Pope Francis has amended the Catholic Church laws so that women may be Bible readers at Mass, serve at the altar and distribute communion — practices already common in many countries.
In a wide-ranging interview, the head of the German bishops' conference called for far-reaching changes to the Catholic Church and criticized the Vatican's treatment of the church in his country.
Pope Francis has called in a new documentary for the creation of civil union laws, giving his clearest support to date for the rights of same-sex couples while breaking from the official teaching of the Roman Catholic Church.
Pope Francis has received a group of Italian parents with LGBT children, who presented the pope with the Italian edition of a new book filled with the stories of such Catholic families. An English edition of the book is due to be released by New Ways Ministry in October.
Much progress has been made in attitudes towards sexual equality and gender identity – but in many places a dramatic backlash by conservative forces has followed.
To link homosexuality and pedophilia is a “great injustice” and a “criminalization” of gay sexual and affective identity, a key Vatican official has insisted
“The throwaway culture, combined with other psycho-social phenomena widespread in welfare societies, is showing a serious tendency to degenerate into a culture of hatred.”
During the fourth-century, Sergius and Bacchus, two inseparable Syrian soldiers in the Roman emperor Galerius’ army, were outed as secret Christians when they refused to pay homage to the god Jupiter.
Critics and supporters of the Vatican’s latest document on gender and sexuality may find little common ground on the issue, but they can agree on this: The church needs to further a dialogue about transgender individuals.
