(LifeSiteNews) — A report has revealed that the Vatican did not approve the German bishops’ guidelines for homosexual “blessings,” despite claims made by German bishops that suggested it did.
In April, the German Bishops’ Conference (DBK) published guidelines for “blessings” of homosexual “couples,” the divorced and civilly “remarried,” and other irregular unions.
The supposed blessings are meant to be an offer for “divorced and remarried couples, couples of all gender identities and sexual orientations, as well as couples who do not want to or cannot receive the sacrament of marriage for other reasons,” the guidelines stated.
Bishop Georg Bätzing, the head of the DKB, has insisted that the document was developed “in consultation” with the Dicastery of the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF). However, Bätzing had refused to answer journalists’ questions about what this “consultation” looked like.
A new report by the Catholic magazine Communio reveals that Bätzing’s statements were misleading, as internal communications between the DKB and the DDF indicate that the Vatican dicastery did not approve any version of the text. The prefect of the DDF, Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernández, argued that the German guidelines are not compatible with the declaration Fiducia Supplicans, as the Vatican document on same-sex “blessings” would allow only for spontaneous blessings and does not seek to “legitimatize” the relationship.
While Fernández’s document Fiducia Supplicans, which was approved by the late Pope Francis, has been heavily criticized as heterodox by many faithful bishops and other clergy members, it leaves enough ambiguity for its defenders to try to argue its compatibility with Catholic teaching.
READ: Cardinal Müller to German bishops: Same-sex ‘blessings’ are ‘diametrically opposed’ to will of God
However, the guidelines of the German bishops’ conference go a step further by including “couples of all gender identities,” and the proponents of the heretical German Synodal Way have explicitly departed from traditional Catholic moral teaching on sexuality.
According to Communio, the DKB sent a draft version of guidelines to the DDF, and Fernández suggested changes that the DKB implemented. However, the DDF was still not in agreement with the revised version and did not officially approve it.
Responding to a question from the Pillar at an October 8 press conference, Fernández confirmed the Communio report, stating that “the DDF didn’t approve anything [of the irregular unions’ guidelines], and wrote a letter some time ago reminding [the German bishops] that [Fiducia Supplicans] excluded any form of ritualization, just as the Pope has said.”
The heterodox German “blessing” guidelines were published as a “suggestion” and have no binding character, meaning that local bishops may decide whether or not to implement them. Due to this informal procedure, the majority of the German bishops likely hoped to avoid an official reprimand from Rome, while still implementing the practice of blessing couples in sinful relationships in most German dioceses. Bishop Bätzing had already implemented the “blessing” guidelines in his diocese of Limburg in July of this year.