‘[The Church] has a responsibility towards creation, and must also publicly assert this responsibility. In so doing she must not only defend earth… she must also protect man from self-destruction. What is needed is something like a human ecology.
‘If the Church speaks of the nature of the human being as man and woman, and demands this order of creation be respected, this is not some antiquated metaphysics… To disregard this would be the self-destruction of man himself, and hence the destruction of God’s own work.’
‘What is often expressed and understood by the term “gender†ultimately ends up being man’s attempt at self-emancipation from creation and Creator… in this way he lives in opposition to the truth, in opposition to the Creator Spirit. Rain forests deserve indeed to be protected, but no less so does man…’ –Pope Benedict XVI
Those were the words spoken on December 22nd by Pope Benedict XVI in a speech to the Roman Curia, the Vatican’s central administration. While the Pope never explicitly mentions gays, lesbians or homosexuality, the speech has set off a furore in the blogosphere, where gay rights activists have condemned the speech as homophobic and transphobic, with some sites reporting that the Pope equates homosexuality with climate change as a threat to humanity.
Vatican spokesperson, Father Federico Lombardi, , defended the Pope’s remarks in the UK’s Guardian newspaper saying they were not specifically targeting homosexuality.
However to gay activists the remarks – made just a few weeks after the Vatican’s permanent observer to the United Nations opposed a UN resolution (see below) urging governments to decriminalize homosexuality – smart of a subtext.
Reverend Sharon Ferguson, chief executive of the Lesbian and Gay Christian Movement, interpreted the remarks as an aggressive justification of homophobia and its resulting violence.
‘It is comments like this that justify homophobic bullying that goes on in schools and it is comments like this that justify gay bashing. There are still so many instances of people being killed around the world, including in western society, purely and simply because of their sexual orientation or their gender identity,’ she told PinkNews.co.uk.
In WA, the remarks were equally ill-received by WA Gender Project spokesman Aram Hosie.
‘I suspect the Pope’s reference to gender was part of a homophobic argument that is based on a fundamental and narrow construction of gender – the same kind of argument we’ve seen used in Australia recently by some right wing and fundamental Christian groups. However, regardless of whether or not the Pope was being deliberately transphobic, his comments do give serious cause for concern.
‘Trans- and homo- phobia are closely related and the Pope’s comments highlight some of the common misconceptions faced by both gay, lesbian and trans people…. I don’t personally, however, hold out much hope that the removal of such attitudes within the Catholic Church is likely, particularly not under the direction of the current Pope who has shown himself repeatedly to be highly bigoted towards the GLBT community.’
