The president of the German Bishops’ Conference, Georg Baetzing, has indicated that they will not stop blessing same-sex couples who are believers, contrary to Vatican guidelines, but has ruled out the possibility of schism.
«I will not take away the possibility for same-sex couples who believe and ask God’s blessing to be blessed,» the president of the German Bishops’ Conference assured at a press conference after his meetings with the Pope and the Roman Curia during the German prelates’ ‘ad limina’ visit to the Vatican.
The Vatican banned in February 2021 any ecclesiastical blessing of homosexual couples, as well as any rite comparable to marriage between a man and a woman. «God does not bless sin,» the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith noted in a document at the time.
In fact, the first to confront this question were the Belgian bishops, who officially asked the Vatican to contemplate blessing the union of same-sex couples and established that, in each diocese, a person dedicated to the pastoral care of homosexual persons was to be appointed. However, they made it clear that this blessing would be clearly differentiated from sacramental marriage.
Archbishop Baetzing has led this week the delegation of German bishops to explain to the members of the Curia the issues that have been addressed in the German Synodal Path that began to walk in 2019, before the worldwide convocation of the Synod called in 2021 by the Pope, and that was raised as a process in which German laity and religious, also bishops, debated proposals for change in the Catholic Church, some controversial, such as rethinking sexual morality on homosexuality or the female priesthood.
Baetzing responded to questions from journalists on whether he would prevent bishops and priests from continuing to bless homosexual couples after these meetings at the Vatican. After assuring that he would not prevent it he has pointed out that the Church must change. «It is a matter of transmitting the message of the Gospel here and now, and not always look to the past, even running the risk of a bruised Church,» he said.
However, he ruled out any risk of a schism after assuring that the Church in Germany «does not go it alone and will not make decisions that would only be possible in the context of the universal Church».
«CATHOLICS IN A DIFFERENT WAY»
«For none of the bishops schism is an option. We are and remain Catholics and we want to be Catholics in another way. These are things that are said from outside to scare and intimidate. We will never allow this to be attributed to us,» he clarified.
Nevertheless, he pointed out that the Church in Germany «wants to and must give answers to the questions that the faithful ask».
Likewise, he described the meeting with the Pope on Thursday as «encouraging» and thanked the members of the Curia for having «openly expressed the reservations that exist in Rome».
«I am also grateful that the concerns and opinions of our Episcopal Conference – on the whole range of issues – were heard,» he stressed.
The 62 bishops of the Catholic Church in Germany met with the heads of some of the Dicasteries of the Roman Curia in a meeting, without the Pope, which was moderated by the Secretary of State, in Cardinal Pietro Parolin, who in introducing the work recalled «the bond of communion and love that unites the Bishops among themselves and with the Successor of Peter», but also mentioned «the concerns that the Synodal Path awakens, indicating the risk of reforms of the Church and not in the Church». Parolin also warned of the risk of reforming the Church but not from within the Church.
Along these lines, both the Prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, Luis Francisco Ladaria, and the Prefect of the Dicastery for Bishops, Marc Ouellet, expressed «their concerns and reservations regarding the methodology, contents and proposals of the Synodal Way, proposing, for the benefit of the unity of the Church and her evangelizing mission, that the requests that have emerged so far be included in the Synod of the universal Church.»
