Vatican Blessings and Same-Sex Couples

Michael Lofton examines the controversial Vatican document Fiducia Supplicans and considers its fruits after a year of its release.

Transcript: Testing 1, 2, 3, are y’all able to hear me? Okay, I think that the audio somehow got adjusted there, but y’all should be able to hear me now. Appreciate y’all letting me know there in the chat.Glad that we didn’t do a whole stream here with no audio like I once did for about 30 minutes. But anyways, okay, so just to summarize what I just spoke of here in a moment. We saw last year, mid-December, right before Christmas, that the Vatican released a document called “Fiducia Supplicans: On the Pastoral Meaning of Blessings.”Right before Christmastime of last year, and it caused massive, massive controversy worldwide on an international scale. Everyone in the world was talking about it rather than preparing for Christmas. And so there are a lot of people who are very offended, not only by the document, but by the timing of its release.Well, we need to talk about this document one year later and kind of review the document and assess it after one year and kind of see, well, what has been the result of this? You know, I did about 60 different videos on this document. It was so controversial and there was so much to cover and a lot of responses and criticisms to interact with.So that triggered quite a few videos on my part. I created a whole Fiducia Supplicans playlist with 59 videos in it. I guess this will be the 60th.And I did one the day that it was released and many after that. I read through the entire document with the audience and gave a commentary on it. And as the days progressed with a lot of criticisms about the document, I evaluated them.I showed what are some legitimate criticisms here and what are some misunderstandings of the document. And to summarize my perspective on it and the document itself, you know, long story short, I pointed out that there are some deficiencies with this document. Because for just again, by way of recap, this document was for the purpose of responding to the German bishops who were wanting to have gay marriage in the Catholic Church.And the document, according to Cardinal Fernandez, who wrote it, the document was written in a response to the German bishops, basically saying, “no, we’re not going to do that. We can’t do that. But here’s what we can do.Here’s what is within bounds of the Christian faith.” And, you know, whether people took away the correct understanding of it or not, the purpose of the document was to communicate that priests could spontaneously, rather than formal ceremonies, bless a homosexual couple. And that was what was incredibly controversial because most people understood that to mean, “wait, if you’re blessing the couple, you’re blessing their relationship.And therefore, you’re blessing what Scripture calls sin.” And so a lot of people were very, very upset with that and misunderstood it. I pointed out in the document, it does make a distinction here, at least a sufficient enough distinction to indicate what is not being blessed is the sin.No, the sin is not being blessed. That’s not it. Neither is the relationship, but rather the persons who make up this disordered union.The persons are being blessed, not the union. And that’s why Pope Francis came back a few days later, maybe about a week later, and Pope Francis made it very clear. He explicitly said, bless the persons, not the union.But just so many people took away from that language of blessing homosexual couples, they took that to mean “the blessing of the union” rather than “the persons.” You know, two people make up a couple. But a lot of people took away from that to mean their relationship, and therefore their sin.And so a lot of people understood this to mean, “well, the Church is blessing sin now.” And I criticize the document not because it necessarily does that. No, that would be a misreading of it.But because the document is written in such a way that it’s open to that misunderstanding on part of your average person who’s not reading carefully. It’s very easy for them to misunderstand it in that way. And I thought, look, it’s best to just not even have that language in there, blessing of homosexual couples.Take that out. Communicate what you wanted to say to begin with. You want to talk about blessing persons, then say just that.Don’t even bring up the word couple in there because you’re just going to mislead a lot of people, and they’re going to misunderstand it, even if what you mean by that is orthodox. Even if what you mean by that is not the sin, is not the relationship. That’s just not how most people are going to take away the meaning of what is written here.Whether right or wrong, that’s just reality. And so I criticize the document from day one saying, “I don’t think this is helpful. I think it’s misleading language.”But it is certainly not what people are telling you it is. And that’s, again, the notion that somehow sin is being blessed. Everybody in the world was effectively saying that.And I’m saying, well, that’s a poor reading of it. And I was confirmed multiple times by Cardinal Fernandez, the head of the Dicastery of the Doctrine of Faith, multiple times confirmed what I was saying. And it was quite clear he was speaking directly about me and my content.Because when journalists asked him about my perspective, specifically my perspective on the document, and Cardinal Fernandez confirmed it. And then we saw shortly after that Pope Francis came out and said exactly what I was saying. It’s referring to persons, not the