The Pope's comments on gender were made during a private meeting last week with bishops from Poland.

During the meeting Francis lamented children are being taught at school that gender can be a choice.

"Today, in schools they are teaching this [gender choosing] to children - to children! - that everyone can choose their gender."

"We are living a moment of annihilation of man as image of God," the Pope concluded.

The Vatican, Tuesday, released the transcript of the closed-door remarks.

Gender, transsexual issues and sexual reassignment surgery are receiving a great deal of attention and support in the media, schools, government and in health professionals today.

"The idea that one's sex is fluid and a matter open to choice runs unquestioned through our culture and is reflected everywhere in the media, the theater, the classroom, and in many medical clinics," writes Dr. Paul McHugh, former Chairperson of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

"It has taken on cult-like features: its own special lingo, internet chat rooms providing slick answers to new recruits, and clubs for easy access to dresses and styles supporting the sex change.

"It is doing much damage to families, adolescents, and children and should be confronted as an opinion without biological foundation wherever it emerges."

Opposition to Dr McHugh's stance is strong, with Transadvocate commentators saying he appears to selectively reading the literature to support his own agenda.

Source

• The Washington Post
• The Wall Street Journal
• Transadvocate
• Childhealing.com
• Image: Pixabay

At one end of the spectrum, Grand Mufti Shawki Allam, a leading religious leader in Egypt, has spoken up against violence against gay people.

According to a report in Mamba Online:

"Each person is equally inviolable," Allam said. "Even if we view homosexuality as a religious sin, that does not give anyone the freedom to injure another person in any way."

"Yes, it is religiously not allowed and not accepted practice in Islam. But that does not give anyone the right to hurt homosexuals or to take the law into their own hands," Allam said in an interview with the German publication Süddeutsche Zeitung.

He continued: "…even if we view homosexuality as a religious sin, that does not give anyone the freedom to injure another person in any way. Each person is equally inviolable. What happened in Orlando is totally unacceptable."

Allam's tolerance is not universal.

At a completely different end of the spectrum Ali Hammuda, a "radical" Muslim cleric in Wales, reportedly tells his followers that it's ok to have sex slaves.

Hammuda is an Imam at the Al-Manar mosque in Cardiff. He has been at this post since Nasser Muthana and Reyyad Khan, then 20, and teenager Aseel Muthana left for Syria in 2014.

Now the preacher has been secretly filmed telling a group of young Muslims it is acceptable to keep sex slaves and that the "end of days" is near.

Source

• Erasing 76 crimes
• Express
• Image: Pixabay

Archbishop Stephan Burger of Freiburg im Breisgau said the German bishops' conference "will revise" the ecclesiastical labor laws, according to a December 9 interview with the German news website Morgenweb.

He said the changes will be made in the interests of maintaining the Church's "credibility" in the eyes of the general public. Continue reading

The Pontiff made the comments in a wide-ranging interview by Argentine daily, La Nacion.

Addressing the turmoil his papacy is causing with conservative-minded groups, Francis says he's pleased the issues are in the open.

It's a "good sign" that there isn't "hidden mumbling when there is disagreement", he said.

Pastoral care of homosexuals

Asked about the Synod itself and especially about homosexuals, Francis said the Synod did not talk about same-sex marriage but how to accompany gay people.

"Nobody mentioned homosexual marriage at the synod; it did not cross our minds. What we did talk about was of how a family with a homosexual child, whether a son or a daughter, goes about educating that child, how the family bears up, how to help that family to deal with that somewhat unusual situation.

"We have to find a way to help that father or that mother to stand by their son or daughter. That's what the synod addressed. That's why someone mentioned positive factors in the first draft. But this was just a draft."

On the question of divorced and remarried Catholics, Francis said that these people are treated as though they are excommunicated and the Synod considered what door can the Church open to these people.

Divorce and remarriage

"In the case of divorcees who have remarried, we posed the question, what do we do with them? What door can we allow them to open? This was a pastoral concern: will we allow them to go to Communion?

"Communion alone is no solution.

"The solution is integration.

