Vatican Issues Guidelines for Same-Sex Blessings

Declaration confirms Pope Francis’ recent statement ending the Vatican’s ban on blessing same-sex relationships.

The Vatican on Monday published guidelines for priests blessing same-sex relationships, permitting such ceremonies but stressing that they must not imply that the unions are the equivalent of heterosexual marriage.

The eight-page document from the Vatican’s doctrinal office confirms and elaborates on a letter by Pope Francis released in October, which ended the Vatican’s ban on blessing same-sex couples. The shift is the latest sign of the Catholic Church’s greater openness to LGBTQ people under Pope Francis and one that is likely to further disturb conservatives.

Catholic priests in some countries, such as Germany, were flouting the ban and calling for change. The pope’s letter and Monday’s guidelines supersede a 2021 Vatican statement that prohibited blessings for gay couples on the grounds that God “cannot bless sin.”

Catholic clergy may “join in the prayer of those persons who, although in a union that cannot be compared in any way to a marriage, desire to entrust themselves to the Lord and his mercy, to invoke his help, and to be guided to a greater understanding of his plan of love and of truth,” said the document, signed by Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernandez, head of the doctrinal office.

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