Vatican City – Pope John Paul II bitterly denounced the gay pride festival
in Rome as offensive to Christians and said Sunday that homosexual
acts are
contrary to natural law.
The pontiff spoke from his balcony overlooking St. Peter’s Square the day
after tens of thousands of people took part in an international gay pride
parade in Rome. The parade capped a weeklong festival the Vatican had
tried
to get canceled.
The Pontiff expressed what he called bitterness for the insult of having the
festival during the grand Jubilee of the year 2000 and for the offense to
Christian values in a city that is so dear to the heart of Catholics all
over the world.
The Roman Catholic Church is celebrating a Holy Year that has attracted
millions of pilgrims to Rome. One of Italy’s leading gay activists, Franco
Grillini, was swift to respond to the pope’s words, which state TV called a
sentence without appeal.
The true offense is homophobia and anti-gay prejudice fed by the Vatican
hierarchy, Grillini said in a statement. Sunday was the day dedicated to
incarcerated inmates, as John Paul visited the capital’s oldest prison. He
celebrated Mass for incarcerated murderers, thieves, rapists and drug
dealers, offering them his personal blessing.
Later, speaking to the faithful gathered in St. Peter’s Square, the pontiff
condemned the gay pride parade and reminded his listeners of church
teachings: Homosexual acts are against nature’s laws, he
said.
While condemning the lifestyle, the Pope said that homosexuals should
not be
the victims of discrimination and that gays should be treated with respect,
compassion, delicacy because homosexuality is a disorder, he
said.
The Vatican’s staunch opposition to World Pride 2000 opened a
Pandora’s box
of anti-gay feelings in Italy, much of it from the political right. However
it has also put gay rights issues on Italy’s public agenda for the first
time, mobilizing the gay community and winning it support and sympathy
both
at home and abroad.
World Pride organizers said they chose Rome for the festival in hopes of
opening a dialogue with the church. Instead it highlighted tensions
between
the two and between Italy’s secular and Catholic
establishments.
The respected daily Corriere della Sera, in a front-page editorial Sunday,
asked why the Vatican hadn’t dedicated a Jubilee day to gays, as it has to
so many other groups.
It would have been proof of a real ecumenism and rich generosity in this
year of pardon, the paper said.
Meanwhile the Rome daily La Repubblica, reminded readers Sunday that
the
church has not resolved the problems of pedophilia and homosexuality in
the
clergy.
The paper’s veteran Vatican watcher, Marco Politi, wrote that a report on
pedophilia among American priests prepared in April by the pope’s
guardians
of orthodoxy, the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, was sealed as
a
pontifical secret.