union.Bless the persons, not the union. But before we analyze the fruits of this, or perhaps lack thereof, let’s just look at it one more time to show you what I’m referring to. Again, this was released by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith on the pastoral meaning of blessings.And, you know, it does have a lot of good stuff in it about blessings in general. But there are some difficult parts where they’re certainly open to misunderstanding. And that’s part of the problem.But it does say right out at the outset, paragraph 5, that the response of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith that was given a few years ago, that says you cannot bless homosexual relationships. You can’t bless their unions. You can’t bless homosexuality.And it, in fact, says you can’t bless sin. That is reaffirmed right here. And that’s something that a lot of people missed.It says, “this is also the understanding of marriage that’s offered by the gospel. For this reason, when it comes to the blessings, the Church has the right and duty to avoid any right that might contradict this conviction or lead to confusion. Such is also the meaning of the Responsum of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, which states that the Church does not have the power to impart blessings on unions of persons of the same sex.”And I showed people, you see the distinction that the document is making. It’s saying you can’t bless their union. When it speaks about them as a couple, it’s talking about the persons, not their union.So, again, I was confirmed by Pope Francis multiple times, said what I was saying. But you could see how some people might misread it in light of paragraph 38, which we’ll look at next. But by the way, paragraph 11 also confirms, again, you can’t bless the union of persons of the same sex.So it’s there multiple times in the document. But you do get to paragraph 31 of blessings of couples in irregular situations of couples of the same sex. That’s very misleading language.And notice what it says: “Within the horizon outlined here appears the possibility of blessings for couples in irregular situations and for couples of the same sex.” Most people are not going to read this carefully, and they’re going to misunderstand that. And this was ripe for misunderstanding and confusion.So I thought it was poorly written in this section. I thought, “there’s no reason to put this here, this language of couples of the same sex. Just say you want to bless persons.”Just say that. Even though that’s what’s being communicated, avoid this language of couple because so many people are going to misunderstand it. And if you read all of paragraph 31, it’s clear we’re talking about the persons, not their union.The persons, not their relationship. The persons, not their sin. And it’s not a blessing of approval for anything they’re doing.Rather, it’s a calling out to God for them to be purified of any sin involved in their life. That comes out in paragraph 31 on down. And, you know, I’ve explained this a thousand times until I’m blue in the face.Like I said, about 60 different videos I explain this. And I explained it over and against an avalanche of people from cardinals on down who misunderstood it. And I was very much in a minority position.But once again, I was confirmed by Cardinal Fernandez, by Pope Francis himself, who said exactly what I was saying. So, you know, at the end of the day, I just had to point out to people, look, you’re not getting it. You’re clearly not on the side of what Pope Francis is saying and how he’s interpreting it, nor the person who wrote the document.So if you’re coming to a conclusion that they’re not coming to, you’re misreading it. And so even if I’m maybe in a minority position here, I’m on the side of the author and of the head of the Catholic Church, the Pope. And so, hey, I’ll stand.I’ll stand there. Despite the fact that I’m in a minority position and I’m getting a lot of pushback. And by the way, I do want to show you where Pope Francis did say that.”Bless the persons, not the union.” I did a show going over this a couple times, but he says, “not the union, but the persons naturally taking into account the context sensitivities, the places where one lives, the most appropriate ways to do it.”So, he says, “when a couple spontaneously approaches and asks for them, he is not blessing the union, but simply the people who together have requested it.” And again, this is not a blessing of approval, but rather, as paragraph 31 is going to note, a cry out to God for them to be purified of anything that is not in conformity with God’s commands. But again, I think the document could have been written better.As I’ve said a thousand times, hey, if Cardinal Fernandez had reached out to me in advance and said, “Michael, poke some holes in this, what do you think?” I would have said, “first of all, take out this language in paragraph 31, communicate what you’re trying to say there. Just take out that language.You’re just unnecessarily going to create a massive amount of misunderstanding in the media, because the media loves to just grab snippets, takes them out of context, and you’re just begging for that to happen.” So, I would say modify that and also “put in a little bit more of an emphasis of the need for repenting of sin.” There is a notion of repentance of sin in here, but it’s like, I think we need to focus on that a little bit more here, because there’s going to be so many people who try to take this out of context unless you offer that balanced approach.So I don’t like the way it was written in some areas. Other