Bishop Heiner Wilmer of the German Diocese of Hildesheim has appointed three lay “ministers” to offer so-called “queer-sensitive pastoral care.”
According to a press release from the diocese, the lay “pastoral ministers” will “provide support” when two lesbians want to register “their child” (i.e., a fatherless child they have obtained by adoption or surrogacy) for baptism, when a so-called “trans person wants to celebrate their transition with a blessing ceremony or parents of a non-binary child [sic] seek pastoral care.”
Contrary to the diocese’s statement, however, no human being is “transgender” or “non-binary,” as there are only two sexes, male and female, which are determined by chromosomes at the moment of conception. Catholic teaching upholds the reality of the sexes and condemns bodily mutilation, such as “transition” procedures, as “against the moral law.” It is never licit to “bless” sinful practices or situations, as Cardinal Robert Sarah has explained.
The Diocese of Hildesheim added that its “queer-sensitive pastoral care will broaden the focus on dealing with gender diversity,” particularly what it referred to as “transgender or intersex people.”
The diocese cites its heterodox declaration, “Blessing for this World,” from March 2021, which claimed, “People are an equal part of the Church regardless of their sexual identity. God’s blessing applies to them and their relationships as partners – because it applies to all loving relationships without exception,” it blasphemously stated.
However, the Catholic Church teaches that God’s blessing does not apply to homosexual and other immoral relationships, which are never “loving.” In fact, the Church has always condemned homosexual activity, as it is contrary to the natural law and divine revelation.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church states:
Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity (Cf. Genesis 19:1-29; Romans 1:24-27; 1 Corinthians 6:10; 1 Timothy 1:10), tradition has always declared that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.” (Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Persona humana, 8). They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved. (CCC 2357)
The Catechism reiterates that the homosexual inclination is “objectively disordered.” It also teaches, quoting St. Thomas Aquinas, that loving is “to will the good of another” and that mortal sin, such as homosexual activity, causes the “eternal death of hell” unless it is repented of. (CCC 1766, 1861)
The Diocese of Hildesheim stated that it seeks to build on the “Blessing for this World” declaration and that it wants to establish “safe(r) spaces” for what it called “queer people under the roof of the church of Hildesheim.”
Bishop Heiner Wilmer is a staunch supporter of the heretical Synodal Way. He was one of the 40 German bishops who voted in favor of adopting a document that contradicts the Church’s moral teaching and falsely states that homosexual acts are not sinful or intrinsically evil.
In April 2020, Wilmer criticized Catholics who he said are “fixated only on the Eucharist” and downplayed the negative impact of public Masses being shut down in Germany during the COVID lockdowns.
