Fr. Gerald E. Murray

The Flemish-speaking bishops of Belgium have issued a so-called blessing service for the union of homosexual couples. This imposture is obviously in complete contradiction to the Catholic Faith – an unholy parody of the blessing given within a Catholic marriage ceremony. It represents a manifest loss of faith on the part of these shepherds, who swore to uphold the Catholic Faith at the time of their episcopal consecration and have now publicly rejected that Faith by embracing what is offensive to God.

He created man and woman with complementary sexual faculties and commanded them to be fruitful and multiply. He also forbade them to misuse their sexual faculties by engaging in sodomy.

When a priest blesses a man and a woman who pledge their vows in marriage, he is calling upon God to favor them with His grace and strength to fulfill those vows. God’s favor does not, and cannot, rest upon two men or two women who pledge to violate His law by promising to sodomize each other.

Sodomy is a mortal sin that violates the natural order created by God through a grave misuse of the sexual faculty – a plain violation of the natural law, condemned in the Sacred Scriptures as a sin of grave moral turpitude.

The embrace of sodomy by these bishops is disgraceful. The prayer they suggest for the conclusion of the “blessing” ceremony runs: “God. . . .You know their hearts and the path they will take together from now on. Make their commitment to each other strong and faithful.”

God has already told us that He condemns the path that these two have embarked upon. Mortal sin is a path to Hell. A commitment to engage in mortal sin is a deadly pact that spiritually harms each person involved. Asking God to make this deadly pact “strong and faithful” is a diabolical perversion of the duty of the Church’s ministers to lead the sheep away from sin with the help of God’s grace.

Do these bishops think that God wants people to ask His help in violating His law?

What the bishops have done is stupefying. They’re false shepherds, leading their sheep astray into grave sin. They are confirming people in behavior that destroys souls.

The suggested “vows” include this incredible prayer: “We thank you that we could find each other. We want to be there for each other in all circumstances of life. We confidently express here that we want to work on each other’s happiness, day by day.”

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No thanks should be offered to God for finding an accomplice in mortal sin. God condemns mortal sin. He wants us to avoid both it and the near occasion of sin, which means we should shun unholy friendships that may lead to sin. Leading someone to commit sodomy will never produce happiness, but rather plunges the soul into the darkness and disorientation of separation from God.

The bishops attempt to justify their departure from the Faith by making the specious claim that homosexuals who “choose to live as a couple” have entered into a relationship that “can be a source of peace and shared happiness for those involved.”

Do the bishops really believe that violating God’s law brings peace and happiness? If they do, then they need to recognize their spiritual blindness and repent. They cannot pledge that they are faithful to Christ and his Gospel, and at the same time reject the Divine Law on sexual morality. If they will not repent, they should resign.

But we all know that they will not do that. They view themselves not as willful subversives working to overthrow Christian morality, but rather as bold prophets of a new, reworked Christianity in which sodomy is no longer sinful, but is rather part of God’s plan for Creation.

They describe homosexual unions as “life situations that do not fully live up to the objective ideal of marriage.” But sodomite unions are not “life situations” that happen outside of one’s control. They are a freely chosen way of life that in no way resembles marriage, but rather is a complete counterfeit. Marriage is not an “objective ideal,” in the sense of something one can strive for but which, in fact, only a few attain. Marriage is God’s plan for man and woman.

For these wayward shepherds, homosexual unions can be “the generous response one can give to God. . .the self-giving that God asks for amid the complexity of concrete restraints, even when the full objective ideal is not achieved.” This is nonsense, plain and simple. There is no “generous response to God” in violating God’s law and seeking to justify that violation by claiming that it is something that God allows and looks upon favorably.

The Flemish hierarchy has decided to launch a full-scale attack on the Catholic Faith under the guise of creating “a climate of respect, recognition and integration.” Their infidelity is in fact a clear example of disrespect to God and his law, and a refusal to recognize that law as being normative. Rather than promote the integration into Christ of those who are troubled with homosexual temptations, the wayward shepherds confirm them in a gravely sinful lifestyle by telling them that God approves of what they are doing.

Pope Francis is duty-bound to protect the flock from wolves, especially those who teach error with the authority given them by the Church when they were named bishops. The Catholic faithful need to hear from him that preaching error and immorality will not be tolerated.

The Catholics of Belgium need to be protected from their own bishops who are attempting to destroy Catholicism and replace it with a monstrosity of their own creation, a vicious system that promotes sin and thus separates man from God.

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The Rev. Gerald E. Murray, J.C.D. is a canon lawyer and the pastor of Holy Family Church in New York City. His new book (with Diane Montagna), Calming the Storm: Navigating the Crises Facing the Catholic Church and Society, is now available.

Images: *Sermon and Deeds of the Antichrist by Luca Signorelli,  1499-1502 [Chapel of San Brizio, Duomo, Orvieto, Italy]