What new Pope said about transgender and LGTBQ
An event that has been globally described as unprecedented and historic, Cardinal Robert Francis emerged the 267th pontiff of the Catholic church adopting the name Pope Leo XIV.
Pope Leo XIV emergence marks the first time an American born would become the global leader of the Catholic church – his emergence comes a few days US president, Donald Trump touted his followers on social media by posting an AI generated picture of himself garbed in Pope’s attire in the manner of “behold your new pope”.
In view of Pope Leo XIV emergence, the Reliant Nigeria News has reviewed the Pope’s earlier stance on homos3xuality and gender transition; ideologies that late Pope Francis has controversial stance on.
Despite maintaining a cordial and close ties with late Pope Francis, Pope Leo XIV whose missionary work experience is evident in his exploit in Peru, appears to have a rather clear and unambiguous stance on gender transition contrary to that of his predecessor.
Pope Leo XIV is quoted to have described gender transition as “confusing” and as a new and unnatural omen in which people try to create genders that do not exist.
Pope Leo XIV stance on gender transition and LGTBQ understandably negates that of his predecessor, late Pope Francis who had described homosexuality as “a human fact”. Pope Francis in an interview in May 2024 stated that transgender people would be baptized and play the role of godparents.
In 20 years of his reign, Pope Francis was the first Catholic Pope to openly support the inclusion of the LGBTQ community by publicly identifying with them and promoting the blessing of same-s3x marriages .
While the conclave was being held to determine the new Pope, the LGBTQ Catholics were uncertain about their continued inclusiveness by the new Pontiff.
In January 2023, Pope Francis declared that homos3xuality is not a crime he then appealed to lawmakers across countries of the world to stop criminalizing homos3xuality as it was “unjust” to do so. He though stated that the Catholic see homos3xuality as a sin.
The feeling in the air for the LGBTQ Catholic with the emergence of Pope Leo XIV is that of uncertainty especially as his previous public utterances appear to be radically different from Pope Francis perspective
