Vatican City, Oct 23, 2015 / 02:27 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- With the pastoral care of homosexual persons on the agenda of the Synod on the Family, one man with same-sex attraction has appealed to the synod fathers to protect the Church's teaching on this issue. “I would love (the synod fathers) to know that we exist, that we are so concerned that culture is going to change the truth in the Catholic teachings about same-sex attraction,” said Paul Darrow in a recent interview with CNA.   Paul, whose story is featured in the 2014 documentary Desire for the Everlasting Hills, produced by the Courage apostolate, had given his testimony at an Oct. 3 conference aimed at reaching out to bishops preparing for the Synod on the Family. As he recounts in the documentary, Paul had become involved in the New York City gay scene in the 1970s, working as an international fashion model. After years of moving from one partner to the next, maintaining hatred for the Catholic Church, he settled in Sonoma County with his partner, Jeff. He attributes his ultimate conversion to Catholicism to Mother Angelica after coming across one of her programs on EWTN. He is now a member of Courage, an apostolate which offers pastoral support for men and women with same-sex attraction. Courage organized the Oct. 3 event, and is active in prison ministry and the pro-life movement. The question of homosexuality has arisen several times over the course of the three-week Synod on the Family, which wraps up later this week. Running from Oct. 4-25, it is the second and larger of two such gatherings to take place in the course of a year. Like its 2014 precursor, the focus of the 2015 Synod of Bishops is the family, this time with the theme: “The vocation and mission of the family in the Church and the modern world.” Paul Darrow spoke to CNA about the Synod on the Family, homosexuality, and his conversion to Catholicism. The text of the interview is below:What do you want to communicate to the Synod Fathers? Paul: In a nutshell I would love to communicate to them that there is a group of Catholics, men and women, who care so much about the Lord that they seek in every way to follow the Lord’s teachings: A group with same-sex attraction. And this particular group – many of us are Courage members – who love God so much, we’re not asking for him or for the Catholic Church or for the Synod to make any changes regarding the teachings on same-sex attraction. Having lived that lifestyle for a lifetime, I’ve been at other places in my life where I would have loved to say: Well, it would be great if same-sex marriage was accepted by the Church; it would be great if they would not have a problem with people who are not monogamous; or it would be great for the Church to accept promiscuity… I would love (the Synod fathers) to know that we exist, that we are so concerned that culture is going to change the truth in the Catholic teachings about same-sex attraction.Having been informed by your past experiences, what does it now mean for you to love another person? Paul: When I was six years old, I thought I was in love with Linda Dixon. We promised that we would marry each other. When I was 13 years old, I was in love with another girl. But, I also really liked these guys. So, as we all know, who we loved at 15 or 14 or 13, in a lot of cases, in most cases – although there are exceptions – we weren’t really mature enough to understand what love really meant. So, having lived the homosexual lifestyle in a very promiscuous, self-indulgent, self-serving way, I thought I was in love with so many men. I realize now that it was of course the conquest, because as soon as a man loved me back, I was looking for another man. It was an immature love. I’m not saying in any way that people with same-sex attraction are immature. But I’m saying: basing love, as much as it is in the homosexual lifestyle, as much as it is based on sexual intimacy, makes it immature. Now that I’ve opened my heart to Jesus and have become a devout Catholic, I realize I wasn’t even capable of loving anyone except myself. I realize in hindsight that, when I was a child I knew true love. I really knew how to love somebody, like my mother. But, that type of ability to really be able to love somebody evaporated when I fell into the same-sex attraction lifestyle of just using people, and manipulating them. I had a manipulative type of love. I loved them as long as they would think I was wonderful, as long as they would do what I wanted to do. Again, that wasn’t love. Now, my love has changed. …Now when I (do prison ministry), I literally love these men as human beings, because so many of them were in a situation that so many of us could be in if we had just followed our desires just a little bit more. I just understand now what love is. My heart was really closed to true love, to real love, selfless love, until I realized that Jesus had selfless love for me. That changed everything.Groups like Courage offer pastoral care to persons with same-sex attraction in the context of the Church’s teaching on chastity. However, there are other groups who believe pastoral care should include support for those living in homosexual relationships. What