Vatican Clarifies Guidance on Blessing Same-Sex Unions

PRAY WITH US about Vatican clarifies guidance: Father God, we thank You for giving us Your Holy Spirit. Because He searches all things, even the deep things of God. And the desperately wicked hearts of men too, to convict us of sin. So do Your deep work in us, to stir our consciences against approving what is evil in Your sight. That would only confirm people in the hellbound direction of sin that cannot enter the Kingdom of God.

Instead, let Your Kingdom come into their hearts. Let them hear Your voice so they will open their doors and let You change them. All have sinned, yet all can be forgiven and restored to their true identity in you, by Your grace alone. So turn the trend against cheapening Your grace. And let us hear testimonies of Your true grace multiply instead. In Jesus’ name, amen

PRAYER ALERT: Vatican Clarifies Guidance on Blessing Same-Sex Unions

All around the world the pope has gotten major pushback for his guidance last month. It included a kind of “blessing” on same-sex couples. Yet “without officially validating their status or changing in any way the Church’s perennial teaching on marriage.”

I have already written that it didn’t go quite as far as many say. But it did go into dubious territory and therefore drew massive resistance. Especially in Africa and Eastern Europe. The Kenya Conference of Catholic Bishops, for one, objected to the new guidance. It is “causing anxiety and even confusion among the Christians, and in general the people of God.”

Accordingly, the papal office headed by Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernández issued a “clarification.” It asks for a “a full and calm reading of the Declaration so as to better understand its meaning and purpose.” He denies it could be considered “heretical, contrary to the Tradition of the Church, or blasphemous.” He said that such a “non-ritualized” blessing on same-sex couples should take only 10-15 seconds…

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