Posted on 03/11/2014 8:18:59 AM PDT by BlatherNaut
When Pope Francis encourages compassion for those judged and excluded by the church, I can't really include myself among those alienated masses. I'm not gay. I'm not a woman. I'm not divorced. But he speaks to me as a lifelong Catholic estranged from a hierarchy too often in conflict with what seem to me to be basic Christian values.
True, Francis has not changed the policies that perpetuate the discrimination I find so objectionable.
What he is changing is the way we relate to one another, shifting emphasis from the doctrine of the church to the message of the Gospel.
The argument that his papacy is more about tone than substance fails to grasp the power of his bully pulpit. By focusing on ways we might make room for one another -- as opposed to issuing directives that defend the rules and close the ranks -- Francis is laying the foundation for a church quite different than the one led by his most recent predecessors.
-snip-
Before moving to Boston last year, my wife and I had been without a parish for several years as a result of our failure to find a church home we found nourishing.
What excites us about our new parish -- The Paulist Center on Beacon Hill -- is the community it fosters within its walls and the welcome it extends to everyone else.
(Excerpt) Read more at ncronline.org ...
“Not a word of the Catechism has been changed about homosexuality or will be changed. It is an intrinsic disorder and to practice it is a sin.”
I’m a Protestant and I hope the RCC does not change on this issue. It would negatively affect all of us, Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox alike.
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