Pope Francis reportedly expressed his opposition to gay men becoming priests during a meeting with Roman priests this week, which comes only a couple weeks after he made similar remarks during a closed-door meeting.
Francis, 87, reportedly said that “there is an air of frociaggine in the Vatican” and that those who are gay should not be admitted into seminaries. According to the Washington Post, the word “frociaggine” roughly translates to “fa***tness” in the Roman Italian dialect.
The Post reported that Francis made the remarks while meeting with approximately 200 priests at Rome’s Salesian Pontifical University.
While speaking about the “danger of ideologies in the Church”, he reportedly “reiterated the need to welcome and accompany gay men in the Church” but indicated they should not be allowed into priesthood.
Francis made nearly identical remarks during a private address to Catholic bishops in May while railing against the number of gay priests who were in training.
He reportedly made the remarks in the context of proposals from Italian bishops about changes they want to see in guidelines determining the candidates that seminaries accept.
He reportedly said that he was opposed to letting in candidates who were leading a “double life” by claiming to be celibate while secretly being gay, The Telegraph reported.
He said that there was “already too much fa***try” in seminaries, according to numerous translations of his speech, which was in Italian.
CNN noted that Francis in 2016 upheld the Vatican’s ruling in 2005 that the Catholic church cannot allow the ordination of gay men. In 2018, he told Italian bishops “not to accept gay candidates for the priesthood,” the report added.
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However, the Vatican backtracked on his comments late last month after they were leaked to the press and some backlash ensued online.
“The Pope never intended to offend or express himself in homophobic terms, and he extends his apologies to those who felt offended by the use of a term, as reported by others,” the Vatican said in a May statement. “As he (Pope Francis) has said on several occasions, ‘in the Church there is room for everyone, everyone! No one is useless, no one is superfluous, there is room for everyone. Just as we are, everyone.’”
