Cardinal Wilton Gregory: After 12 Years in the Church, and His Mistreatment of the L.G.B.T.Q. People
The first big decision of the pope was to choose the name Francis, after St. Francis of Assisi. In doing so, he signaled a desire to cast his lot with the poor and those on the margins. Few could have predicted that he would do more for one globally marginalized group — L.G.B.T.Q. people — than all his modern predecessors combined.
Francis, the official leader of the church for 12 years, moved the church to a modern perspective and greater acceptance of gay people. There’s no debating that. His efforts complemented his image as a refreshing counterpoint to Pope Benedict, who had resigned before the election of Francis and was portrayed as a stern moralist. The pope was not bound by ancient dogma. The pope is more in touch with today’s developments. The pope is warm and personable. God’s Labradoodle.
Those who doubt the effectiveness of his approach need only to look at the increasing number of L.G.B.T.Q. groups and retreats in many parishes, as well as prominent church leaders who have grown more vocal in their support — though still mainly in the West. In January, Cardinal Wilton Gregory, the archbishop of Washington, issued an apology for the church’s mistreatment of L.G.B.T.Q. people. For the Catholic Church’s Jubilee celebration in Rome this year, a Mass for L.G.B.T.Q. people was added to the Vatican’s official list of events.
That’s tough to get your head around in the abstract. It’s not easy if you have spent a lot of time in the church. I have — from my days as an altar boy through decades of journalism, including a 1993 book, “A Gospel of Shame,” about the church’s child sexual abuse crisis, and a stint covering the Vatican for The Times when I was its Rome bureau chief from 2002 to 2004.
When covering the church, I found myself across the table from a priest who recognized me as gay, communicated his unalloyed comfort with that, and spoke in a way that made me think he was gay as well. It was so easy, it moved but also puzzled me. His existence in the church seemed to be a mixed message to me.