parts are good, but the document as a whole, it’s not how I would have suggested it having been written. But be that as it may, I wasn’t asked, right?So here we are. Okay, but if you want just a more thorough understanding of this situation, like I said, I did a whole playlist going over it in greater detail, going over every conceivable objection that you can think of. Don’t come to me and say in the comment section at the end of this video, “but, Michael, it says this”, “but, Michael, it says that”, “but, Michael, this and that.”Don’t even try it. Don’t even do it, because I have 60 videos on it already. I’ve already responded to your objection.I already thought of your objection before you thought of it, and I thought of it on the first day, and I responded to it on the first day that it was released. Be that as it may, most people didn’t watch the video. That’s okay.I responded to it multiple times afterwards. So if you come back in the comment section and say, “Michael, you misunderstood it,” or “Michael, but what about this”, or “but it says that”, stop yourself from doing that. Don’t do that.Go look in the playlist section and engage the content there, because I’ve already interacted with your objection. All right. Now, there is an article that was released that talks about this:”One year later, Vatican document on same-sex blessings not causing much of a stir”, it says. Well, you know what? I was ridiculed for pointing out that, in reality, I don’t think that this is really going to change anything, because practically what the document is saying was already things that priests were doing and could do.So it’s really not going to change a whole lot. People will say, “well, what’s the purpose of the document?” I’d answer that a million times, but to recap, again, to respond to the German bishops and to reemphasize a point that has already been made.When it comes to magisterial documents, most of the time you’re not coming up with something new. You’re responding to some recent controversy, or you’re reiterating some truth that has always been known. That’s usually what goes on in a magisterial document.That’s what goes on here. But I pointed out to people, look, I don’t think that this is really going to significantly change anything. And everyone in there, you know, everyone that you can imagine was just losing their mind thinking, “this is the end of the Catholic Church.”I saw Catholics and non-Catholics concluding “this is the end of the Catholic Church.” And it looks like one year later, I stand vindicated. We saw about maybe two or three abuses of Fiducia Supplicans blessings, maybe about two or three instances we saw in the public eye.But that was about it. The world did not end. The sky did not fall.And I want to point out all of those people who were yapping and talking and saying “this is the end of the Catholic Church”? Notice they’re not talking about it now, and they’re not saying anything about it now. Let me just point that out.All right. “One year later, not causing much of a stir”, the document says. It notes here: “around this time last year, a Vatican document authorizing priests to provide non-liturgical blessings for same-sex couples led to headlines around the world in the secular and Catholic presses.” And that’s unfortunately because most of the headlines were 100% false.And they were explicitly saying that the Vatican has now authorized blessings for unions of persons of the same sex. And I said, “no, it explicitly says you can’t bless the union.” It says that there in paragraph 5.It’s not talking about that. It’s not what it means by couple. And so we went through that over and over, but we saw that misleading headline from secular news and Catholic news, unfortunately.And we saw cardinals misrepresenting the document from cardinals on down. It was really unfortunate. In so many cases, it honestly looked like the cardinals and the bishops who were criticizing it, it really looked like they didn’t even read the document.Because when you listen to what they said, what they said was completely contradicted by what the text explicitly says. And so it was like, oh, I wonder if they didn’t actually read it, but they maybe just got somebody else to read it for them and give them a summary. And they gave them a bad summary of it.That seemed to be the case with many of them, which is unfortunate. But it says: “Around this time [last year], the Vatican document authorizing priests to provide non-liturgical blessings for same-sex couples led to headlines around the world. Some bishops from Africa rejected the pronouncement,some in Europe celebrated it, and bishops in various places issued guidelines explaining it.” That’s not entirely accurate. There’s a grain of truth to it, but not entirely accurate and somewhat misleading.I did go over all of the instances of the African bishops, and pretty much everyone who made a statement on it, I reviewed it in that playlist. And I showed that the African bishops were not rejecting the document, but some of them were saying “we can’t apply it in our diocese because there are some legal concerns with it.” So they weren’t rejecting it in principle, but saying “we can’t apply it.”And Fernandez and the Pope both came back and said, “yeah, okay, that’s understandable. You can’t outright reject the document. But what you could do is note that, well, there might be some impractical ways of doing this because of how our government is structured.”For instance, some places in Africa, it’s illegal to be a homosexual. And so if you’re having a blessing for a person who’s struggling with