There has been all sorts of misinformation floating around about the blackmail of Vatican Prelates and a gay lobby being at work, and Pope Francis’ confirmation of some of these things was leaked to the press.
When Pope Benedict XVI resigned on Feb. 28, the Italian media were reporting all sorts of scandal—a gay lobby influencing Vatican policy, blackmail of gay prelates, the possibility that that this had to do with his resignation—and some of the rumors have been laid to rest, others confirmed, when information from Pope Francis’ private meeting with a Latin American church group was leaked to the press.
The Latin American and Caribbean Confederation of Religious, known as CLAR, it’s Spanish acronym, had met in private with Pope Francis. CLAR is the regional organization for priests and nuns of religious orders; they had put together a synthesis of the Pope’s remarks during their June 6 audience with him.
“The ‘gay lobby’ is mentioned, and it is true, it is there … We need to see what we can do …,” the synthesis reads, confirming the presence of of an undefined “gay lobby.”
CLAR was distressed to know that the document had been leaked and made a formal apology to the Pope. The document had been published on the Chilean-based website “Reflection and Liberation” in Spanish and was then translated by the blog Rorate Caeli, which is read in Vatican circles.
Rev. Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, said only that the meeting had been private and he therefore had nothing to comment on.
The term “gay lobby” has caused a lot of confusion, speculation, and even anger. Many assume that this means that there is a homosexual subculture within the Vatican, but newspapers La Repubblica and Panorama alleged that high-ranking prelates were being blackmailed—by whom, we don’t know—for being gay. Last year they stated that there was a secret dossier of the scandal, but the Vatican denounced the reports as not only defamatory but “unverified, unverifiable, or completely false.”
Italian gay rights groups have called the entire situation insensitive and homophobic.
“That priests have sex with other men doesn’t authorize anyone to speak about a gay lobby, because we’re not talking about a group that represents the interests of the homosexual community but rather a group that is an integral part of a power structure—the Vatican—which is violently homophobic,” said Franco Grillini, president of Gaynet rights group.
The Pope appears to want to get to the heart of the matter in the document: “I would rather have a Church that makes mistakes for doing something than one that gets sick for being closed up …”
Photo: Alessandra Tarantino/AP