"They have not been excommunicated, true. But they cannot be godfathers to any child being baptized, mass readings are not for divorcees, they cannot give communion, they cannot teach Sunday school, there are about seven things that they cannot do, I have the list over there.

"Come on! If I disclose any of this it will seem that they have been excommunicated in fact!

"Thus, let us open the doors a bit more.

"Why cant they be godfathers and godmothers? 'No, no, no, what testimony will they be giving their godson?'

"The testimony of a man and a woman saying "my dear, I made a mistake, I was wrong here, but I believe our Lord loves me, I want to follow God, I was not defeated by sin, I want to move on.

"Anything more Christian than that?

"And what if one of the political crooks among us, corrupt people, are chosen to be somebody's godfather.

"If they are properly wedded by the Church, would we accept them? What kind of testimony will they give to their godson? A testimony of corruption?

"Things need to change, our standards need to change.

Personal life, Curia reform and Cardinal Burke

Francis also talked frankly about aspects of his personal life, the upcoming reform of the Vatican bureaucracy and the new position for Cardinal Burke.

Acknowledging that reforming the Curia is complex and will take a little longer than people might expect, Pope Francis confirmed the decision to transfer Cardinal Burke was decided long before the Synod.

"So it is not true that I removed him because of how he had behaved in the Synod", the pontiff said.

Sources

• The Independent
• Irish Times
• NCR
• Image: Modern Thrill

The bishops postponed the decision until April 2015 after a minority of conservative bishops resisted the change.

They were also impeded by a federal court ruling that supported current Church laws.

The Catholic Church is Germany's second largest employer and employees are required to adhere to lifestyles consistent with Church teaching.

Source

• Breitbart

It took two years for him to build up the courage to confide in his Catholic schoolmates that he was gay.

When college rector Gerard Tully gave the green light to same-sex partners being allowed to attend the school ball this year, Mr Go said he knew attitudes had changed.

Mr Tully said it was in line with the school's philosophy that every student was valued and supported for what they were.

"We make no apologies for the fact that we're a Catholic school and the gospel is at the centre of what we're about."

He was proud of Mr Go's achievements and success in receiving a scholarship to help with his tertiary studies.

"Johann's a fantastic young man who has made a positive contribution to school life, and we're all very happy for him receiving this award," Mr Tully said.

Source

• Stuff.co.nz
• Image: GABA

The idea that someone was a "homosexual" for life or had this feature as a permanent identity would have struck them as more than odd. In other words, "homosexuality", for which a word in Greek did not exist at the time (or in any other language until the late 19th century), was purely transitory. It appears that many of these mentoring relationships in ancient Greece were chaste and that the ones that were not rarely involved sodomy. Homosexual relationships between mature male adults were not accepted. This is hardly the idealized homosexual paradise that contemporary "gay" advocates harken back to in an attempt to legitimize behavior that would have scandalized the Greeks.

What is especially ironic is that ancient Greece's greatest contribution to Western civilization was philosophy, which discovered that the mind can know things, as distinct from just having opinions about them, that objective reality exists, and that there is some purpose implied in its construction.

The very idea of Nature and natural law arose as a product of this philosophy, whose first and perhaps greatest exponents, Socrates and Plato, were unambiguous in their condemnation of homosexual acts as unnatural. In the Laws, Plato's last book, the Athenian speaker says that, "I think that the pleasure is to be deemed natural which arises out of the intercourse between men and women; but that the intercourse of men with men, or of women with women, is contrary to nature, and that the bold attempt was originally due to unbridled lust." (Laws636C; see also Symposium of Xenophon, 8:34, Plato's Symposium, 219B-D). Continue reading

Sources

• MercatorNet
• Image: CathNews USA

The cardinal said that as a Catholic, respect for all was a matter of course and not something for which he should be rewarded.

Source: The Tablet

'Gary' explained that when he was 15, his parents took him to a place called Exodus International where a group leader would try to persuade participants of what an awful life they would have if they were gay'. His parents rushed him to the centre after finding gay porn in his room. He was so upset by the experience he later took to his wrist with a razor.