impact does this latter approach have, especially on young people who are still unsure about their sexuality? Paul: A word comes to my mind, and it’s counter-culture... (which) means, going against the culture. Some (of these other groups) I’m familiar with. I’ve been part of some of those groups before I came to the Catholic Church, many years ago. I call these other groups “counter-Catholic.” Each one of those groups, as I look at them, are asking the Catholic Church to do something that is for their benefit – not for their spiritual benefit; not for their spiritual growth – rather, simply because it’s a worldly thing they want to have incorporated into the Catholic Church. Some of these groups would like to have gay marriage approved by the Catholic Church, because they feel: We’re together, we love each other, etc. They just want it to be sanctified by the Church. They’re requesting something that makes their life easier. They’re not requesting to carry a cross, like husbands and wives who are faithful to the Church have to do every day; carry a cross for their children, put their children’s benefit before their own out of love for their children; put their wives’ needs before their own because of their love for their wives, etc. From my experiences from these types of groups, they just want us to change for them. The thing that amazes me is that there are so many churches that have given in since Martin Luther’s time. There are so many churches that accommodated people’s desire to not follow the teachings of the Lord. I think I would prefer that they go to other churches, and change the other churches. They’d probably have better luck at it, because the other churches seem to cave in more easily... whereas our Church has been true for thousands of years to truth. If that were to change, many people (like myself) would be so devastated, because then it takes the truth out of our Church, and our Church wouldn’t be the Church that we love.Many among the millennial generation, including otherwise devout and well-formed Catholics, have a difficult time understanding why the Church teaches what it does on the question of homosexuality. Based on your life experiences, having lived this lifestyle, why do you think younger people have such a difficult time? Paul: It’s the younger people, but it’s also the parents, the cousins, some of the sisters and brothers, the whole family unit. When someone comes to a family, especially a young person, and says: “I have this thing that is different, and I want you to accept it, it’s the way I want to live because I was born that way,” the family caves in because they love their children so much. Even if it isn’t in their own family, they know children like that in other families, and they will think: What’s so bad about that? Why can’t the Church just accommodate them? They’re good people. I know them. They take care of my grandmother. They feed my dog. They bring me things when I need help. But again, it’s one of those situations that has nothing to do with truth. Where do you stop going down that slippery slope? You could be one step away from saying: We want to be able to have abortions. We want to be able to have birth control. All of these things are about human desire. But the value of life, and the purpose of a man and a woman, the purpose of marriage, the purpose of the Temple of the Holy Spirit being our body, those things aren’t changing. It’s communication. They need to hear it from people who do understand, who can speak about it. People like myself who’ve lived both sides. If they only knew how much we love them!What message would you give to a young person struggling with their sexuality, perhaps having dappled in the lifestyle? Paul: (It depends) if they were a Christian, if they were Catholic, if they believed in God. I heard a very wise priest once, who's a theologian at a Catholic university. Someone asked him a question: “A lot of these fellows are older; these women and men who are living these chaste lives. I’m 22 years old. Are you telling me that I have to go an entire lifetime without sexual intimacy?” The response was: “No, you cannot have that type of intimacy because that’s not the type of intimacy that Jesus ever spoke about.” That is so crystal clear. Now, if it’s an atheist, it would have to be a different approach. But that makes it very clear, very black and white, why it’s an issue. Hopefully the parents and the teachers who understand the truth would educate themselves to what exactly would you say, and what are the mistruths. Hearing about God’s incomparable love, endless mercy, had a lot to do with me thinking the Catholic Church wasn’t maybe as bad as I thought it was, and maybe led me to hate the Catholic Church a little less than I did. The more I heard about that love, and mercy, and compassion, the more I understood it. Then, when I went into a Catholic Church, and saw all of the love and compassion, and how different these people were living than the people I hung out with most of my life, it opened up my heart. But, that would have fallen short had I also not learned about the spiritual truth, and the spiritual truth really does exist. They’re not mutually exclusive, but a lot of people think that it has to be all about love and compassion. But, (for example, they) can have love and compassion for a woman who (goes) through an abortion. It’s such a sad thing: they need to be loved, and need to have compassion, but somewhere, somebody should probably tell them a little bit about life. But also, God often intervenes. You can change on a dime once you hear the truth. Read more

