276
submitted 11 months ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/world@lemmy.world

Pope Francis has formally approved allowing priests to bless same-sex couples, with a new document explaining a radical change in Vatican policy by insisting that people seeking God’s love and mercy shouldn’t be subject to “an exhaustive moral analysis” to receive it.

The document from the Vatican’s doctrine office, released Monday, elaborates on a letter Francis sent to two conservative cardinals that was published in October. In that preliminary response, Francis suggested such blessings could be offered under some circumstances if they didn’t confuse the ritual with the sacrament of marriage.

The new document repeats that rationale and elaborates on it, reaffirming that marriage is a lifelong sacrament between a man and a woman. And it stresses that blessings should not be conferred at the same time as a civil union, using set rituals or even with the clothing and gestures that belong in a wedding.

But it says requests for such blessings should not be denied full stop. It offers an extensive definition of the term “blessing” in Scripture to insist that people seeking a transcendent relationship with God and looking for his love and mercy should not be subject to “an exhaustive moral analysis” as a precondition for receiving it.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] Ranvier@sopuli.xyz 1 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

I'm making the time scales bigger to make the changes more obvious to you. But it's not something that has a start and stop point and suddenly our current version of the Bible froze in time never to change again. You said new editions don't count but then said people don't carry around a pen changing them. But that's exactly what the new editions are. You can't just read the old versions because that's a different language than it is now, you won't get the same meaning as what that language meant when it was written. You can try and translate to current language, but something will always be lost and changes will have to be made in some regard or other, especially for non current languages, and how you do that and the choices you make in that new edition will depend on many factors, including their own religious interpretations. Even fifty years ago English is a different language, just not as much as a thousand. Our current religious texts are continuing to change over time, just as they always done in the past, for many different reasons including the impermenance of language itself. And that process has happened many many times and is still happening. That's the point. If the text of scriptures stayed the same over time we wouldn't have so many endless versions of so many different religious texts, some of which even started out as the same story if you go far back enough. To say, the text of the Bible doesn't change, is just untrue unless you really stretch the definitions of what that would mean to a meaningless place.

[-] rah@feddit.uk -1 points 11 months ago

Our current religious texts are continuing to change over time

I disagree.

To say, the text of the Bible doesn't change, is just untrue

I didn't say that. As you keep pointing out, there are many different scriptures which are referred to as "the Bible". Each is a different scripture.

this post was submitted on 18 Dec 2023
276 points (96.3% liked)

World News

39023 readers
2335 users here now

A community for discussing events around the World

Rules:

Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.


Lemmy World Partners

News !news@lemmy.world

Politics !politics@lemmy.world

World Politics !globalpolitics@lemmy.world


Recommendations

For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS