Accept gays, but not their �ungodly acts�, Catholics say

Tefo Pheage | Tuesday April 19, 2016 15:49

 

Yesterday’s statement by the church breaks its silence over the matter, which was recently given impetus by a Court of Appeal judgment forcing government to recognise and register a leading gay rights advocacy group.

The church’s Bishop of Gaborone, Reverend Valentine Seane said gays should be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity.

“According to the teachings of the church, men and women with homosexual tendencies must be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity.

Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided,” he said in a position paper, which further advised that homosexual people like other Christians are called to live the virtue of chastity.

The church’s leader further said while condemning homosexual acts, the scriptures did not “permit us to conclude that all those who suffer from this anomaly are personally responsible for it”.

“It (Scripture) does attest to the fact that homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered,” he said.

Despite these views, the church said the clampdown on homosexual people and their wishes should continue.

“The church teaches that respect for homosexual persons cannot lead in any way to approval of homosexual behaviour or to legal recognition of homosexual unions.

The common good requires that laws recognise, promote and protect marriage as the basis of the family, the primary unit of society,” the Bishop said.

In an apparent swipe at the recent Court of Appeal judgment, Seane said legal recognition of homosexual unions or placing them on the same level as marriage would mean not only the approval of “defiant behaviour” with the consequences of making it a model in the present society, but would also “obscure basic values which belong to the common inheritance of humanity.”

The position paper condemned homosexual unions as ungodly.

“There are absolutely no grounds for considering homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even remotely analogous to God’s plan for marriage and family. Marriage is holy, while homosexual acts go against the natural law.

“Homosexual acts ‘close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from genuine affective and sexual complementarity,” Seane said.