I doubt very much that the Pope has read every word that Radcliffe has spewed forth, nor would I expect him to do so before appointing him to what is in fact a very inconsequential position. He is one of a group of people who talk to another group of people who might get around to writing something that very few people will bother to read and which carries very little weight.
I wouldn’t have made the appointment, but I know someone who attended Mass at Blackfriars while at Oxford, which may be more personal knowledge than the Pope had. The guy does have a reasonably impressive resume—not everyone has been head of a religious order numbering in the thousands—and if one is appointing him to the Vatican equivalent of bat boy, isn’t it more important to spend time elsewhere? I’d be much more concerned about the latest two appointments as auxiliaries in Brooklyn, but I’m not losing any sleep over that one either. (One was born in Poland, which is probably a good sign.)
It looks like he really said this.
I found the following below at
Women Priests, Gay Sex, and Communion for the Re-Married: Is Fr. Timothy Radcliffe an appropriate speaker for Flame2 Youth Conference 2015?
http://faithinourfamilies.com/2014/11/25/women-priests-gay-sex-and-communion-for-the-re-married-is-fr-timothy-radcliffe-an-appropriate-speaker-for-flame2-youth-conference-2015/
“...Fr Radcliffe also gave a keynote address to a US religious education conference, in which he was reported as saying: “We accompany people in friendship as they become moral agents. Let’s look at the gays. For some reason–I don’t actually understand why–it’s become a very hot topic in all the churches at the moment. It’s tearing the Church of England apart. It’s the cause of great dissension in our own church. Usually when we think about it, we ask, ‘What is forbidden or permitted?’ But I’m afraid I’m an old-fashioned and traditional Catholic, and I believe that’s the wrong place to start. We begin by standing by gay people as they hear the voice of the Lord that summons them to life and happiness. We accompany them as they wrestle with discovering what this means and how they must walk. And this means letting our imaginations be stretched open to watching Brokeback Mountain, reading gay novels, having gay friends, making that leap of the heart and the mind, delighting in their being, listening with them as they listen to the Lord.”...”