Pope Francis approves blessings for same-sex couples — if the rituals don’t resemble marriage

ROME — Pope Francis has formally approved allowing priests to bless same-sex couples, with a new document explaining a radical change in Vatican policy by insisting that people seekin🧔g God’s love and mercy shouldn’t be subject to “an exhaustive moral analysis” to receive it.

T🐷he document from the Vatican’s doctrine office, released Monday, elaborates on a letter Francis  that wa🔯s published in October.

In that pre🃏liminary response, Francis suggested 🌞such blessings could be offered under some circumstances if they didn’t confuse the ritual with the sacrament of marriage.

The 🌞new document repeats that rationale and elaborates on it, reaffirming that marriage is a lifelong sacrament between a man and a woman.

And it stresses that ble𒅌ssings should not be conferred at the same time as , using set rituals or eve♋n with the clothing and gestures that belong in a wedding.

But it says re🍸quests for such blessings should not be denied full stop.

It offers an e✱xtensive definition of the term “blessing” in Scripture to insist that people seeking 🅰a transcendent relationship with God and looking for his love and mercy should not be subject to “an exhaustive moral analysis” as a precondition for receiving it.

“Ultimately, a blessing offers people a means to increase their trust in God,” the document said. “The request for a blessing, thus, expresses and nurtures openness to the trꦏanscendence, mercy, and closeness to God in a thousand concrete circumstances of life, which is 🦄no small thing in the world in which we live.”

He adde♒d: “It is ൲a seed of the Holy Spirit that must be nurtured, not hindered.”

The Vatican holds that marriage is an🐷 indissoluble union between ♊man and woman. As a result, it has long opposed same-sex marriage.

And in 2021, the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said flat-out that the church couldn’t bless the unions oཧf two men or two wome🔜n because 

That document created an outcry, one it a꧋ppeared e✃ven Francis was blindsided by even though he had technically approved its publication. Soon after it was published, he removed the official responsible for it and set about laying the groundwork for a reversal.

In the new document, the Vatican said the church must shy away from “doctrinal or disciplinary scಌhemes, especially when they lead to a narcissistic and authoritarian elitism whereby instead of evangelizing, one analyzes and classifies others, and instead of opening the door to grace, one exhausts his or her energies in inspecting and verifying.”

It stressed that people in “irregular” unions — gay o😼r straight — are in a state of sin. But it said that shouldn’t deprive them of God’s love📖 or mercy.

“Thus, when people ask for a blessing, an exhaustive moral analysis should not be placed as a precondition for confer✨ring it,” the document said.