Vatican City, Oct 23, 2015 / 06:03 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The Bible is so dangerous that some Christians risk persecution to have one. But for Pope Francis, its life-changing role in daily life is important too. “The Bible is not meant to be pla... Read more

Vatican City, Oct 23, 2015 / 04:06 am (CNA).- It hasn't gotten a lot of media coverage so far, but the rampant effects of pornography on families worldwide have sparked concern and dialogue among the synod's bishops – particularly the Americans. “Porn demeans the best in the male spirit. It addicts them to a kind of cheap junk food, when real women with minds and hearts, beliefs and hopes, are much more interesting,” Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia told CNA Oct. 19. “Happiness is built on reality, with all of its warts and joys – not on illusions. Pornography is nothing but illusions.” The Vatican's synod on the family was opened by Pope Francis on Oct. 4, and it will run until Oct. 25. This year's event follows the theme “The vocation and mission of the family in the Church and the modern world,” and follows 2014's extraordinary synod on the family, which focused on pastoral challenges regarding family life. So far, this year's discussion has tended to be reduced in Western secular media to two issues: communion for divorced-and-civilly remarried, and Church teaching and pastoral care regarding homosexuality. However, actual topics brought up during meetings have been much broader, with synod fathers touching on themes such as domestic violence, violence against women, incest and abuse within families, marriage preparation and pornography. Archbishop Chaput is a member of the synod's English-speaking “D” small group, which has been one of the most vocal about the need to include greater reference to the harm done to families by the use of pornography. Other members of the group include Cardinal Thomas Collins of Toronto, who serves as moderator for the group, Cardinal Daniel Di Nardo of Galveston-Houston, Archbishop Jose Gomez of Los Angeles as well as a number of African and Asian prelates. In his comments to CNA, Archbishop Chaput said that although pornography has typically been a largely male problem, it’s something that many women struggle with as well. Porn, he said, “does huge damage to families. It isolates individual family members by creating private sexual obsessions. And it wrecks the intimacy between husbands and wives with notions of 'perfect' sex that bear no relation to real human beings.” “It's a terrible cheat,” he said, adding that it robs husbands and wives of “the richness of a long-term, mutually rewarding sexual friendship…and substitutes a shabby replacement that can never really feed the human heart.” And the damage isn’t just isolated to individual families – it affects the larger family of the Church, he noted. “The number of our Catholic clergy who struggle with this problem is very unsettling, and it has nothing to do with celibacy,” the archbishop said, noting that protestant ministers and Jewish rabbis contend with the same issue. “Pornography's always been a problem. Ancient Rome was famous for it. Sex is powerful and fascinating, and people have always abused its appeal…It's an epidemic; or more accurately a pandemic. Anyone with an internet connection anywhere in the world can find all the porn he or she wants,” he said. Cardinal Daniel Di Nardo backed the concern in an Oct. 20 interview with CNA, saying that no matter where a person lives, pornography is still a major issue due to the easy access provided by the internet and social media. “The problem came up with all the bishops,” he said, referring to the synod. But in the United States the problem is such a major issue that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops is currently drafting a statement to address it, he said. Pornography “represents the dark side of what can happen in terms of the internet and so many forms of social media that this also becomes a breeding ground for so many distortions of human sexuality,” the cardinal said. Whether the person using porn is young, middle aged or older, it's “a major issued for families nowadays.” Cardinal Di Nardo noted that he often hears from the priests in his diocese that when families who are in difficulty come to them for help, frequently “you find out that part of the issue started with someone in pornography.” “We worry about our young people, but this even happens in terms of married couples. It's so pervasive, that’s the problem. It’s very pervasive. So we think it’s an important issue to deal with.” Archbishop Jose Gomez also spoke to CNA about the issue Oct. 20, reflecting that the phenomenon of pornography is not “a victimless or private activity,” but is “truly a social sin.” “Pornography is a scourge in every