KOCHI: There have been no amendments to the extant doctrine of the Catholic Church regarding familial life and homosexuality, the Kerala Catholic Bishops Council (KCBC) clarified on Thursday. The KCBC came out with a statement after Pope Francis’s support on ‘same-sex civil union’ was revealed in a documentary film on Wednesday.
“Media reports claiming that Pope Francis had upheld the institution of same-sex marriage in the documentary ‘Fransesco’ by director Yevgeny Afinivsky, are totally false and misleading. The Church does not discuss doctrines on religious issues pertaining to marriage and familial life through documentaries. Pope Francis had preached earlier too, that all those who belong to the LGBT community are also children of God, and deserve all humanitarian considerations and attention,” stated the KCBC statement issued by deputy secretary general, Fr Jacob G Palackappilly.
“The Church had adopted a similar stand in 1975, when the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued the document Persona humana (Human Person) dealing with sexual ethics. The Church is of the opinion that homosexual inclination and homosexual actions should be viewed separately,” he said in the statement.
The KCBC statement claimed that the news brought out in media that the Pope had sought equality under the law for families and homosexual civil unions, is false. “The Catholic Church does not acknowledge a civil union of same-sex lovers as a marriage. Many countries, however, have accepted these as civil unions. Pastoral services for people living in same-sex relationships are a subject of serious discussion by the Church. The Pope’s official stand is as per the ‘Amoris Laetitia’ Doctrine released by the Catholic Church after the Synod on family. There has been no change in the Pope’s stand on this issue. Media commission chairman of KCBC Bishop Joseph Pamplany makes it clear through this statement,” reads the KCBC statement.