After the president of the Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar, Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo Besungu of Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo, traveled to Rome to protest the document, Pope Francis allowed the African bishops to prohibit such blessings on their continent.
“The Africans are a separate case: For them, homosexuality is something ‘ugly’ from a cultural point of view; they do not tolerate it,” the Pope told the Italian newspaper La Stampa.
Three months later, in an interview with CBS News, the Pope downplayed the significance of Fiducia Supplicans, suggesting that it permitted blessings only for individuals, despite the document’s repeated references to “couples.”
“No, what I allowed was not to bless the union. That cannot be done,” the Pope said. “But to bless each person, Yes.”
The next month, in a closed-door meeting with Italian bishops, the Pope used a vulgar Italian term for homosexuality while reaffirming the Church’s policy of banning men with “deep-seated homosexual tendencies” from seminaries. He apologized for the expression through a spokesman, who said the Pope “never intended to offend or express himself in homophobic terms.”
In April, the doctrinal office released the declaration Dignitas Infinita, on the defense of human dignity, including topics in the realm of gender and bioethics. Cardinal Víctor Fernández, prefect of the dicastery, had predicted, in an interview with Spanish news agency EFE, that the document would reassure Catholics who had been concerned by the controversy over same-sex blessings.
The new declaration quoted a recent statement by Pope Francis characterizing as “deplorable the practice of so-called surrogate motherhood, which represents a grave violation of the dignity of the woman and the child, based on the exploitation of situations of the mother’s material needs,” and calling for a universal ban.
But in the CBS interview shortly thereafter, the Pope seemed to blunt his condemnation and suggest that there could be exceptions: “I would say that in each case the situation should be carefully and clearly considered, consulting medically and then morally, as well. I think there is a general rule in these cases, but you have to go into each case in particular to assess the situation, as long as the moral principle is not skirted.”
Pope Francis also told CBS that he would not consider the ordination of women as deacons, seemingly shutting the book on a question that he had named three separate panels to study. But in October, the Pope adopted as part of his official papal teaching a final synodal document stating that “the question of women’s access to diaconal ministry remains open. This discernment needs to continue.”
The synod proved an anticlimax for those expecting it to address hot-button questions, such as LGBT issues, clerical celibacy or contraception, after the Pope consigned those matters to special study groups, including one explicitly designated to handle “controversial doctrinal, pastoral and ethical issues.” They are supposed to report on their findings by the end of June 2025.
