Homosexuality on the threshold of the Synod: Two Conferences in Rome.

Rorate Caeli ^ | 9/30/2015 | Sandro Magister

[ebb tide]

Homosexuality is per se outside of the topics of discussion at the Synod convened to discuss matters of the family. But in fact it was present in a powerful way in the debates themselves. According to the media hype, the dominant leanings in the Catholic world are for a radical change in the doctrine and practice of the Church, with the full acceptance of the practice of homosexuality and with the blessing of unions between persons of the same sex.

But there are also others who want to take a new path with respect to the pastoral ministry to homosexuals that is firmly based on Catholic doctrine. Both these approaches will be represented in Rome in these feverish days before the Synod.

The first approach will have its moment in the sun on Saturday, October 3 at the international conference with the title “Ways of Love: Snapshots of Catholic Encounters with LGBT Persons and their Families”. The program in Italian, English and Spanish can be found at waysoflove.wordpress.com. LGBT is an acronym for Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual. At this meeting in Rome, they explain, they will initiate “a global network of LGBTQI Catholics”, extending the acronym to include “queer” and intersexuals. Their stated objective is “a Catholic Church in which the whole people of God—LGBT and heterosexual persons—can live, pray and offer their service together in harmony”. Speakers at the conference include Mary McAleese, the former president of Ireland, José Raúl Vera Lopez, Bishop of Saltillo in Mexico, himself a Dominican, the Jesuits Pedro Labrin from Chile and Pino Piva from Italy, the American Sister Jeannine Gramick and the Italian Sister Anna Maria Vitagliani, Martin Pendergast from England, Rungrote Tangsurakit, from Thailand, and also “a priest who works in Africa whose anonymity was requested by his superior”.

The second approach will be expounded on Friday, October 2, in a conference at the Angelicum, the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas. In the morning session papers will be presented by Cardinal Robert Sarah and by Livio Melina, the president of the Pontifical Institute John Paul II for the study of marriage and family. The speakers at the afternoon session are Cardinal George Pell, the psychiatrist Paul McHugh of the Johns Hopkins Institute, Dr. Timothy Lock, and Jennifer Morse of the Ruth Institute. Included in the morning session will be testimonies from three Catholic homosexuals each with his own different story: Rilene, David and Paul.

The meeting was organized by the San Francisco based publishing house, Ignatius Press, (http://www.ignatius.com), founded and directed by the Jesuit Joseph Fessio of the Napa Institute (http://napa-institute.org/), headed by the Jesuit Robert Spitzer, and by Courage International (http://couragerc.org), a Catholic organization headed by Father Paul Check and dedicated to the pastoral care of homosexual persons, which operates with the placet of the United States Conference of Bishops and the Pontifical Council for the family. The conference statement, program, profiles of the speakers and other information can be found at truthandlove.com (http://www.truthandlove.com).

The presence of Cardinals Sarah and Pell at this conference leaves no doubt about the orientation of this conference and its opposition to the “openings” supported by the “Rainbow Catholics” at the other conference in Rome and the Synod fathers friendly to their way of thinking.

Father Check introduces the conference at the Angelicum in this way:

In the Gospel Jesus does not only bestow his compassion, but he also calls us to conversion, because he knows that we will be truly joyful and fully realized as persons only when we live in the way that God wanted us to live when he created us. Many of today’s approaches to homosexuality do not include this fuller perspective of the human person. They rather seem to limit themselves to an acceptance without recognizing the call of Jesus to conversion. And they defend a “right” to sexual intimacy, but they do not acknowledge the plan of God with respect to marriage to which Jesus himself refers to in Matthew 19.

[ebb tide]

Why even discuss sodomy at a Catholic synod?

[Gay State Conservative]

“Be fruitful and multiply” doesn't jibe with perverts “marrying”.It can't be much plainer than that.

[SkyPilot]

Who needs Scripture when you can hold “synods” and re-write God’s Word?

[Mrs. Don-o]

Don’t be foolish. Nobody can rewrite God’s Word.

[Mrs. Don-o]

And... despite all the hand-waving and flim-flamming... the Catholic Church will never approve the depraved act of sodomy let alone predicate it as the basis of a Sacrament (Matrimony). What a disgusting thought.

[cradle of freedom]

These sickos have gotten so much power and pride through the efforts of the Democrat party and all of the blind followers of the blind who did not know or refused to know that their party had been supporting sodomy for 40 years. The Democrats gave homosexuals many millions of dollars to organize pressure groups, now they are even going to the Vatican itself. They are feeling empowered and flushed with victory now they think that they can conquer the world for perversion.

[NetAddicted]

What do Cardinals Sarah and Pell imply for the conference?

[NetAddicted]

Homosexuals are in darkness, so I assume they’re influenced by demons.
Since G-d created everything, why did he create demons?

[NetAddicted]

Found this article, so i assume the Synod is going to closely follow Catholic doctrine: http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/news/2015/07/08/cardinal-pell-same-sex-marriage-votes-show-society-is-abandoning-christian-foundation/

[piusv]

But Francis met quietly and privately with Kim Davis so all’s good. /s

[HLPhat]

>>Why even discuss sodomy at a Catholic synod?

