ROME (AP) – Pope Francis became the first pontiff to support same-sex civil unions in comments to a documentary premiered on Wednesday, sparking cheers from gay Catholics and seeking clarification from conservatives, on the issue of the Vatican Given the official teaching of.
Popel Thums-Up came to the middle via the feature-length documentary “Francesco”, which premiered at the Rome Rome Festival. The film, which features a fresh interview with the Pope, addresses Francis’ issues, including those most affected by the environment, poverty, migration, racial and income inequality, and discrimination.
“Gay people have the right to remain in the family. They are children of God, ”Francis said in one of his interviews for the film. “You cannot get someone out of the family, nor can you make your life miserable for this. We have a civil union law; In this way they are legally covered. “
Serving as Archbishop of Buenos Aires, Francis supported civil unions as an alternative to same-marriage for gay couples. However, he had never publicly come out in favor of civil unions as a pope, and there had not been any pontiff before him.
The Jesuit priests, who have been at the forefront of seeking to build bridges with homosexuals in the church, praised the pope’s remarks as “a major step forward in support of the church for LGBT people.”
Martin said in a statement, “The pope’s speaking of civil unions also carries a strong message for the church where the church has opposed such laws.”
However, the Orthodox Bishop of Providence, Rhode Island, Thomas Tobin, immediately called for clarification. “There is a clear contradiction in the Pope’s statement that there has been a long-standing teaching about same-sex people in the church,” Tobin said in a statement. “The Church cannot impartially support acceptance of immoral relationships.”
Catholic teaching recognizes that homosexuals should be treated with respect and respect but homosexual acts are “intrinsically disorganized”. A 2003 document from the Vatican’s Office of Doctrine states that the Church’s respect for homosexuals “cannot lead in any way to the approval of homosexual behavior or the legal recognition of homosexual associations.”
Doing so, the Vatican argued, would not only denounce “devious behavior”, but would create an equality for marriage, which the Church believes is an untouched union between man and woman.
That document was signed by Cardinal Joseph Retzinger, future Pope Benedict XVI and Francis’ predecessor.
One of the main characters in the documentary is Juan Carlos Cruz, a Chilean survivor of sexual harassment whom Francis initially maligned during his 2018 trip to Chile.
Cruz, who is gay, said that during his first meeting with the Pope in May 2018, he patched things up, with Francis assuring him that God had made Cruise Gay. Cruise told his own story in snippets during the film, explaining Francis’ development to understand sexual abuse as well as documenting the Pope’s views on gay people.
Director Evgeny Afiniewski had notable access to the Cardinal, the Vatican television archives and the Pope himself. He said that he negotiated his way through perseverance and Argentinean companionship tea and alfajorous cookies, which he got for the Pope through some well-connected Argentines in Rome.
“Listen, when you’re in the Vatican, the only way to get something is to break the rules and then say, ‘I’m sorry,'” Afinewski said in an interview before the premiere.
The director worked on official and informal channels in early 2018, and became so close to Francis by the end of the project that he showed the Pope the film on his iPad in August. The two recently exchanged Yom Kippur greetings; Afineevsky is a Russian-born Jew based in Los Angeles. On Wednesday, Afinevski’s 48th birthday, the director said Francis presented him with a birthday cake during a private meeting at the Vatican.
But “Francesco” is more than a biopic about the Pope.
Wim Vendors starred in the 2018 film “Pope Francis: A Man of His Word”, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. “Francesco,” is a visual survey of the world’s crises and tragedies, with possible ways to resolve them by the Pope.
Afinevsky, who was nominated for an Oscar for the 2015 documentary “Winter on Fire: Ukraine Fight for Freedom”, traveled the world to film his Pope film: settings include Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh where Myanmar’s The Rohingya sought refuge; US-Mexico border; And Francis, a native of Francis.
“The film reverses the cameras, telling the Pope’s story,” said Vatican communications director Paolo Ruffini, who was one of Afinevsky’s closest Vatican-based colleagues on the film.
Ruffini said that when Afinevsky first approached him about a documentary, he tried to lower his hopes for the Pope’s interview. “I told him it wasn’t going to be easy,” he said.
But Ruffini gave him some advice: the names of those who were influenced by the pope, even after just a brief meeting. Afinevsky found him: Refugee Francis met with some of his foreign travels, was blessed by prisoners, and some homosexuals whom he has made ministers.
“I told him that many of those encounters were definitely filmed by Vatican cameras, and there he would find a veritable gold mine that tells a story,” Ruffini said. “He will be able to tell the Pope’s story through the eyes of all and not only his own.”
Francis dates back to his first overseas trip in 2013, when he uttered the famous word “Who to judge, I” when asked about the priestly homosexual priest during an air passenger conference returning home from Rio de Janeiro.
From then on, he served for gay and transsexual prostitutes, and welcomed people into his inner circle in homosexual participation. One of them was his former student, Yao Grassi, who along with his partner met Francis during the Pope’s 2015 visit to the Vatican’s Washington DC embassy.
The Vatican publicized the encounter, making videos and photographs available, during the same visit by Francis to his then ambassador, Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, who was invited by anti-gay activist Kim Davis to meet the pope.
News from the Davis audience made headlines at the time and was viewed by conservatives as a papal stamp of approval for Davis, who went to prison for refusing to issue a same-sex marriage license. While the Vatican strictly sought to reduce it, a Vatican spokesman said the meeting was not in any way a sign of Francis’ support for her or his position on gay marriage.
However, former Cardinal George Mario Bergoglio was opposed to gay marriage when he was a radical of Buenos Aires. Then, he recalled gay sex workers as a “war of God” against Argentina’s move to approve same-sex marriage.
Pope’s authorized biographer Sergio Rubin said at the time of his 2013 election that Bergoglio was politically wise enough to know that the Church could not win a straight fight against gay marriage. Instead, Rubin said, Bergoglio urged his fellow bishops to advocate for gay civil unions.
It was not until Bergoglio’s proposal was shot down by the Orthodox Bishops’ Conference that Bergoglio publicly announced his opposition, and the church lost the issue altogether.
Francis, in the new documentary, essentially confirms Rubin’s Transparent account. Regarding his belief in the need for legislation to protect homosexuals living in civil relations, he said: “I stood up for that.”
Francis DeBernardo, executive director of the Ministry of New Ways, an organization of LGBT Catholics, praised Francis’ comments as a “historic” change for a church that holds a record of persecuted homosexuals.
“At the same time, we urge Pope Francis to apply the same logic to recognize and bless these same unions of love and support within the Catholic Church as well,” he said in a statement.
However, more conservative commentators sought to play Francis’ words down, saying that while secular civil unions are one thing, the blessing of one of those churches is quite different.
In a tweet, conservative American author and commentator Ryan Anderson said that he and some of his colleagues went on record a decade ago that they would support federal civil unions for two adults who are committed to sharing domestic responsibilities. Such an arrangement, Anderson said, would leave churches with the option of refusing to recognize these unions as marriage.
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