POPE TO STOP CONDEMNING SAME-SEX CIVIL PARTNEERSHIPS HINTS LEADING CARDINAL IN MOVE WHICH COULD BE STEP TOWARDS CATHOLIC GAY MARRIAGE

Pope to stop condemning same-sex civil partnerships hints leading cardinal in move which could be step towards Catholic gay marriage

   Cardinal Timothy Dolan said the pontiff wants same-sex unions studied

   He said on U.S TV that Pope Francis wants to know what's driving them

By Hannah Roberts In Rome

PUBLISHED: 07:08 EST, 10 March 2014 | UPDATED: 09:14 EST, 10 March 2014

Pope Francis has suggested that the Vatican could support gay civil unions in the future, according to one of the church’s most senior cardinals.

Cardinal Timothy Dolan said that the pontiff wants the Catholic Church to study same-sex unions, ‘rather than condemn them’.

Cardinal Dolan told American television that Francis wants church leaders to 'look into it and see the reasons that have driven them.'

Pope Francis - pictured holding his weekly general audience on March 5, 2014, in Vatican City - wants the Catholic Church to study same-sex unions rather than condemn them
Debate: Archbishop Dolan said his own view was that gay unions could 'water down' the symbolic meaning of traditional marriage
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Debate: Archbishop Dolan said his own view was that gay unions could 'water down' the symbolic meaning of traditional marriage

'It wasn't as if he came out and approved them,' Dolan told NBC on Sunday.  'He said, “Rather than quickly condemn them, let's just ask the questions as to why that has appealed to certain people.”’

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In an interview to mark his first year in the church’s top job, Pope Francis last week reaffirmed the Vatican’s opposition to gay marriage but indicated that some types of civil unions could be acceptable to the church.

The Pope restated the church's teaching that 'marriage is between a man and a woman,' but added 'We have to look at different cases and evaluate them in their variety.'
Cardinal Dolan, pictured here with Barack Obama in New York in 2012, told American television that Pope Francis wants church leaders to 'look into same sex unions and see the reasons that have driven them'
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Cardinal Dolan, pictured here with Barack Obama in New York in 2012, told American television that Pope Francis wants church leaders to 'look into same sex unions and see the reasons that have driven them'

POPE FRANCIS' HISTORIC TRIP TO ASIA: PAPAL VISIT TO KOREAN PENINSULA FIRST FOR 25 YEARS

Pope Francis will make his first trip to Asia in August, visiting South Korea to participate in a Catholic youth festival, preside over a beatification ceremony for 124 Korean martyrs and bring a message of peace to the war-divided peninsula, officials said.

The August 14-18 trip announced Monday by the Vatican will be Francis' second foreign visit this year after his brief visit to Jordan, Israel and the Palestinian territories in May.

Francis told reporters last summer en route home from his first foreign trip to Brazil that he wanted to go to Asia because Pope Benedict XVI never managed to get to the continent, aside from a quick trip to Turkey in 2006.

The visit will mark the first time in 25 years that a pope has visited the Korean peninsula. Pope John Paul II last visited in 1989 and he canonized 103 Korean martyrs during a 1984 trip.

Francis last month cleared 124 other Korean martyrs for beatification and is expected to preside over the ceremony himself during the trip, South Korea's Yonhap news agency and the Vatican-affiliated missionary news agency AsiaNews reported.

Yohhap quoted Bishop Peter Kang U-il, president of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of Korea, as saying the visit will also help bring peace to the peninsula. The two Koreas have been in a near-constant standoff since an armistice ended the Korean War in 1953.

‘I think his choice of the divided Korean peninsula as the destination of his first Asian trip came out of his aspiration for peace on the peninsula and the rest of the world and his hope to pray together with Asian youths,’ Kang said, according to Yonhap.

Some countries justify civil unions as a way to provide the same economic and legal rights to cohabitating couples as those who are married, the Pope said in the interview with Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera.

As archbishop of Buenos Aires, the then Jorge Maria Bergoglio was one of the leaders of the Catholic Church's public charge against legalising same-sex marriage in Argentina. He called the proposed legislation ‘a destructive attack on God's plan’.

But behind closed doors the Argentine archbishop is said to have supported civil unions for same-sex couples.

Former theology professor and gay rights activist Marcelo Marquez said: 'He told me “I'm in favour of gay rights and in any case, I also favour civil unions for homosexuals, but I believe that Argentina is not yet ready for a gay marriage law”.’

But Francis’ comments are the first time that a Pope has indicated even tentative acceptance of civil unions, according to Vatican watchers.

Archbishop Dolan said his own view was that gay unions could 'water down' the symbolic meaning of traditional marriage.

'It's not something that's just a religious, sacramental concern,' Dolan said. 'It's also the building block of society and culture. So it belongs to culture. And if we water down that sacred meaning of marriage in any way, I worry that not only the church would suffer, I worry that culture and society would.'

Since being elected Pope last year Francis has softened the tone coming out of Rome. He told journalists that he would not 'judge' gays and lesbians including gay priests saying, 'If a person is gay and seeks God and has good will, who am I to judge?'

In recognition for the perceived change in stance Francis appeared on the cover of gay magazine The Advocate as their person of the year.


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