Several senior bishops around the world have joined the petition of three hundred and fifty Austrian priests protesting against the Vatican Congregation's decision on homosexual unions.


A group of about three hundred and fifty priests, organised by a priest Helmut Schüller, stated on Sunday in Call for Disobedience 2.0 that they would continue to bless same-sex couples. The group argues that it strongly protests against the assumption that same-sex loving couples are not part of the divine plan.

In March, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a statement to queries on the issue of so-called gay marriage, which was the most decisive rejection of those efforts ever written. The Church's top doctrinal office said, "it is not licit to impart a blessing on relationships, partnerships, even stable, that involve sexual activity outside of marriage (i.e, outside the indissoluble union of a man and a woman open in itself to the transmission of life), as is the case of the unions between persons of the same sex."

Last week sixty German priests signed a letter stating that they disagree with the position of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and will bless homosexual couples.
With the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith refusing to bless homosexual partnerships, we are raising our voices and saying, We will continue to accompany people who enter into binding partnerships and bless their future relationships.' We do not refuse the blessing ceremony, the authors of the letter stated.

Archbishop of Brisbane Mark Coleridge is pushing for more active gay inclusion in the Catholic Church due to the Vatican's ban on blessings for gay couples.

A church that says we cannot ordain women is equally obligated to ask how we can include women in leadership ... A church that says we cannot bless same-sex unions is equally obligated to ask how we we can include same-sex couples, he stated.

Cardinal Blaise Kupich, Archbishop of Chicago, believes the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith's position on LGBTQ will be disappointing for many. Vatican should encourage Catholics to redouble our efforts to be creative and resilient in finding ways to welcome and encourage all LGBTQ people in our faith family, Cardinal Kupich suggested.

Bishop of Essen in Germany Franz-Josef Overbeck, said that despite the ban on blessings of homosexual couples, he will continue to accompany all people in his pastoral care, if they ask for it, regardless of life situation.

Similar response offered Bishop Johan Bonny of Belgium who said he was ashamed of his Church due to an intellectual and moral lack of understanding that Pope Francis approved the Congregation's ban on blessing same-sex couples. Belgium Bishop even apologised for what he saw as a mistake of Vatican. I want to apologize to everyone for whom it is painful and incomprehensible, he wrote. In response to the Congregation's statement that God cannot bless sin, Bonnie said that sin is one of the most difficult theological and moral categories to define, and therefore one of the last to apply to individuals and their way of life together.

A Silence of the Opponents of LGBTQ

Unlike proponents of broader acceptance of LGBTQ groups in the Catholic Church, the opponents are not so vocal. Although an editorial in Vatican daily L'Osservatore Romano stated that the Congregation expressed the views of the majority in the Church until now only Bishops of Portsmouth in Great Britain, Philip Egan, made an appealed to the Pope to confirm the assessment.

COMMENTARY

From the beginning of the institutional church and even earlier homosexuality was abnormal state of mind from the perspective of Natural Law. In Western civilisation, the institution of marriage has been reserved for man and woman.

The so-called queer theory developed in 1980s by gays and lesbians and introduced to the Universities in 1990s denies the Natural Law and builds on Marxist views rejecting existence of marriage as an institution.

For decades Catholic Church was one of the first institutions which pointed at the gay unions as an example of the logical mistake.