Editorial
Oct. 2, 2015 (LifeSiteNews) – The state of affairs in the Vatican is nauseating.
A few days ago, we were overjoyed to hear that the Pope met with Kim Davis, telling her to “stay strong” in her fight for natural marriage. The meeting brought back hope that the Holy Father sees and understands the struggles facing supporters of true marriage in America; that his concerns went beyond climate change, the death penalty and the arms trade.
Then it seemed very strange that Vatican officials would neither confirm nor deny the meeting. This was followed by an insult to Davis, with a statement distancing the pope from Davis, saying that her meeting with the Kentucky clerk was not a ‘real’ audience – and that the meeting “should not be considered a form of support of her position in all of its particular and complex aspects.”
Meanwhile, English-language attaché of the Vatican press office, Fr. Thomas Rosica, described what he labeled the “negative impact” of the pope's meeting with Davis and suggested that the pope may not have been properly briefed before the meeting.
Orthodox Catholics didn’t face just this confusing message, however. Earlier today, just hours after the Vatican press office threw Davis under the bus, came the news that Pope Francis met with a homosexual couple at the U.S. nunciature. In fact, the meeting with the gay couple was, according to the Vatican, “the only real audience granted by the Pope” at the Vatican embassy in D.C. That meeting, the Vatican said, was with Francis’ former student Yayo Grassi “and his family.”
Grassi, a former student of Pope Francis, told CNN that the Pope himself arranged the meeting with a personal phone call weeks ago. In contrast, Vatican English language spokesman Fr. Thomas Rosica said the pope’s meeting with Davis was arranged by the Nuncio to the USA. Other Vatican sources claimed to various media that the Pope was “blindsided” by the meeting with Davis, claiming the meeting was unknown to the Vatican and also to the U.S. Bishops conference, who would have opposed the meeting, according to a CBS source in the Vatican.
This is beyond the pale.
Good Catholics can have different approaches to poverty, immigration, war and even the death penalty, but not with regard to abortion and same-sex 'marriage.' The Kim Davis meeting can and should be seen as the Pope's most important meeting in America. Everything else he did and said paled in comparison to his support for religious freedom on marriage — support that the Vatican is now suggesting wasn’t really support for Davis after all, and that an audience with a gay couple was ‘real,’ whereas the Davis meeting was not.
Unbelievable.
It’s great that Pope Francis meets with people of all stripes. Like Christ, he must praise those suffering for the sake of ‘righteousness’ assuring them that “theirs is the Kingdom of heaven.” And when meeting with those steeped in sexual sin, like Christ he should be kind and forgiving and showing the ultimate mercy by having the courage to tell them “go and sin no more.”