The Archdiocese of Detroit bars a support group for Catholic families with gay members from using a Detroit parish for a Saturday meeting because the scheduled speaker represents a pro-gay rights ministry censured by the Vatican, Patricia Montemurri reports in the Free Press.
The ban comes a month after Catholic bishops publicly feuded at a Vatican meeting over Pope Francis' more welcoming words and outreach to gay Catholics and their families.
"I feel bad for the message that it sends to Catholics that there can't be discussion of an issue of great importance to them and their families — how to stay in better communication with their church and their gay and lesbian children," said Francis DeBernardo, executive director of Maryland-based New Ways Ministry, an advocacy group for Catholics who are lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT), but which is not sanctioned by the Catholic church.
Archbishop Allen Vigneron has quashed DeBernardo's scheduled appearance Saturday at Christ the King parish in northwest Detroit to the Fortunate Families support group. Instead, Fortunate Families organizers have moved the meeting to a Farmington Hills condo clubhouse.
The Rev. Victor Clore, pastor of Christ the King parish, sides more with Pope Francis than his boss downtown. "It's treating people as if they were children," he tells the Free Press.