country, it is being fueled by globalization through the Internet and global travel,” the archbishop said. “Everyone knows there are links between the porn industry and prostitution and human trafficking and child abuse.” Another important point the archbishop stressed is the fact that pornography is a corporate phenomenon with large, big-name companies across the globe both promoting the use of porn and profiting from it. “Obviously, there are cable television companies and the cable networks, and global hotel chains – many of them are making pornography available in every room.” One example of those companies is the Hyatt Hotel chain, which recently decided to cut off access to on-demand video pornography in all their locations across the globe. Archbishop Gomez stressed that “there are a lot of other companies involved in this. We need to start a conversation with the business community and get them thinking about ‘divesting’ from pornography as a dimension of their corporate responsibility.” Many of these companies have policies not to support environmental pollution or discrimination, so “we have to help them to see how pornography promotes injustice and cruelty against women and children and how it is polluting the human ecology, the moral ecology,” he said. Married Brazilian auditors in the synod Pedro and Ketty de Rezende also spoke to CNA Oct. 20, sharing their concerns surrounding pornography as both a married couple, and as parents. Ketty affirmed that pornography “was definitely a topic” in the synod discussion, and voiced her concern that “with the easy access kids have to all of the media, they can very easily access pornography.” She and her husband noted that the problem with pornography is not just its harmful effects, but that it “goes way beyond that” to the commitment to live in chastity that every baptized person makes. “When we are baptized we assume a commitment to chastity, because that’s the only way you can entirely participate in the communion of the Church,” Pedro said. “Any form that involves the person in a context that’s against the morals taught by the Church is not just negative for the person, but also negative as in what that person can bring to society. Pornography is just one of the forms.” Ketty emphasized the importance of educating one’s family on chastity. Quoting Bl. Pope Paul VI, she said that “contemporary man values more witness than teachers, and if he listens to teachers it’s because they’re witnesses.” “The whole family has to witness virtues, they all have to live it and when they all live it the children naturally pick it up…That’s one of the virtues we really have to make clear in the world today,” she said. “So what I really think is one of the major issues in the synod is a call to chastity.” The couple also shared some of the ways they have found to be effective in terms of teaching their children about chastity, naming the use of scripture and just being with their children and being aware of what they are exposed to as two key points. “First we live our faith by reading the Word of God. I think the Word of God is one of the first to call us to chastity, right? Only the pure will actually see God,” Ketty said. She emphasized the need to remember that “our faith is a meeting with a person, it’s meeting Jesus. And that’s the first call to a chaste life.” Other than that, “it’s being with our kids, warning them also, ‘look maybe this book isn’t something that’s good for you to read, this film isn’t really appropriate,’” she said, adding that it’s also helpful to show kids other options that “don’t harm their souls or their minds with unchaste things.” Read more

Vatican City, Oct 22, 2015 / 03:54 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Though it has been more than 10 years since the death of Pope John Paul II, the saint’s impact can still be seen in those working to uphold Church teaching at the Synod on the Family, said his former secretary. “The teaching of the magisterium of the Church and of John Paul II is always current,” said Archbishop Mieczyslaw Mokrzycki of Lviv. He told CNA that the words and writings of St. John Paul II are being frequently invoked by bishops at the synod who are defending the Church’s teachings on marriage. Responding to calls for the Church to permit the divorced-and-remarried to receive Communion, he said, “many bishops have recalled the great teaching of Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI which they expressed clearly, that it would be against the doctrine of the Church, against the sacrament of the Eucharist, the sacrament of Penance, against grace.” Archbishop Mokrzycki, who is the president of the Ukrainian Bishops Conference, is among the synod fathers gathered in Rome for the Oct. 4-25 Synod on the Family, which gathers bishops from around the world to discuss issues relating to families in the Church today. But many remember Archbishop Mokrzycki for another role – one of John Paul II’s two personal secretaries during the last nine years of his life. Archbishop Mokrzycki spoke to CNA’s sister agency, ACI Stampa Oct. 22, the feast day of St. John Paul II. He discussed the Pope’s legacy, relevance to the synod, and what it was like to live beside a