Gary was just 15; legally not even an adult.

Late last month California's state Assembly approved a bill prohibiting children and teenagers from undergoing GRT. The legislation prevents licensed psychologists and therapists from seeking to change the sexual orientation of children under 18.

But in Australia GRT of minors is unregulated — there are no age restrictions or safeguards for minors entering an ex-gay ministry. About ten ex-gay Christian ministries around the nation offer GRT counselling.

In an ex-gay ministry, often run out of a church-run function centre or cafe, homosexual attraction is treated like an addiction. Participants are given a range of techniques to help them deal with the 'affliction'. Group members have individual counselling sessions and meet in small groups to discuss the 'struggles' they have had that week in containing their urges — often to be told 'God forgives your sins' by the layperson who runs the group.

GRT is not recommended by any secular health organisation. Continue reading

Image: Stephen's Liberal Journal

Reports dubbed the pope's appointment of Cordileone as the "Bombshell by the Bay."

The incoming prelate of the city that thrust same-sex marriage onto the national stage has decried the "contraceptive mentality" of modern life.

Cordileone, a 56-year-old son of a commercial fisherman, is known to his supporters as a charming and brilliant defender of the faith.

The Los Angeles Times reported that the prelate is fluent in Spanish and Italian, and has been known to sing vintage TV theme songs in Latin and is a deep believer in a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.

Father Thomas J. Reese, a senior fellow at Georgetown University's Woodstock Theological Center, was quoted in the Times report that Cordileone's appointment "re-emphasizes the Vatican's concern, and the U.S. bishops' concern, about gay marriage."

"Even in a city like San Francisco, they're willing to appoint someone who … has a high state and national profile on this issue," he said.

Cordileone used to be bishop of Oakland diocese for three years where he said gays and lesbians who are in sexual relationships of any kind should not receive the sacrament of Holy Communion.

"If we misuse the gift of sexuality, we're going to suffer the consequences," he said, "and I firmly believe we are suffering the consequences."

Source

• Los Angeles Times
• Newser.Com
• US Catholic
• Image: Diocese of San Diego/LA Times

Australasian Anglican scholars responded to FUP with a collection of writings called Sexegesis: An Evangelical Response to Five Uneasy Pieces on Homosexuality, Gordon Preece being one of the co-editors.

He writes that "Sexegesis is literally exegesis or reading out from texts on (homo)sex. We argue that the Five Uneasy Pieces (FUP) advocating a revisionist reading of the Bible on homosexuality, do not - apart from Meg Warner and Alan Cadwallader's pieces - really do exegesis".

• Read Gordon Preece's article
• Image: Changing Attitude Australia

Rev Dr Gordon Preece is Director of Ethos: Evangelical Alliance Centre for Christianity and Society.

Cardinal Christoph Schönborn made his comments after allowing a gay man in a civil partnership, to remain on a parish council in Lower Austria. Continue reading

The warning will be read in 2,500 churches during Sunday Mass, and will also be co-signed by the Archbishop of Southwark, Peter Smith.

In appealing to wider society the archbishops will call marriage a "natural institution" with meaning beyond the confines of religion and a setting for secure relationships and the bringing up of children.

The letter has been sent to bishops throughout England and Wales and will be accompanied by a covering note encouraging an estimated 5 million church-going Catholics to sign the petition established by Lord Carey's Coalition for Marriage.

"The reasons given by our Government for wanting to change the definition of marriage are those of equality and discrimination," say the archbishops.

"Our present law does not discriminate unjustly when it requires both a man and a woman for marriage. It simply recognises and protects the distinctive nature of marriage."

"Changing the legal definition of marriage would be a profoundly radical step. Its consequences should be taken seriously now."

Calling a possible law change a "profoundly radical step" that would "gradually and inevitably" change society's understanding of the purpose of marriage, the archbishops say changing the definition of marriage "would reduce it (marriage) just to the commitment of the two people involved. There would be no recognition of the complementarity of male and female or that marriage is intended for the procreation and education of children."

"The roots of the institution of marriage lie in our nature," say the archbishops.

