Vatican says Church ‘does not have, and cannot have’ the power to bless same-sex unions

Does the Church have the power to bless same-sex unions?

“Negative.” That’s what the Vatican said bluntly in a statement, where it described same-sex unions as a “choice.” 

“The blessing would manifest not the intention to entrust such individual persons to the protection and help of God but to approve and encourage a choice and a way of life that cannot be recognized as objectively ordered to the revealed plans of God,” it explained. 

While God continues to bless His children as He believes “we are more important to God than all of the sins that we may commit,” the Church stressed that He “does not and cannot bless sin.”

“He blesses sinful man, so that he may recognize that he is part of his plan of love and allow himself to be changed by him. He in fact ‘takes us as we are, but never leaves us as we are,’” it read.

The Vatican later clarified that their stance on the matter “is not therefore, and is not intended to be, a form of unjust discrimination.” Instead, it’s “a reminder of the truth of the liturgical rite and of the very nature of the sacramentals, as the Church understands them.” 

The statement was approved by Pope Francis himself. It can be recalled that he previously expressed his support for civil unions for same-sex couples. Homosexuals are “children of God and have a right to a family. Nobody should be thrown out, or be made miserable because of it,” he said in the documentary Francesco by award-winning filmmaker Evgeny Afineevsky, which premiered late last year.