A man has been arrested after cutting down a flag pole with an LGBT rainbow flag in front of a Catholic church in Germany.
On July 13 at 6:45 p.m. local time, several witnesses saw a man use a saw to cut down the flag pole in front of the St. Sebastian church in Mannheim. The metal pole fell onto the market square, and no one was injured.
According to police, the perpetrator fled on foot afterwards.
The local police investigated the case as one of property damage and on Thursday arrested a 58-year-old man from Mannheim. The police did not publish any further information about the suspect or his motives.
The LGBT rainbow flag was put up by parish priest Father Lukas Glocker on the occasion of the local celebration of LGBT “pride month,” called “Monnem Pride.”
“The flag symbolizes that every person, regardless of sexual orientation, gender identity, background, religion, appearance, or skin color, should be treated with respect and dignity,” Glocker told Catholic News Agency (KNA).
As part of an ecumenical network, the Catholic parish of Mannheim participated in the “Monnem Pride” event for the third time this year. The motto was: “Love is good for the soul – hate harms the soul.”
The parish said in a statement that every human being is a creation of God and possesses an inalienable dignity and that the “rainbow flags in front of our churches are therefore a visible sign of our commitment to treating all people with respect and dignity.”
However, according to Catholic teaching, a necessary distinction must be made between the treatment of people who experience same-sex attraction and the practice of sodomy. According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, people with homosexual tendencies are to be treated “with respect, compassion, and sensitivity” (CCC 2358). At the same time, the Catechism states that homosexual acts are contrary to the natural law and are not to be approved (CCC 2357).
The LGBT “pride” movement encourages homosexual acts and transgender ideology, both of which are explicitly rejected by Church teaching. Erecting LGBT rainbow flags in front of Catholic churches signals adherence to a deeply anti-Catholic ideology.