I saw this coming long ago. Pope Francis advocates for homosexual civil unions. He'll be pushing church weddings for gays by this time next year. Presided over by gay priests who were ordained by gay bishops. @bwallac2335 Mod: threads merged. Sorry for the wrong formatting.
I'm just waiting for Bishop Barron to make a YouTube video explaining how this is all very Catholic, very much in the spirit of Vatican II.
https://www.lifesitenews.com/opinio...n-which-pope-endorses-homosexual-civil-unions A quote from RC Archbishop Vigano: "Jorge Mario Bergoglio is trying to force some Cardinals and Bishops to separate themselves from communion with him, obtaining as a result not his own deposition for heresy but rather the expulsion of Catholics who want to remain faithful to the perennial Magisterium of the Church. This trap would have the purpose – in the presumed intentions of Bergoglio and his “magic circle” – of consolidating his own power within a church that would only nominally be “Catholic” but in reality would be heretical and schismatic....We painfully acknowledge that, in this epochal clash, he who ought to be guiding the Barque of Peter has chosen to side with the Enemy, in order to sink it." If Vigano is correct, Jorge is trying to establish a new, heretical religion while retaining the name, banner, reputation, and real estate of the RCC.
I think we should not overplay the hand. Pope Francis statement : “homosexuals have a right to be a part of the 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, the pope said. What we have to create is a civil union law. That way they are legally covered,” Pope Francis added. “I stood up for that.” When you read the words and not the commentary it seems that this is a statement against homophobia rather more than it is a statement in favour of Homosexuality. If he had said that all people deserve the protection of the law, regardless of ethnicity, gender, sexual identity, or orientation. Most of us would agree. Pope Francis clearly does not enjoy a huge level of support from the conservative right of the RCC, and I don't think we should get caught up in that. All people are made in the image and after the likeness of God, and all people are the object of God's redeeming love, and invited to his eternal embrace through the saving death and resurrection of Jesus. When we endorse state sponsored derision and deprivation of basic liberty on the basis of things like this we are not being true to the witness of the gospel which affirms we are all made in the image and after the likeness of God.
This is... Yikes. We all know about the dangerous of homophobia. But when are we going to talk about the dangers of homophilia? I've been following our friend Francis the First for a while and he has had many a chance to push the envelope into outright civil war within the Roman church, which he didn't seize upon, and pulled back from the brink. Just last year ago he could have pushed for women priests, but instead retreated back to allowing women deacons in a local geography (still a break in principle, but contained in its impact). The allowance of divorce and remarriage was relegated to a footnote in a 300+ tome. The abolition of death penalty was done by a stroke of a pen in a paragraph, rather than through a lengthy and public engagement with theology. He seems reluctant to outright declare war on those who are actually still Christian within his denomination (many decent, good roman catholics, all their theology errors aside), and to boil the frog slowly rather than violently. He has been pushed by his progressive secular allies (overlords?) to adopt an ecumenical/interreligious liturgy, but that has been shelved as far as I know. But now that I think of it, he did endorse the construction of the "Abrahamic temple" which will embody the three "Abrahamic religions" under one complex and one set of rituals, so maybe you're right: https://fsspx.news/en/news-events/news/abu-dhabi-babel-abrahamic-family-house-53956
O God, Trinity of love, from the profound communion of your divine life, pour out upon us a torrent of fraternal love. Grant us the love reflected in the actions of Jesus, in his family of Nazareth, and in the early Christian community. Grant that we Christians may live the Gospel, discovering Christ in each human being, recognizing him crucified in the sufferings of the abandoned and forgotten of our world, and risen in each brother or sister who makes a new start. Come, Holy Spirit, show us your beauty, reflected in all the peoples of the earth, so that we may discover anew that all are important and all are necessary, different faces of the one humanity that God so loves. Amen.
To be frank, I personally have thought and said some things very similar to what Francis said. I have openly stated that I don't see a valid legal reason to forbid homosexuals from having a civil agreement which creates rights of survivorship and suchlike, similar to a marriage. (Although our Supreme Court recently went much further and re-defined marriage!) And I have openly stated that God loves all human beings, no matter if they feel drawn to members of the same or the opposite sex. The problem is when people engage in sin willingly and without repentance, especially when they deny that their sins are actually sins. That said, I am a layperson with some legal training. I am not the head of a huge denomination. I don't have a responsibility to a flock who looks to me as their spiritual leader. I can talk about what's best from a legal standpoint and not risk confusing a whole bunch of people or potentially leading some to self-justify their sin. Francis, on the other hand, is in a much different position. All his talk of 'the brotherhood of all men' could contribute to people falsely thinking that God winks at their sin... whether it be sexual misconduct, rejection of Christ as Savior, or whatever. As a prominent (if not the most-spotlighted) spiritual leader representing the Gospel of Jesus Christ, Francis has no business saying or writing things that compromise eternal destinies in favor of creating a more peaceful temporal existence. He is substituting humanism for true Christianity. Francis should be guiding people spiritually toward the Way, Truth and Life, but instead he's sacrificing the Gospel message and guiding people toward "happy land in the here and now," as if we can somehow create heaven on earth all by our human selves. As a shepherd, Francis is letting the flock of the sheep run wild while he tries to gather the goats and the wolves and to make them part of the flock. “homosexuals have a right to be a part of the 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..." Homosexuals are not children of God automatically by their being humans. They first must surrender themselves to Jesus and trust in Him for the forgiveness of their sins. Then they become children of God. If they do not accept Christ's redemptive sacrifice, God will indeed throw them out of His presence and into the lake of fire for eternity. Francis is so wrong!
We need a deeper understanding of grace. I think the use of the word 'homosexuals' could be largely irrelevant as the sentence would have the same theological validity if any number of other words were used, including the word 'people'. We are all flawed, we are all falling short of the glory of God, like Moses we are hidden in the rock lest we see the face of God and die. Christ came into the world, not to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. It is the privilege of Bishops to err, and indeed we would regard none of them as infallibile. On his words as we are discussing them and not the insane commentary around them, I am inclined to think that Francis is not so wrong, and a good many would see in his words 'love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control', and we know where that comes from.
No I did not 'just' admit that. That has been my position for some long period of time. It is as much a flaw as pride, vainglory, and hypocrisy, in-graciousness and a lack of hospitality. We are all flawed. We are all falling short of the glory of God.
This is my position as well: it's a sin, but not some especially-heinous class of sin. I think Christians in general could do better at getting that message across. Homosexual behavior is sinful, but so is fornication and adultery, heterosexual or no.
There is one more point, though: if homosexual behavior is indeed sinful, then it follows that it should be repented of in much the same way as any other sin like adultery or gluttony. But Christians have lost the courage to draw that conclusion, at least in Western (secularized) countries.
Human nature IS flawed, is it not? Even yours and mine! Isn't that why we need a Saviour? Who needs a Saviour most, the 'flawed' or the 'perfect'? Assuming there are any that are perfect, that is. Scripture says there arn't. .
And so is gluttony, hypocrisy, dishonesty, unkindness, hardness of heart and foolishness, but American and British society, (and all other societies), are rife with them. The thing about the church is that we supposedly don't do those things after becoming 'saved', but most 'believers' still do, (on a possibly reduced level enough to convince themselves and other people that they don't any longer), but not enough to convince God. We all need a Saviour and we all have a Saviour for ALL of our lives. That is basically what the message of The Gospel really IS. It's what we do about that which sorts the sheep from the goats. Matt.18:23-35. .