But Church Teaching ...

Changes in church teaching

The Roman Catholic church is a dynamic, living organisation and consequently church teaching has changed dramatically over time in response to social changes. For example, current church teaching on marriage reflects the needs of the ruling classes in Europe in the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries. This was a change from the church's earlier hostility to marriage. It is neither true to the teaching of Jesus Christ or reflective of the society in which we now live. Similarly, the church (both the Anglican and the Roman Catholic church) turned against slavery, an institution it once supported strongly on Biblical grounds, in the late eighteenth and the nineteenth century in parallel to secular social developments which began to see slavery as morally wrong and led eventually to its abolition by law.

In the mediaeval and renaissance periods the Roman Catholic church prohibited the lending of money at interest. This meant, for example, that the Medici family (early examples of bankers in the modern sense of the word) had to make their fortune from trading in currencies rather than in the extension of credit. However, the church was eventually forced to recognise that the provision of credit at interest was an essential element in the rapidly developing economy and ceased to oppose the practice. In fact, the church now requires its organisations to place their funds on deposit, in direct contravention of its teaching during the mediaeval period.

There is much in church teaching which can be affirming of lesbian, gay and bisexual Catholics. Attempts to impose a nineteenth century morality of sexual behaviour are not convincing and are demeaning to the church and to its faithful. At the heart of Christianity and specifically Catholicism we find the unconditional love of God for all of his creation, and a repeated theme of reaching out to those who have been marginalised or victimised. Lesbian, gay and bisexual Catholics are ready to take their place as much loved members of the Catholic church and to engage with the real issues which face religion and humanity in the twenty first century, in which Catholics of all sexual orientations, whether sexually active or celibate, can celebrate our togetherness.