A priest in San Carlos City, Pangasinan compared “homosexual union” to death, but maintained that the church respects its lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community.
In a homily delivered at the Sto. Domingo Church on July 5, Father Allan Abuan lectured on the meaning of the acronym “D.E.A.T.H.” which he said stands for divorce, euthanasia, abortion, total birth control, and homosexual union.
He said he hoped the legalization of same sex marriage in the United States would not happen in the country. The US Supreme Court, in a historic decision June 26, ruled that same sex marriage falls under the 14th Amendment, thus legalizing gay marriage in all 50 states.
Father Abuan argued even that children raised by gay couples suffer regression, calling the term “anthropologic regression.”
He said in the anthropological lens, a child raised by gay parents fails to evolve unlike ones raised by a heterosexual family.
“We are not against our lesbian and gay brothers and sisters… (But homosexual union) is against the natural order of things… We hope what happened in the US will not happen here in the Philippines,” Abuan said.
At a national convention on family life in Cebu city on July 17, Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) President and Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas said Jesus Christ does not judge the LGBT community, which he said has played a major role in the church.
“The first thing we should call to mind is that Jesus died for all. At the cross, there were only seven words attributed to Jesus, and at the cross, He did not ask ‘Are you a homosexual? If you are, I’m not dying for you.’ No. There was no such thing,” Villegas said in the convention according to a Cebu Daily News report.
“Jesus wants everybody to be saved, and come to a degree of sanctity while here on earth. So if the heterosexual person is called to holiness, homosexual persons are also called to be saints. And it is possible for a homosexual person to become a saint, not only in heaven, but already here on earth,” he added.
During the open forum, according to the report, Villegas was asked about same-sex marriage and said the Catholic Church does not judge the LGBT community.
“We do not judge. We constantly bring to them God’s invitation ‘Come follow me. Come and be holy. Come and be a saint.’ That is a call given to all of us,” Villegas said in the report.
But when asked at the sidelines of the convention, Villegas reportedly said of same-sex marriage: “It’s an error, a tragic error of humanity,” adding that in the Bible, God only created man and woman.
Villegas said the CBCP is expected to release by the end of August a pastoral letter on the care of the homosexual person, as well as on the position of the Church on same-sex union.
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