VATICAN CITY, DEC. 9, 2002 (Zenit.org).- Here is the letter of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments in response to the consultation of a bishop who asked if it is licit to confer priestly ordination to men with manifest homosexual tendencies.
The letter was published in Italian in the November-December issue of “Notitiae,” the bulletin of the Vatican congregation.
* * *
Pro. N. 886/02/0
Vatican City, May 16, 2002
Most Reverend Excellency:
The Congregation for Clergy has sent this Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments your Excellency’s letter, asking us to clarify the possibility that men with homosexual tendencies be able to receive priestly ordination.
This Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, conscious of the experience resulting from many instructed causes for the purpose of obtaining dispensation from the obligations that derive from Holy Ordination, and after due consultation with the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, expresses its judgment as follows:
Ordination to the diaconate and the priesthood of homosexual men or men with homosexual tendencies is absolutely inadvisable and imprudent and, from the pastoral point of view, very risky. A homosexual person, or one with a homosexual tendency is not, therefore, fit to receive the sacrament of Holy Orders.
I take the opportunity to send you my most cordial greetings.
Yours sincerely in Domino Your Most Reverend Excellency
Jorge A. Card. Medina Estévez
Prefect
[Translation by ZENIT]