Sort of reminds me of the stage in the life cycle of a dying bee colony where the workers start laying eggs and making nothing but drones.

The result is, naturally, predictable.

[SkyPilot]

Watch them, they will show you how easy it is. It will be creeping decrees endorsing immorality. It has already begun.

[Mrs. Don-o]

"Why even discuss sodomy at a Catholic synod?"

I haven't read or heard that it's sodomy, itself (meaning the physical practice of sexual vice) which has come under discussion in the synod process. Rather, it has been the question of homosexual people in the Church.

And there are two good reasons to consider their situation: first, to discuss pastoral strategies to help homosexual people and their families to obtain the grace to be freed from sin and to grow in healing and virtue, and (2) to distinguish between that, and the disastrous "mainstreaming' of sodomy which is going on politically and culturally, and which is a tremendous source of confusion as well as corruption.

A "Good Shepherd" strategy would involve pastoral guidance to the gay "person" and his or her family, plus opposition to the gay "movement" or gay "lobby" which seeks not to free them from their sins, but to entrap them in them. We truly need God to enlighten us so we can do both of these things correctly.

When he was the Archbishop of Buenos Aires in the midst of a battle with Cristina Fernández de Kirchner over "gay" "marriage" just a couple of years ago, now-Pope Francis write an urgent letter to some Carmelite sisters imploring them to pray for him:

"Let us not be naive: it is not a simple political struggle; it is an intention destructive of the plan of God. It is not a mere legislative project (instrument), but rather a move of the Father of Lies who wishes to confuse and deceive the children of God."

I think Pope Francis knows what is happening and is approaching the battle with a certain strategic finesse. If you know anything about sailing, this means tacking against the wind. It looks like a zigzag, but it's the only way to achieve the right direction when the wind is against you.

[xone]

Since G-d created everything, why did he create demons?

He didn't, angels were good, disobedient angels became demons. Like man they chose sin. Unlike man they can't be saved.

[ebb tide]

And there are two good reasons to consider their situation: first, to discuss pastoral strategies to help homosexual people and their families to obtain the grace to be freed from sin and to grow in healing and virtue, and (2) to distinguish between that, and the disastrous "mainstreaming' of sodomy which is going on politically and culturally, and which is a tremendous source of confusion as well as corruption.

Do you not remember how God handled Sodom's "homosexual people"?

I guess Francis possesses more mercy, but less justice than God, Himself, does. That's why the secular world loves him so.

[ebb tide]

I haven't read or heard that it's sodomy, itself (meaning the physical practice of sexual vice) which has come under discussion in the synod process.

And I had always thought you were more well read:

5. On Unions of Persons of the Same Sex

a) Is there a law in your country recognizing civil unions for people of the same-sex and equating it in some way to marriage?

b) What is the attitude of the local and particular Churches towards both the State as the promoter of civil unions between persons of the same sex and the people involved in this type of union?

c) What pastoral attention can be given to people who have chosen to live in these types of union?

d) In the case of unions of persons of the same sex who have adopted children, what can be done pastorally in light of transmitting the faith?

Read more: http://www.ncregister.com/blog/edward-pentin/vatican-publishes-preparatory-document-on-2014-synod/#ixzz3nTFB33gp

[Mrs. Don-o]

The Genesis Sodom incident indicates that, per Abraham's sense of justice --- which God appreciated --- if 10 just men could have been found, the whole city would have been spared. Didn't work out: they couldn't even find 10.

It went otherwise in Nineveh --- another wicked city --- where the preaching of repentance moved each man and woman to abandon the wickedness they had previously embraced.

That's what's called a pastoral strategy.

As in Nineveh, there are some, like Jonah, who don't seem to want to even try for a pastoral strategy. That's too bad. But it's evidently what God wanted.

By the time we get to 55 A.D. Corinth (yet another wicked city), you've got Paul telling the people, after one of his famous sin-catalogues (the sexually immoral, idolaters, adulterers, men who have sex with men, thieves, the greedy, drunkards, revilers, swindlers) that such were some of you --- evidently indicating that by the power of Jesus and the preaching of the Word, the hoped-for conversions took place.

Thus, in that case, no fire from heaven!

I guess some would find that a distinct let-down.

[ebb tide]

That's what's called a pastoral strategy.

Lot had a pastoral strategy also; he told the sodomites to leave the two men alone. The fudge-packers did not heed his "pastoral" advice. Nor did Lot's wife heed his "pastoral advice".

There is no discontinuity between the Old and New Testaments on one of the four sins that cry to Heaven for vengeance.

I'm sorry that you, Kasper, Marx and Francis think otherwise.

[ebb tide]

Can you please forward your cartoon to Guy Consolmagno, S.J.?

Those Jesuits are big into that stuff.

[ebb tide]

By the time we get to 55 A.D.

And by the time we get to 2015 A.D., the Church has reverted to asking for opinions to those questions posed in Post 16 on this thread?

Imagine that! A pope asking for opinions on sodomite unions, even how to "help" them raise children in the "faith".

Don't kid yourself, this is one pro-homo synod coming up.