Sources

• The Telegraph
• Full transcript of Archbishop Nichols' statement
• Image: The Telegraph

Nichols has shrugged of recent criticism that Masses for homosexuals provide a platform for dissent from Church teaching, and he reaffirmed the Westminister diocese's pastoral provision for gay Catholics.

Rejecting complaints that the gatherings in Soho for weekly Mass encourage active homosexuals to ignore Church teachings, the archbishop said that he is taking steps to ensure that the ministry supports the Church's teaching and that the Masses "are not occasions for confusion or opposition concerning the positive teaching of the Church on the meaning of human sexuality or the moral imperatives that flow from that teaching, which we uphold and towards which we all strive."

The pastoral provision, known colloquially as the "Soho Masses", has attracted criticism since it was established in February 2007 by the archbishop's predecessor, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor.

Earlier this month a short video of the bidding prayers at one of the Masses was posted on YouTube. Critics claimed that the prayers challenged Catholic teaching on homosexuality - a claim denied by the organisers.

"As we approach the fifth anniversary of the establishment of a pastoral provision for Catholics of a same-sex orientation at the Church of Our Lady of the Assumption, I would like reaffirm the intention and purpose of this outreach," said the archbishop.

Nichols outlined three essential and consistent foundations of the practice:

• the dignity of all persons created by God,
• the moral principles concerning chastity and the Church's teaching on sexual activity, and the pastoral care of Catholics who are of same-sex orientation, and
• all who participate in the Mass are called to live the church's teaching through an ongoing conversion of life.

The Soho Masses Pastoral Council, the group who organises the masses say that as a result of the archdiocese's outreach, an increasing number of gay Catholics had returned to the practice of the faith.

"The Masses offer us a warm, joyful and inclusive occasion to share in communion with each other, with our families and friends, and with the whole Church, secure in the knowledge that we, too, have our place at the Lord's table," the group said.

Sources

• Catholic Herald
• Image: Lego Rainbow Catholic Rosary

Murray is the executive director of the Rainbow Sash Movement, which advocates for acceptance of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Catholics within the church.

Through a post issued today on Rainbow Sash's blog, its board of directors state that Murray has challenged Dolan, president of the U.S. Catholic bishops' conference, "to meet him in the public square at any Catholic university in the United States to debate gay marriage. Such a debate will not only be informative, but could highlight reason over homophobia."

The archdiocese is aware of the request, but is unlikely to respond.

The Gawker report, written by former Miami New Times contributor and theatre critic Brandon K. Thorp, gathers information from an intensive investigation by a group of South Florida Catholics calling themselves "Christifidelis."

If Gawker's claims are to be believed, Favalora stands accused of

• liking attractive young men to sit on his lap
• allegedly treating them to trips in the Florida Keys
• being part owner of a company that makes Yohimbe, an "all natural" erection-inducing beverage.

Christifidelis maintains Favalora cultivated a "homosexual super-culture" throughout the 195 churches, schools, missions, seminaries, and universities in the Miami Archdiocese by

• rewarding his favourite homosexual 'sons'
• forgiving his 'favoured sons' many indiscretions—rampant sex, hedonism, embezzlement, alcoholism
• railroading chaste priests and
• punishing those with the temerity to complain.

The Christifidelis report is cheekily titled "Miami Vice," and in 2005 they undertook an extensive investigation of priestly misbehaviour in the Archdiocese.

Christifidelis believe their findings resulted in Archbishop Favalora's early retirement last year, and his replacement by Thomas Wenski.

The leader of Christifidelis, an attorney named Sharon Bourassa, declined to comment, but it did not stop Gawker releasing portions of "Miami Vice" to the public.

Sources

• Catholic Culture
• Gawker (warning some explicit images)
• Gawker - "Full Miami Vice" report
• Miami Times News
• CathNews USA
• Catholic Exchange

"I think for a lot of Christians, they want to have a fight and they choose sexual orientation as the ground. I think that whole argument isn't about the rights of Christians. It's about politics, the "equality boss" told the Sunday Telegraph.

