The Advocate, a leading lifestyle magazine which actively promotes gay rights, has named Pope Francis its person of the year.
“If someone is gay and seeks the Lord with good will, who am I to judge?” is the quote that earned the pontiff the title.
The holy father’s made the statement during an interview with reporters in July on his way from Brazil to Rome.
The magazine cover features a photoshopped image of the pontiff with “NO H8” written on his cheek.
Pope Francis was selected ahead of nine leading personalities including Edie Windsor of the US Supreme Court’s Defense of Marriage Act case, whom the magazine refers to as “a hero to LGBT Americans for taking the final punch in the fight against the discriminatory Defense of Marriage Act”
Further justifying its choice, the magazine said the fact Pope Francis leads over 1.2 billion Catholics all over the world, makes a difference.
For The Advocate, Francis’s view on how the Catholic Church should approach LGBT people was best explained in his own words during an in-depth interview with America magazine in September.
“A person once asked me, in a provocative manner, if I approved of homosexuality. I replied with another question: ‘Tell me, when God looks at a gay person, does he endorse the existence of this person with love, or reject and condemn this person? We must always consider the person.””
The magazine notes that Pope Francis’s stark change in rhetoric from his two predecessors, both who were at one time or another among The Advocate’s annual Phobie Awards, makes what he’s done in 2013 all the more daring.
Source: The Advocate