The Vatican released a document on Monday calling for the church to welcome and accept gay people, unmarried couples, people who have divorced, and the children of those less than traditional families.
NBC News reports that the document, which was prepared after a week of discussions at an assembly of 200 bishops on the family, said Monday that “homosexuals had ‘gifts and qualities to offer’ and asked if Catholicism could accept gays and recognize positive aspects of same-sex couples.” Reuters adds that “The document will be the basis for discussion for the second and final week of the assembly, known as a synod, which was called by Pope Francis and focuses on the theme of the family.”
According to the document:
Homosexuals have gifts and qualities to offer the Christian community: are we capable of welcoming these people, guaranteeing to them a further space in our communities? Often they wish to encounter a Church that offers them a welcoming home.
The New York Times adds that:
The 12-page report, written by a committee picked by Francis, says that without abandoning church teaching on the sacrament of marriage, pastors should recognize that there are “positive aspects of civil unions and cohabitation.” That is a striking departure from traditional Catholic preaching that such couples are “living in sin.”
The report also says that gay people have “gifts and qualities to offer to the Christian community,” and that some gay couples provide each other “mutual aid to the point of sacrifice” and “precious support in the life of the partners.”
Church conservatives, such as John Smeaton, are calling the document a betrayal of traditional family values. Smeaton, the co-founder of the conservative Voice of the Family, said: “Those who are controlling the synod have betrayed Catholic parents worldwide,” adding that the statement was “one of the worst official documents drafted in Church history”.
However, according to NBC:
Others – such as New Ways Ministry, a leading U.S. Catholic gay rights group, called it a “major step forward”, praising it for being devoid of the “major gloom and doom and apocalyptic horror” that accompanied past Vatican pronouncements on homosexuals.
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