Roman church if things keep heading in this direction. I think the worst of it all is the cognitive dissonance forced on the laity. You’re supposed to pretend like teachings haven’t changed and that the pope doesn’t go against catholic teachings when he clearly does. His amoris latetia (however u spell it lol) has caused much worry for traditional Catholics. There’s people arguing there are multiple ways to interpret it. You’d think they wouldn’t have to interpret anything because that’s what the magisterium is for. But that’s what they’re having to do in order to reconcile the popes teaching with church doctrine. Because even outside ex cathedra he is due religious submission of mind and will. Ultramontanism will probably eventually lead to the full corruption of the church. I honestly hope it doesn’t and they get it together. It’s sad to watch people doing mental gymnastics in order to pretend their church is infallible[/QUOTE]

 

I think you’ve hit the nail on the head. The dogma of papal infallibility didn’t actually solve anything, it just pushed resolution of just about any subject back one step. Now you have Catholics parsing everything promulgated since Vatican I for any clues that magic words indicating an ex cathedra statement were uttered in this or that pronouncement. And of course it’s all a “he said/she said” thing. There’s no real way to create any consensus within that framework. And at the same they destroyed what gave them actual unity: the historic Latin liturgy.

 

You are so right. There is actually much argument about ex cathedra statements aside from the immaculate conception and assumption. The farther back in history you go the more dissent you there is on what is ex cathedra or not. I’ve seen some people liken it to nailing jello to a wall. It doesn’t work for early popes because they didn’t know papal infallibility was a thing (contrary to what Catholics now say). So it’s this sort of this theologian says it’s infallible but the other one says it’s not. What good is infallibility when you can’t tell what’s infallible? You also have to account for the fact that up until now the regular catholic didn’t read every single papal pronouncement and probably would never have any idea of it during their lifetime. It is only recently this has happened which has just lead to the growth in the personality cult of the papacy. Now every statement a pope says carries weight with a maximalist interpretation of Vatican I. I’ve read some church history and in the beginning of papal claims, they always claimed the title vicar of Peter instead of vicar of Christ. I mean what other conclusion can you come to than to hang on to the popes every word if you genuinely believe him to be the infallible vicar of Christ on earth? You never know when he will utter the magic ex cathedra words and pronounce a new dogma!

I feel bad for trads and their TLM. Even if the pope has the power to change their liturgy, why do it?

 

Exactly. That’s the crux of the issue, no question.

 

In reality the is the contemporary version of 'is it lawful to pay taxes the Caesar or not?' (Luke 20:22)

It is framed this way so that there appears to be no answer.

The Church in Australia (a largely a pluralist secular democracy) must recognise the extant marriages that people have entered into. We are not free to conduct a wedding for someone who is already married in the eyes of the law. So we are not allowed to ignore that. I think what Pope Francis is saying is that we are all equal before God and before the law. No one should be treated second best before the law on the basis that their spouse is of the same gender as themselves. That seems reasonable and just. He has also expressed the view, several times, that the Church is not about to conduct mono-gendered marriages.

sursum corda

 

This is typical behaviour for Pope Francis. I believe it stems from the unfortunate celebrity status that the Bishop of Rome has and has had for far too long now. In the past many Catholics would not know what the pope looked like and would never have heard his voice. Some may not have even known the name of the current pope.

Nowadays the pope is like some famous celebrity constantly splashed across the cover of popular magazines. Whilst what he may say in an interview to Jesuits in Slovakia or in his off-the-cuff responses to journalists' questions on aeroplanes does not constitute official church teachings many Catholics do accept as fact what he says. He does a great disservice to Catholics because the role of the pope is to defend the Faith.

Pope Francis seems to believe that as the pope he is all-powerful and can do whatever he wishes. His illustrious predecessor Benedict XVI made it very clear that the pope is not all-powerful and there are definite limits to his authority.

I pray that at the end of this dreadful papacy the Holy Spirit may lead the cardinals to elect a holier man who is concerned with the orthodox Christian Faith.