Santa Fe bishop says Church needs to be closer to ‘LGBTQ brothers and sisters’
Archbishop Wester invokes the Synod's Study Group 9 report to claim the Church is "not drawing near enough" to LGBT-identifying Catholics
The Archbishop of Santa Fe has urged the Church to move closer to LGBT individuals, citing the recent Synod Study Group report in doing so.
“As a church, I fear we are not drawing near enough to our LGBTQ brothers and sisters; we are not moving forward together on the same journey.” Such was the testimony of Archbishop John Wester, in a recent op-ed published by Father James Martin’s pro-LGBT group Outreach.
Continuing, he attested that “this is especially true when it comes to the experiences of our transgender and nonbinary people, many of whom feel we approach them with suspicion and hostility.”
According to Wester, “there is a persistent tendency in our discourse to seek simple, categorical answers for what are, in reality, deeply complex and personal human journeys.
Wester – a prelate with a public and highly controversial record supporting LGBT issues – had recently attended a meeting organized by another heterodox pro-LGBT group, New Ways Ministry, during which he and a number of other bishops “dialogued with theologians, pastoral workers and LGBTQ persons.”
The meeting “deepened my pastoral concern, understanding and right judgment about the lives of LGBTQ Catholics,” he commented.
The Santa Fe archbishop is no newcomer to the pro-LGBT scene circling the Church. He has long been a regular attender at similar such conferences and maintained close links with Fr. James Martin, who is arguably the most prolific promoter of LGBT ideology within the folds of the clergy.
He was one of a select handful of bishops who publicly endorsed Fr. Martin’s pro-LGBT book “Building a Bridge,” and has also given his regular support to the Association of United States Catholic Priests (AUSCP) – an organization which advocates for women deacons, homosexual priests, and married priests.
Despite this experience, for Wester the recent New Ways Ministry meeting was still eyeopening. “I was struck by the urgent need for the church to develop a pastoral approach that more compassionately listens to the needs of the people of God today,” he revealed.
Wester cited the recent Study Group 9 Report which was published by the Synod office in the Vatican. The text sparked widespread outrage due to its unfiltered promotion of homosexual ideology and attack on an organization helping individuals deal with same-sex attraction in line with Catholic teaching.
Among the most polemic of passages in the report was the presentation of a homosexual man’s testimony, which the report stated “bears witness to the discovery that sin, at its root, does not consist in the (same-sex) couple relationship, but in a lack of faith in a God who desires our fulfilment.”
For the Santa Fe bishop, the Study Group report highlighted that “while we bishops offer the gentle guidance of the church’s perennial wisdom, we are also called to journey with individuals and families, respecting the sanctuary of the human conscience.” Such thematic language was often employed during the Francis pontificate and – far from suggesting that individuals form their conscience properly – it came to mean that people should act in accord with how they felt moved, regardless of whether it aligned with Church teaching or not.
Increasingly these arguments have led to open attacks on Church teaching, as activists attest that the Church’s stance regarding homosexuality, or issues such as female ordination, have somehow harmed the faithful. Wester appeared to champion this belief.
“We cannot remain asleep while so many LGBTQ people feel that the church is not connecting with them or, worse, failing to listen to them and welcome them,” he wrote.
“By embracing a culture of listening and dialogue, we allow the church to become what it is meant to be: a place where, like Samuel, every person can learn to hear God’s voice and where, like Eli, the leadership of the church can humbly facilitate that sacred encounter,” Wester added.
This style of being a church would create a “path of mutual learning,” he added, “and it is the path to which the Holy Spirit summons us as a church that truly seeks to walk together in synodality.”
What Wester and so many other LGBT activists remain silent on when it comes to championing the cause of care and listening, is the fact that the Church’s teaching has the ultimate care of souls at its heart.
Under the leadership of Cardinal Ratzinger in 1986, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) issued a document instructing bishops on the pastoral care of homosexual persons. The CDF admonished bishops to ensure they, and any “pastoral programme” in the diocese are “clearly stating that homosexual activity is immoral.”
The instruction expressly warned that silence over the Church’s moral teaching was deleterious to an individual’s spiritual wellbeing:
But we wish to make it clear that departure from the Church’s teaching, or silence about it, in an effort to provide pastoral care is neither caring nor pastoral. Only what is true can ultimately be pastoral. The neglect of the Church’s position prevents homosexual men and women from receiving the care they need and deserve.
Therefore special concern and pastoral attention should be directed toward those who have this condition, lest they be led to believe that the living out of this orientation in homosexual activity is a morally acceptable option. It is not.
Such meetings by pro-LGBT groups are nothing new, nor is Wester’s promotion of these kinds of arguments. They serve to highlight the immense internal division within the Church such that the ver hierarchy is divided on adherence to Catholic teaching.
Whether or not Leo XIV can enforce the Church’s law on such issues will be a crucial element in judging his pontificate.
"journey with individuals" is code for "disregard Catholic doctrine and tradition." Your glory in Heaven will be great should your prayer and sacrifice bring a lost Bishop or Priest to salvation.