this, then that may then target them legally. And so for that reason, they said, “look, this just doesn’t practically work.”But there was so much misunderstanding there. So many people thought “the African bishops are standing up and they’re rejecting it.” It’s just like, yeah, no, that’s not actually what they were doing.Numerous African bishops were explicitly saying they’re going to implement it. But you did have a group of African bishops who came back and said “we can’t apply this because of our certain circumstances.” And the Vatican had no problem with that.Okay, so: “one year later, what has been the document’s effect on the Catholic Church in the United States? How common – or uncommon – are blessings of people in same-sex relationships and parishes?” Well, you know, I suspect it really hasn’t changed a whole lot because, like I said, this was already going on anyway.You know, blessing persons, not their union, but the persons in this situation, has been the case for a very, very long time. But it says: “to try to find out, the National Catholic Register, CNA’s sister news partner earlier this month contacted all 177 Latin-rite dioceses in the United States asking for their experiences with implementing the document, [Fiducia Supplicans,] which allowed what the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith called the ‘possibility of blessings for couples […] of the same sex,’ providing the blessings to be short, follow no liturgy to avoid looking like a wedding, and ‘not claim to sanction or legalize anything.'”So again, what’s being blessed? The persons, not the union. “Twenty-one dioceses responded.Some of those declined to comment. All who provided information said they don’t track blessings offered by priests; virtually none reported receiving either complaints or comments from priests or other people regarding practices stemming from the document.A year ago, supporters saw the document (which was followed by a clarifying statement two and a half weeks later) either as a useful pastoral approach to people in what the Church considers objectively sinful situations, or a step toward full endorsement of same-sex sexual relationships, which they welcomed.” Which, I do have to point out: Everyone thought that the Synod on Synodality was going to normalize it, and where are those guys now? I was telling you all along they do this every single time that the synod comes out.They lie to you every single time, and they say, “oh, the Church is going to approve this,” and “it’s going to do that,” and “the sky is falling,” and every single time it doesn’t happen. I’ve pointed it out, and for some reason, people keep falling for this stuff. And you’ll note: synod came and went, and all the stuff that people said “women’s ordination” and “gay marriage” and all that, none of that happened, did it?But all those people who are yapping, right, and they’re on YouTube explaining people for their money with the fear-mongering, all those people, where are they now? Yeah, interesting how when that document came out from the synod, you didn’t hear a peep from them. They didn’t come back and say, “sorry, guys, we got it wrong.We got it wrong.” Yeah, they didn’t do that. Interesting the way that works.By the way, thank you for this question here from a member from 17 months: “Any plans to get video transcripts on the R&T site?” Maybe, maybe.Right now, I’m still a one-man show, so I just do not have the time to do that, unfortunately. Okay, so it says: “some critics said it undermined church teaching on marriage and sexuality. Other opponents said it didn’t go far enough.”Well, you know, certainly it didn’t go far enough if you’re in favor of homosexual marriage, right? It certainly didn’t do that. Or if you want to maintain the view that homosexual acts are not sinful.Well, it didn’t go that far. It certainly didn’t. But some say that it undermined Church teachings.No, not directly, not directly. But you could say indirectly insofar as people misunderstood it. And insofar as it allowed people to misunderstand what is being said.In that sense, you could say. But the document in and of itself and what it affirms and denies doesn’t. In fact, it confirms church teaching on marriage and sexuality.The problem is most people don’t sit down and actually read it, let alone read it in context and in its entirety, and so it’s open to misunderstanding. It says: Father Darrin Connall told the Register that as vicar general of the Diocese of Spokane, Washington, he speaks with many priests regularly and that no one has told him about a same-sex couple asking for a blessing.”That’s interesting, right? Honestly, I did, again, say that I don’t think it’s going to be the disaster that everybody is claiming it’s going to be. I don’t think this is the end of the Catholic Church.But I did expect there to be more abuse of this document. I’m surprised there hasn’t been more abuse of this document. I wonder why that is.Like I said, we saw maybe about two or three instances that I covered here on the show where we saw some abuses of the document. But that was it. And I kind of have to ask, well, “why is that?”Why so few abuses? Because when everyone in the world is reporting that this is going to happen and now the Church is blessing sin, you would think that that would open the door for a ton of people to abuse the document. It’s interesting that that just did not happen.It continues: “‘I’m unaware of one case where that’s happened;'” that is, a same-sex couple asking for a blessing. “‘I haven’t heard a priest talk about it since last December, last January.’Bishop