saint. The full transcript of the interview is below:Q: Your Excellency, today – Oct. 22, the feast of St. John Paul II – is a special day for you personally and for the universal Church. It might be difficult for you to explain how you feel, but maybe we can try? It is a great joy for us, and I don't only mean the Polish people, but for the entire Church, to think about the day of the election of John Paul II, who after his election won over the whole world, particularly the Italians, because he said those beautiful and famous words: “I don't know if I can explain myself well in your – in our – Italian language. If I make a mistake, correct me.” And from then on, all the children of Italy when they met him said: you asked us to correct you, so say it right! It was a special day for the entire Church, and we saw it for the entirety of his long pontificate, he was an extraordinary man.Q: What was it like to live with a saint? Was it more joy, or work? Both – joy and fatigue, because John Paul II was a very strong man with himself and with others. We worked a lot and made others work a lot. And this is also why we saw that his pontificate was very interesting and very rich.Q: What has he taught you as a bishop and as a pastor that is useful for your mission today? The Holy Father was not only the head of the universal Church, not only the head of the Vatican State, but was above all a pastor, the bishop of the diocese of Rome, and he underlined this a lot during his pontificate. He wanted to visit all the parishes of the diocese. And at the end when we saw that he had so much fatigue and couldn’t visit the parishes anymore, about 20 parishes remained and he wanted to meet them just them same, and so he invited all the parishes that he still hadn’t visited to the Paul VI Hall. And we saw that the Romans were very grateful for this great gesture of love, because they saw that the Pope didn’t neglect them, he didn’t forget them, and even if he couldn’t go, he invited them to his house. And so also for me. He was a great pastor. I was able to learn from him a vision of pastoral life, of concern for all levels, of love for one’s neighbor, of charity and of bringing people to salvation. The great ones, the poor, the little ones; I saw how with great love he embraced each and every one.Q: Of the magisterium of John Paul II, a large part was dedicated to the family. Right now you are busy with the synod on the family. How does this magisterium enter into the synodal debate? During the pontificate of John Paul II, above all in the years in which I was with him, the Pope didn’t speak a lot about his family. He sometimes spoke about his father, sometimes about his sister that he lost as a child and his brother who was a doctor that died young. But he made it visible that around him was a great family of friends, a great family of the Church. And then I saw that in the years I was with him many families came to find him from different parts of the world: from Poland, from Italy, from the United States. He had the capacity of maintaining contact with many people, with many families and not only Christians. Also and above all with many Jewish families. And in this I saw the importance of contact with the family, and as the Pope he underlined the role of the family in the life of the Church and in the life of society. From the beginning of his pontificate, he placed a lot of focus on the great role of the family. He dedicated a cycle of catechesis in the Wednesday audiences to the passage in Genesis which says: male and female I created them. And then there is the apostolic letter to the family, Familiaris Consortio. He was very committed in the development of this theme and was close to the family, to emphasize the great importance of the family in daily life, and the necessity of being close to the family in order to live better the vocation of each one. Because every person has a vocation, to be a religious sister, a priest, a doctor. But to be a family is a great beauty, but also a committed vocation that requires responsibility, and is also difficult to live. Because of this, John Paul II wanted to help this vocation to grow.Q: Now 10 years after John Paul II’s death, what is his legacy today? The teaching of the magisterium of the Church and of John Paul II is always current. Of course society has changed a bit, because culture changes, circumstances change. Also during this synod the bishops have brought different problems and family difficulties. Some wanted to be a little bit “progressive” and offer Communion to the divorced-and-remarried, but many bishops have recalled the great teaching of Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI which they expressed clearly, that it would be against the doctrine of the Church, against the sacrament of the Eucharist, the sacrament of Penance, against grace. Certainly the teaching of John Paul II was perhaps very demanding, but real. If we want our faith to have value, we must bear some sort of difficulty, because only then are we faithful to the teaching of Jesus Christ.Q: What does your diocese bring to the synod? For me, it was a great experience, because I was able to hear testimonies and the vision of life and of the Church throughout the world on the different continents. But I want to say above all that we bishops are very close to families, we want to help people grow in the vocation of being in a marriage, a family. And we know that this vocation is very beautiful, very important, but we also want to help families realize their vocation and their commitment.   Read more

