Posted on 07/29/2013 5:33:38 AM PDT by SoFloFreeper
Pope Francis reached out to gays on Monday, saying he wouldn't judge priests for their sexual orientation 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. Francis was much more conciliatory, saying gay clergymen should be forgiven and their sins forgotten.
Francis' remarks came Monday during a plane journey back to the Vatican from his first foreign trip in Brazil.
He was funny and candid during a news conference that lasted almost an hour and a half. He didn't dodge a single question, even thanking the journalist who raised allegations reported by an Italian newsmagazine that one of his trusted monsignors was involved in a scandalous gay tryst.
(Excerpt) Read more at mobile.philly.com ...
I am not Roman Catholic so what the Pope says doesn’t concern me except as it concerns all Christians when someone is teaching doctrine contrary to Scripture. God has declared homosexuality to be an abomination and nobody can change that. If the Pope leads homosexuals (or any sinners) to believe they do not have to repent and will be accpetable to God, he isn’t doing them any favors.
No amount of good will or good works saves a person. Only faith in Christ and repentance leads to salvation.
Isn’t one reason the Scriptures were written was to instruct us as to what is right and what is wrong? If we’re being told through Scripture what’s wrong, how is it that we are making our own judgments?
There’s a great difference between a person having same-sex attraction, knowing it’s wrong, and seeking help, or at least not acting on it, and a flaming activist who is “proud” of his sin. Worse yet are those pushing it into the school system to brainwash our children. Hope they look good in millstone.
When the reporter asked him to talk more about homosexuals he referred them to the Cathecism of the Catholic Church, which states.....
2357 Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity,141 tradition has always declared that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.”142 They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.
Nothing to see here. Move along...........
Its hard not to opus out some days...
The first one.
>> “If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?” Francis asked. <<
.
Unbelievable!
So much for Francis, he’ll apparently make an excellent “False Prophet.”
Get readfy for a wild ride.
Thank you for the compliment. That is where I "try" to live my life. Sometimes I succeed. Sometimes I fail. But in my case, I "hunger and thirst" for truth, as best I can find it out.
FWIW, I've only been RCC for a few years. I'm now 66 years old, born and raised Episcopalian (high church flavor) in South Louisiana. Married a a "cradler" RCC. Unchurched for forty years. Then the wife decided she needed to learn more about HER faith (she was catechized (badly) in the early "post-Vatican-II" era). So she started buying and reading books on what the RCC is "really" all about.
Now, I have what is probably the world's worst addiction...I am an omnivorous reader. A worse addiction than crack cocaine. I read anything and everything. So when she would finish a book, I would read it. Recall phrase above about "hunger and thirst". After much study, I realized that I had found TRUTH. So I immersed myself in the Tiber, and here I am. And the more I study, the more truth I find.
"Hey! Is that allowed on FR?"
Oh yes.....there are a number of us who try.
Is it a 'sin' to be an adulterer; iffn you only THINK about it?
You are welcome; but I especially thank Al Gore - for inventing the Internet.
He has made searching for stuff SO easy these days!
256 sure didn't!
I smell a red herring...
Well said. Amen to all that.
Thank you for this interesting snippet of your story. Very interesting! In time, I hope we learn more! Compliments to Mrs. Warthog.
One can be an "alcoholic" but not a drunk. I know alcoholics who have been clean and sober for years. They're still alcoholics, though. Same as a chaste, pure, God-pleasing person whose unbidden sexual attractions are for people of the same sex. Still homosexual in orientation, but not rolling out the welcome mat--- or the sofa-bed--- in his mind!
You need to sort that out with many of your fellow Catholic FReepers who insist that the RCC does teach that one has to be a Catholic to be saved. Your statements sound very reasonable and I do hope it is the case.
Back to this article. What I find interesting as I pursue all these posts is no one is picking up on the incorrect headline (in the article). The Pope never said "gay Priests", he said "gay". One can say - what difference does it make since "gay Priests" are a subset of "gay"? However I think it makes a lot of difference. The Pope seemed to be welcoming sinners into the Church and leading them to Christ. Gays are just sinners unless their hearts are hardened and they don't repent (which is the usual problem). He wasn't saying he is condoning Gay Priests leading the flock. That's a different thing all together. This is just another hit piece with the Pope helping them along with a loose comment. He will likely clarify that comment through others later.
Either they read the Catechism and understand the teaching of the Church or they don’t
God gives us free will.
Anyone can say they are Catholic.
It is up to the listener to discern.
When people want to believe what someone says it’s up to them.
But the Church says what it says.
a lot of Freepers won’t listen to a word I say when I speak about what the Church does say.
They enjoy hating what they perceive to be the Church.
“The Pope seemed to be welcoming. . .”
Here’s the problem. The Pope didn’t seem to be doing anything. It should read, ‘the paper tried to present the pope as. . .’
But Freepers have a deaf and blindness about the lack of sincerity of the paper when it comes to the Church.
They are so negative on the media when it comes to politics, it’s what this site is about.
Yet they enjoy believing these papers when it comes to the Church.
Hypocrisy
“They enjoy hating what they perceive to be the Church.”
BS. I don’t hate anyone or anything. But I certainly resent being told that I am going to Hell simply because I am not Catholic. So enough of the phony persecution complex.
"Quoting from the Catechism of the Catholic Church, he said that people with homosexual tendencies must not be excluded but should be integrated into society. “If a person is gay and seeks God and has good will, who am I to judge him?” he asked."
Source: Vatican Webpage
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