The LGBTQA community is responding with shock, anger and frustration at the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith statement concerning same-sex unions.
Many in our community can't understand why Pope Francis would allow such a negative and hateful document on same-sex marriage to be released.
Some even now are believing they have been misled and are starting to believe Pope Francis's words have misled us with his actions. "I feel vicarious shame for my Church," Johan Bonny, the Roman Catholic bishop of Antwerp, Belgium, wrote in a commentary in the Flemish newspaper De Standaard.
"I want to apologize to all those for whom this response is painful and incomprehensible ... Their pain for the Church is mine today. ... God has never been stingy or pedantic with His blessing on people," he said.
The ruling, which the pope approved, came as a surprise to many within the Roman Catholic Church because he has been more conciliatory toward gay people than perhaps any other pontiff.
He has held meetings with same-sex couples and encouraged those who want to raise their children in the Church to do so. In 2013 he made the now-famous remark "Who am I to judge?" about gay people seeking God and trying to live by the Church's rules.
Cardinal Blase Cupich, archbishop of Chicago, said the disappointment of gay Catholics was "understandable," and that the Church now had to "redouble our efforts to be creative and resilient in finding ways to welcome and encourage all LGBTQ people into our family of faith."
Tobias Schaefer, the provost of the cathedral in Worms, Germany, did not hide his outrage.
"If the Church does not have the power to bless wherever people yearn for blessing, has it not abandoned its most fundamental duty? Blessings are not a way of passing a moral judgement!" Schaefer said on Facebook, adding he would disobey the directive, according to WKZO.com .
The Rainbow Sash Movement joins the voices of outrage and betrayal in our Church community who thought that hypocrisy and hate would give way to truth and love.
Joe Murray
Executive Director
Rainbow Sash Movement (LGBTQ Roman Catholics)