Vatican City, Oct 22, 2015 / 11:27 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis announced Thursday to the Synod on the Family that he has chosen to establish a new office in the Roman Curia that will deal with issues of laity, family, and life, as part of his reform of the curia. “I have decided to establish a new Dicastery with competency for Laity, Family and Life, that will replace the Pontifical Council for the Laity and the Pontifical Council for the Family,” Pope Francis said Oct. 22, according to a communique from the Holy See press office. “To this end, I have constituted a special commission that will prepare a text delineating canonically the competencies of the new Dicastery. The text will be presented for discussion to the Council of Cardinals at their next meeting in December." The Pope added that in addition to the pontifical councils for the laity and the family, the Pontifical Academy for Life will also joined to the new office. This move is significant because it streamlines three separate offices into one; it is also meant to give greater attention to issues relating to the laity in the Church. Pope Francis' decision has been widely anticipated since he established, shortly after his March 2013 election as Bishop of Rome, the Council of Cardinals to advise him on the reform of the Roman Curia. The cardinals' council was established in April 2013, and originally included eight cardinals from around the world; its number was later expanded to nine. The group first met in October of that year; at an Oct. 3, 2013 press briefing, Holy See press officer Fr. Federico Lombardi revealed that “the council also plans to give more specific attention to issues relating to the laity, so that this dimension of the life of the Church is properly and effectively recognized and followed by the governance of the Church.” “Now there is a Pontifical Council for the Laity, but it is still possible to think of ways of strengthening this aspect,” he added. Catholic News Agency reported Oct. 30, 2013 that Cardinal Oscar Rodríguez Maradiaga of Tegucigalpa, who co-ordinates the Council of Cardinals, had said that curial reform could develop the laity's role in the Church's ranks by creating a 'Congregation for the Laity', which would include the pontifical councils for the family and the laity, and the Pontifical Academy for Life. It was noted then that the reform of the Roman Curia was expected to streamline the body by reducing the number of pontifical councils, and subsuming them within an increased number of congregations. Pope Francis' announcement called the new office a dicastery – a word which covers both congregations and pontifical councils. While he failed to refer to the new body as a congregation, that can nevertheless be reasonably expected – both given Cardinal Rodríguez' statements, and the fact that it will include two existing pontifical councils. There had been in 2014 some speculation that the expected 'Congregation for the Laity' would also include the Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers, but the Pope's announcement has not borne out that prediction. The Council of Cardinals last met in September, and it was reported at that time that they had formally submitted to the Pope a proposal for a congregation for laity, family, and life. By then, it had been decided that the Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers would not be included in the 'laity congregation', but rather in a second, new, congregation for charity, justice, and peace, which would subsume also the pontifical councils for justice and peace, migrants, and Cor Unum. While Pope Francis' recent announcement does not mention a new dicastery for charity, justice, and peace, it may still be reasonably expected in the coming months. The next meeting of the cardinals' council is scheduled for December. Pope Francis reflected on the program of curial reform in February, at the opening of a consistory of cardinals. Speaking Feb. 12, he emphasized that reform “is always that of promoting greater harmony in the work of the various dicasteries and offices, in order to achieve more effective collaboration in that absolute transparency which builds authentic synodality and collegiality.” “Reform is not an end in itself,” he said, “but a way of giving strong Christian witness; to promote more effective evangelization; to promote a fruitful ecumenical spirit; and to encourage a more constructive dialogue with all.” Pope Francis' reform of the Roman Curia has already resulted in the creation of a Secretariat for the Economy and a Secretariat for Communications. Ultimately, it is expected that assisted by the Council of Cardinals, Pope Francis will promulgate a new apostolic constitution describing the Roman Curia. The curia is currently governed by St. John Paul II's Pastor bonus, which was issued in 1988. Read more