Defrocked gay Catholic priest condemns 'homophobic' Vatican
October 28, 2015
Polish Bishop, Ryszard Kasyna, said on Wednesday that he decided Charamsa should no longer be allowed to celebrate mass, carry out sacraments such as communion and baptism or wear a cassock.
In a statement published by the Pelplin Diocese, Kasyna said that the "penalty is intended to encourage Father Charamsa to mend his ways and can be rescinded depending on his behavior."
Kasyna's comments on Wednesday came on the same day that extracts from a letter, sent by Charamsa to Pope Francis, were published by the BBC.
The Polish priest provided the broadcasting corporation with a copy of the original letter, in which he condemned the "immeasurable suffering" of homosexual Catholics, as well as their families.
'Violently homophobic'
The 43-year old priest said that after a "long and tormented period of discernment and prayer," he had decided to "publicly reject the violence of the Church towards homosexual, lesbian, bisexual, transsexual and intersexual people."
Despite the Roman Catholic Church being "full of homosexuals," it is also "frequently violently homophobic," Charamsa wrote, adding that he could no longer tolerate the "homophobic hate of the Church, the exclusion, the marginalization and the stigmatization of people like [him]," whose "human rights are denied" by the Church.
While Charamsa thanked Pope Francis for some of his more lenient behavior towards gay people, the priest described Pope Benedict XVI's comment that homosexuality was "a strong tendency ordered toward an intrinsic moral evil" as "diabolical.
Hopes of liberalization
Charamsa was initially fired from the Vatican on October 3, after publicly announcing his homosexuality and presenting his Catalan partner, Eduardo.
His announcement came just hours before the start a three-week synod, which focused on family in the Vatican. Reformers within the Roman Catholic Church had hoped that the Synod would begin to liberalize attitudes toward controversial matters like divorce and homosexuality.
Conservatives, including most African prelates, said, however that that homosexual acts are sinful and that the church should uphold Catholic teachings to avoid confusing the faithful.
ksb/jil (AFP, AP)