The sin of homosexuality [here we are speaking of homosexual acts] is condemned in both the Old and New Testaments.* Saint Peter, our first Pope, in his Second Epistle, says:
"And reducing the cities of the Sodomites, and of the Gomorrhites, into ashes, God condemned them to be overthrown, making them an example to those that should afterwards act wickedly. And he delivered just Lot, oppressed by the injustice and lewd conversation of the wicked." (2 Peter 2: 6-7).
The sin of homosexuality has been condemned by Fathers and Doctors of the Church, and by the Popes, for 2,000 years. And with good reason, Saint Peter Damian [himself a Doctor of the Church] explains that the sin "should not be considered an ordinary vice, for it surpasses all of them in enormity." (The Book of Gomorrah).
The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us that: "Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that 'homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.'" (2357). Which is why, in his 1994 Angelus Address, protesting against a special resolution crafted by the European Parliament encouraging the nations of Europe to approve homosexual "marriage," Pope John Paul II said that, "What is not morally acceptable, however, is the legalization of homosexual acts. To show understanding towards the person who sins, towards the person who is not in the process of freeing himself from this tendency, does not at all mean to diminish the demands of the moral norm (cf. Veritatis Splendor, No. 95)...
But we must say that what was intended with the European Parliament's resolution was the legitimization of a moral disorder. Parliament improperly conferred an institutional value to a conduct that is deviant and not in accordance with God's plan...
Forgetting the words of Christ 'The truth shall set you free' (John 8:32), an attempt was made to show the people of our continent a moral evil, a deviance, a certain slavery, as a form of liberation, falsifying the very essence of the family." (See
here).
But Cardinal Francis George is now suggesting that respect for homosexual persons, which should consist of
an authentic charity which shows them the unnatural lie they have embraced and that they should view with horror the sin in which they find themselves, might mean changing the Church's teaching. As noted
here, Cardinal George asked, "Does respect [for homosexual persons] mean that we have to change our teaching? That's an ongoing discussion, of course."
Really? The Church teaches otherwise. The CDF has taught authoritatively that, "There are absolutely no grounds for considering homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even remotely analogous to God's plan for marriage and family. Marriage is holy, while homosexual acts go against the natural moral law. Homosexual acts 'close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved." (Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions Between Homosexual Persons, 4).
Cardinal George has also referred to the homosexual movement as the "gay liberation movement." But again, Pope John Paul II rebuked the European Parliament for presenting "a moral evil, a deviance, a certain slavery, as a form of liberation."
Why is Cardinal George suggesting that Church teaching may have to change and that this is an "ongoing discussion"? It would appear that he is succumbing to the darkness. Today there is a demand for sex without love,
for a licentiousness in sex which has wrought a heartless society in which individuals do not care for anyone but themselves. The fruit of this demonic theology is the slaughter through abortion and euthanasia of human beings created in the Imago Dei. It is a theology of violence which is rooted in hatred of truth. For at the heart of immorality is falsity, the hatred of truth. Fr. Vincent P. Miceli, in an essay entitled "
The Taproot of Violence," explains:
"...violence entered creation from the rebellion of Lucifer.
This rebellion arose from the heart of pride.
But the sin of pride is the offspring of the vice known as hatred of truth.
Hatred of truth is the result of the creature's attempt to rearrange God's hierarchy of beings and values into an order which the creature prefers to the plan of God. This attempt immediately produces the violence of disorder, the chaos of falsity and immorality.
For hatred of truth is really hatred of God who creates all things wisely and governs them lovingly. Lucifer, the Morning Star, was instantly deformed into the Prince of Darkness because he attempted to live a lie. He wanted to dethrone God and become God himself..."
* C.f. Gen 19: 1-19; Lev 18: 22; Deut 22: 5; 2 Pet 2: 6-7; Rom 1: 24-27; 1 Cor 6: 9-10, Jude.
