Pope Francis has warned people to be wary of gender ideology, which he called “the ugliest danger” of the modern age.
The pope’s warning stems from how gender ideology is “erasing differences” between the two genders, which he warned is “erasing humanity.” The pope’s statement was delivered during a two-day international conference over the weekend titled “Man, Woman, Image of God: For an Anthropology of Vocations.”
“It is very important that there is this meeting, this meeting between men and women, because today, the ugliest danger is gender ideology, which cancels out differences,” Francis said on Friday.
Francis’s statement came shortly after he returned to the Vatican last week, following a visit to the hospital in Rome on Wednesday while fighting influenza. During the conference, the pope, 87, said he still had a cold and found it “tiring to read for a while” and then delegated the task of reading the address to Monsignor Filippo Ciampanelli.
Last year, Francis declared that Catholic bishops were allowed to bless same-sex couples, a declaration that has since caused division within the church. He has defended this declaration, stating that usually, those who reject a decision “don’t understand” it.
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The reaction within the Catholic Church to Francis’s declaration has been divided, with some members, such as Archbishop Thomas J. Rodi of the archdiocese in Mobile, Alabama, stating that “reflection and consultation” were needed to address it properly. Some within the church argued the church’s teachings on marriage being between one man and one woman did not change with the pope’s decision, prompting the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to issue a statement clarifying the differences between pastoral blessings and sacramental blessings.
“The Church’s teaching on marriage has not changed, and this declaration affirms that, while also making an effort to accompany people through the imparting of pastoral blessings because each of us needs God’s healing love and mercy in our lives,” the statement said.
