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Today, in an extraordinary legal case, the Vatican stands accused of subjecting a businessman to “incoherent” allegations over a property deal, which highlights an earlier controversy about an apology having to be issued after the Pope supposedly made homophobic comments, and how for our Editor, Welshman Phil Parry, saying sorry properly is almost NEVER done.
It never rains but it pours – and it is no different in the religious world.
The Vatican has gone on trial in an English court for the first time, after Raffaele Mincione was convicted by a Roman Catholic (RC) Church tribunal over a property deal in Chelsea.
Now Mr Mincione is seeking to appeal against that decision and, in civil proceedings that began in London last month, he is asking the High Court of England and Wales to declare that he and others acted in “good faith” in relation to the Sloane Square deal.
All of this puts centre stage earlier controversies, so it is clear that the Pope’s aim of improving the image of the Church may not be easy.
There were unfortunate headlines after China’s newest RC Bishop was unveiled recently, after he promised to toe the party line, and it has emerged that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) controlled the appointments process.
Bishop Joseph Yang Yongqiang has pledged to “uphold socialist values”, as well as adhere to a principle of ‘sinicisation’ in religious practices.
A huge apology had to be issued after the Pope used a term to describe gay people which is actually extremely offensive and homophobic, but, on the face of it, only outlines in a rather crude way what is the Church’s official policy anyway.
La Repubblica and Corriere della Sera (Italy’s largest circulation daily papers), both used earlier sources, and quoted Pope Francis as saying seminaries, or priesthood colleges, are already too full of “frociaggine”, a vulgar Italian term roughly translating as “faggotness” or “faggotry”. He was also said to have reiterated his view that gay men should not be allowed to become priests.
Afterwards he was also alleged to have used sexist remarks in a meeting with priests – a huge embarrassment when the RC Church aims to attract more women (although not to the priesthood).
But it has continued – and this is all fodder to critics of the Church.
The shocking anti-women comments by Pope Francis were reported on the website Silere Non Possum which claimed to have a recording of him declaring: “Gossip is women’s business…we wear the trousers”.
According to ANSA news agency, the Pope repeated the homophobic term while meeting priests, saying there is an air of “frociaggine” in the Vatican and it was better that young men with a homosexual tendency not be allowed to enter the seminary.
However the announcements about gay people only seem to emphasise earlier stances by Pope Francis, and Church policy as a whole.
In 2018, he told Italian bishops to vet priesthood applicants carefully and reject anyone suspected of being gay.
But the Vatican were forced to issue a statement of ‘clarification’ after the Pope’s reported homophobic comment this time, of which this is the salient part: “The Pope never intended to offend or express himself in homophobic terms, and he apologises to those who felt offended by the use of a term reported by others”.
Yet even here there is a caveat – by emphasising “…REPORTED BY OTHERS”, it puts distance between what has been said, and the Pope himself.
This was the key section, but, as usual, it was surrounded with a diatribe about ‘inclusivity’ in the Church, which, in the context of what has happened, is completely meaningless.
The statement said: “As he (the Pope) stated on several occasions, ‘In the Church there is room for everyone, for everyone! Nobody is useless, nobody is superfluous, there is room for everyone. Just as we are, all of us’”.
The first incident reportedly occurred on May 20, as first published on the political gossip website Dagospia, when the Italian Bishops Conference held a private meeting with the Pope.
“It’s all the fault of some bishop who broke his mandate of silence to report the gaffe…”, reported Il Messaggero, a national paper based in Rome.
According to the media the Pope’s comments came during an informal Q&A session at the annual bishops’ meeting which was attended by over 200 members of the clergy.
Yet it appears that while the RC Church tries to fudge the issue, Pope Francis was only reflecting what is policy anyway.
The catechism of the RC Church, names “homosexual acts” as “intrinsically immoral and contrary to the natural law”, and states that “homosexual tendencies” are “objectively disordered”.
It proclaims: “Although the particular inclination of the homosexual person is not a sin, it is a more or less strong tendency ordered toward an intrinsic moral evil; and thus the inclination itself must be seen as an objective disorder”.
It is this that, in my experience, some priests seem to have problems with.
Researching for a BBC TV Panorama programme called ‘Power to Abuse’, about the cover-up of sexual abuse by a priest at the RC Church in Wales, I conducted interviews with dozens of clergymen.
Many of them were probably gay, and struggling to come to terms with their sexuality when the Church’s teaching is against it.
This wasn’t always popular, however, and one complainant wrote to me about a story I had written concerning a female television ‘reporter’ who had posted pictures of herself on social media in skimpy clothes, is sadly typical of the insults I constantly receive:“Your article on Ellie Pitt was bordering on mysogynistic bullying, a really pathetic article written by a bitter individual who was a complete failure as a BBC correspondent and also loved bashing the Catholic Church with your disgraceful Panorama programme”.
But of course “The Pope never intended to offend or express himself in homophobic terms..”.
i doubt this will be raised in the Vatican’s first legal case in an English or Welsh court, but you never know what these lawyers might get up to!
The memories of Phil’s astonishing 40-year award-winning career in journalism, as he was gripped by the rare neurological disabling condition, Hereditary Spastic Paraplegia (HSP), have been released in a major book ‘A GOOD STORY’. Order the book now!
Regrettably publication of another book, however, was refused, because it was to have included names.