David O’Connell of the Diocese of Trenton, [New] Jersey, said he isn’t aware of any blessings of same-sex couples by priests in his diocese.” He says, “‘I don’t have any sense that it happened at all. It may have.But if it’s been done, it has been done clandestinely, and done without my knowledge.'” Well, that’s kind of part of the whole point, actually. The point of the document is for it to be spontaneous and for it not to be public.Why? Because if it’s being done publicly and visibly, then people are going to misunderstand it. And they’re going to think that the union is being blessed rather than the persons.So that might account for why we haven’t really heard a whole lot about it. That must mean that things are going the way that they should. “‘I’m certainly aware of what the document says.I’m aware of the boundaries, and I have no problem discussing them, but it just doesn’t come up,’ he said, adding that he hasn’t been asked personally to do such blessings. In the Diocese of Buffalo, New York,discussion about the document quickly died down after its release,” according to the vicar general. “‘There was initial discussion at the Presbyteral Council and other consultative bodies when the document was first issued but there have not been any follow-up discussions or requests'” for the document.”That mirrors the experiences of almost all other dioceses that provide comment to the Register. An exception is the Archdiocese of San Francisco.” [Noticeable pause and smirk] Right. “The city of San Francisco has the highest percentage of same-sex couples among large cities in the United States.’We’ve had some issues over the past year with people trying to insist that they be blessed in an illegitimate manner,’ [. . .] a representative of [Arch]bishop [Salvatore] Cordileone said by email. [Peter] Marlow shared with the Register excerpts from a memo Cordileone sent priests of the archdiocese a few days later” after “the Vatican document was released. In it, the archbishop said that such blessings must be ‘spontaneous’ and not ‘pre-planned, pre-scheduled, or ritualistically celebrated,'”which is why you shouldn’t be seeing any blessings of this, right? Because if people are recording it, that’s not really pre-planned, right? And that’s not spontaneous.”He noted in the memo to priests that priests and bishops ‘are frequently asked by people to give them a blessing.’ ‘I’m sure you, as I, never ask information about their moral lives or how they are living out their intimate relationships. We simply bless them,’ Cordileone,” the archbishop, “wrote. Consequently, in the case of two people who present themselves as a couple in a marriage or marriage-like relationship, but it is evident that they’re not in the bond of a valid marriage, it is always licit to bless them as two separate individuals.”Right. “But such blessings shouldn’t be given, he says [said], if it would [be a] cause [of] scandal,” and by the way, the document notes that.Fiducia Supplicans says that multiple times. This cannot be done in a way that would cause scandal. “‘if it would mislead either the persons themselves or others into believing that there may be contexts other than marriage in which “sexual relations find their natural, proper, and fully human meaning.”‘”So the archbishop has the proper understanding of the document. He’s saying, “look, you can’t do this in any kind of way that will make you think that it’s not the persons, but rather the union that’s being blessed. You can’t do that.””The last phrase in quotation marks is taken from Fiducia Supplicans (No. 4). “‘As a consequence, any priest has the right to deny such blessings, if, in his judgment, doing so would be a source of scandal in any way,’ Cordileone wrote.”And that’s again, paragraph 4, right here. So— and again, that’s also right next to paragraph five that explicitly says the union cannot be blessed. “Connell, of the Diocese of Spokane, told the Register that priests make judgment calls about blessings and many other things all the time.’There are all kinds of pastoral decisions that we make on any one day that [the] bishops respect[s]’. Fiducia Supplicans shifted the approach of a previous Vatican policy, as stated in the [a] document released in February 2021, which said that the Church can offer blessings ‘to individual persons with homosexual inclinations, but not to unions of same-sex couples because God does not and cannot bless sin.'” This is inaccurate.The person who wrote this is misleading you, unintentionally, I hope. But this is inaccurate. The document over and over, it does not shift the approach of the 2021 document.As I’ve showed you a thousand and one times, paragraph 5 and paragraph 11 confirm that same approach. It’s the confirmation of that same approach. One hundred percent.Explicitly. It even names that document. It confirms it.There’s no change in the approach. If you go back and read that original document of 2021, which I did with y’all a thousand times, and I have in that playlist, Fiducia Supplicans playlist, I showed you how there is language in that document that opens the door for what you have in Fiducia Supplicans. So the two are 100% consistent.There’s no shifting in any approach or anything else. So whoever wrote this here, that’s misleading. “Vatican officials have said the December 2023 document does not alter church teaching that sexual activity is moral only if engaged and by a man and a woman married to each otherwho are open to the possibility of procreating new life. ‘The real novelty of this declaration’, wrote [Cardinal Victor] Fernández, [===END TRANSCRIPT===]