Same-sex marriage: response to Carla Ryan's letter

Well done on publishing Carla Ryan's letter in response to the Bishop of Shrewsbury's Pastoral Letter. Many of us find her approach much closer to the pastoral spirit of Pope Francis's recent words on his return flight from Rio, that the position adopted by some of our Bishops.

A number of recent pastoral letters on the subject of same-sex marriage continue to promote inaccurate information about the impact of The Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013. Not all of us in LGBT communities are personally in favour of same-sex marriage, for a range of reasons, but neither do we wish to stand in the way of those who wish to enter this status. Inequalities remain, whether in the Civil Partnerships Act 2004, or the most recent legislation, evident in the fact that we now have both two separate pieces of legislation - the 1949 and 2013 Marriage Acts, as well as the Civil Partnership Act.

Carla Ryan shares with Pope Francis a non-judgemental, pastoral approach to lesbian and gay people, rooted in the often-ignored, but more positive elements of Church teaching. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith's 1986 'Letter to Bishops' stressed the duty of trying to understand the homosexual condition and noted that culpability for homosexual acts should only be judged with prudence. Lacking freedom, such a person, even if
engaged in homosexual activity, would not be culpable.

Here, the Church's wise moral tradition is necessary since it warns against generalizations in judging individual cases. In fact, circumstances may exist, or may have existed in the past, which would reduce or remove the culpability of the individual in a given instance; or other circumstances may increase it. (Section 8)

This is echoed in the Catholic Bishops of England & Wales' 1979 Introduction to the Pastoral Care of Homosexual People:

This must be the emphasis when discussing homosexuality; not just the imposing of a negative law. The support and guidance of the moral law is needed by everyone, whether they be homosexual or heterosexual but the moral
law is not merely a negative imposition: it is a positive means of encouraging a way of life which leads to true fulfilment ... Of course, pastoral care does not consist simply in the rigid and automatic application of objective moral norms. It considers the individual in his actual situation, with all his strengths and weaknesses. The decision of conscience, determining what should be done and what avoided, can only be made after prudent consideration of the real situation as well as the moral norm ...

Homosexuals have the same need for the Sacraments as the heterosexual. They also have the same right to receive the Sacraments. In determining whether or not to administer Absolution or give Communion to a homosexual, a pastor must be guided by the general principles of fundamental theology that only a certain moral obligation may be imposed. An invincible doubt, whether of law or fact, permits one to follow a true and solidly "probable opinion" in favour of a more liberal interpretation.

Would that those who are so quick to judge might show evidence that they not only understand the comprehensive sources of Church teaching, including that of our own Bishops and the late Cardinal Hume, but also evidence that they implement it in a just and non-discriminatory manner.

Martin Pendergast