Phillips believes Christians would be better to focus on issues such as gambling or human trafficking which offend Christian values.

"I think the most likely victim of actual religious discrimination in British society is a Muslim but the person who is most likely to feel slighted because of their religion is an evangelical Christian."

"There are a lot of Christian activist voices who appear bent on stressing the kind of persecution that I don't think really exists in this country."

"There are some Christian organisations who basically want to have a fight and therefore they're constantly defining the ground in such a way that anyone who doesn't wholly agree with them is essentially a messenger from Satan."

He said that all religious groups should obey anti-discrimination laws because they are charities providing a public service.

But the equality campaigner also believes that the state should not interfere in religious organisations.

"It's perfectly fair that you can't be a Roman Catholic priest unless you're a man," he said. "It seems right that the reach of anti-discriminatory law should stop at the door of the church or mosque."

Sources

• The Mirror
• The Telegraph
• Image: The Telegraph

"It's not a happy place to be at the moment - and there is growing unrest that the show is losing its way," said one actor who wishes to remain anonymous.

The soap, in Britain, currently features two lesbians, four homosexual men and a transsexual.

Former Corrie star Nick Cochrane, who played Andy McDonald, said: "It's unrealistic. Would one road in a working class area generally produce that number of gay people?"

"I've got plenty of gay friends", he explained, "but they don't all live in a street full of gay people. How many streets in Britain would have schoolgirl lesbians, gay married couples, a transsexual and children to gay couples? It is a little bit far-fetched."

He said the soap was not "the right platform to highlight so many gay issues all at the same time".

And Corrie legend Jean Alexander, 85 - who played Hilda Ogden for 23 years - has said three homosexual storylines is "excessive".

Glenda Young, long time fan and writer of Corrie.net, said she has been a fan for as long as she can remember but that she's not enjoying it any more. Not now, not for a while.

"It's gone downhill and I know it'll come back up but it's so blinking dull at the minute. I've been doing things I've never done before while Corrie's been on TV, like walking out of the room or worse still, changing channels."

The soap has attracted controversy regarding its storylines since homosexual producer Phil Collinson joined the programme last year.

He told The Sun in December that it is "an amazing platform" that really makes "a difference to the way people think.

"What's transmitted on Monday night people talk about in pubs, clubs and at work the next day," he said.

"You can really make a difference to the way people think - and this show has always had a gay sensibility."

Sources

• Digital Spy
• The Christian Institute
• STV - Entertainment

Over 150,000 people signed an online petition demanding that Apple remove the Exodus International iPhone app which claimed to help people with unwanted same-sex attraction to live a life congruent with biblical teaching.

In a statement released on their website, Exodus International said Apple originally gave the App a 4+ rating, but has caved in to the gay activist groups who launched a petition to remove it.

"We are extremely disappointed to learn of Apple's decision to deny equal representation in the public square," said Alan Chambers, president of Exodus International. "Discrimination of thought and belief obstructs essential dialogue and authentic diversity," said Chambers noting that Apple provides hundreds of apps specific to the GLBT community and has made the Gay Christian Network's podcasts available on its iTunes store.

"Ultimately, this issue comes down to what we, as a culture, believe about equality and the freedom to express our beliefs," said Chambers. "It is our hope that Apple will reconsider its decision and allow our organization to be part of the ongoing conversation about the challenging issues many face today."

Apple spokesman Tom Neumayr confirmed the App's removal from the App Store because "it violates our developer guidelines by being offensive to large groups of people."

TWO and Change.org both praised Apple today.

"Apple made a wise and responsible decision to dump an offensive app that demonized gay and lesbian people," Wayne Besen, executive director of Truth Wins Out, said in a statement. "The real winners today are LGBT youth who are safer and less at risk for receiving Exodus' malice and misinformation."

Exodus International is an interdenominational not-for-profit Christian organization, founded by Michael Bussee, Gary Cooper, Frank Worthen, Ron Dennis, and Greg Reid. The free App encouraged people to read prescribed reading material, attend events and to donate to Exodus International.

Sources
Exodus International
Truth Wins Out
cnet News