Pope Francis doubles down on homosexual blessings: ‘Not the union, but the people’ are blessed

( LifeSite )

Pope Francis defended the controversial text Fiducia Supplicans today, stating that blessings of same-sex couples do “not bless the union, but simply the people who together make the request.”

The Pontiff made his comments during a January 26 meeting with the plenary assembly of the Congregation (now Dicastery) for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF). Fiducia Supplicans emerged from that same body of the Roman Curia on December 18, having been written by the new CDF Prefect Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernández, and approved by the Pope. 

Speaking about “evangelization” and the sacraments, Francis closed his address by commenting on the hotly contested text. “The intent of ‘pastoral and spontaneous blessings’ is to show concretely the closeness of the Lord and the Church to all those who, finding themselves in different situations, ask for help to carry on – sometimes to begin – a journey of faith,” he said. 

The Pontiff doubled down on the arguments both he and Fernández have respectively made in the document and in their subsequent brief comments on it, stating that the blessing of two people together is not meant to condone the fact of the two people being together:

I would like to emphasize briefly two things: the first is that these blessings, outside of any liturgical context and form, do not require moral perfection to be received; the second, that when a couple spontaneously approaches to ask for them, one does not bless the union, but simply the people who together made the request.  Not the union, but the people — of course taking into account the context, the sensitivities, the places where people live and the most appropriate ways to do it.

The Pope’s defense of Fiducia Supplicans, and by extension its author Cardinal Fernández, follows widespread opposition to the text from bishops, cardinals, and bishops’ conferences around the world.