By
Floribert Patrick Endong
The Vatican’s choice to reverse itself on the LGBTQ issue is to me, the logical outcome of a systematic hide-and-seek game going on not only in the Catholic church. Many harbingers pointed to this controversial development. I will here underline one among many of these premonitory signs: the seemingly false humility embedded in Pope Francis’ denial to judge the LGBTQ community.
In an interview granted Italian journalist Andrea Tornieli in July 2016, his Holiness “eluded” some anti-gay Catholics’ questioning. He “out of all expectations” declared that: ” who am I to judge (LGBTQ people)” .
At first sight, this declaration indicates humility and caution, in tandem with Matthew 7:1-5 which says:
Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.
At second sight however, Pope Francis’ declaration may elicit a plurality of readings. One of such readings is that, Christians tend to take Jesus’ injunction in Mathew 7 (not to judge) at face value! They use it as an excuse to shy away from many of their evangelism prerogatives! And this is extremely sad!
One however needs to juxtapose the injunction (in Matthew) mentioned above with the Apostle Paul’s exhortation in 1 Corinthians 2:15, to ultimately deeply understand what the Christian’s attitude towards judging should be. In 1 Corinthians 2:15 the Apostle Paul actually says that :
But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man
In line with the above, the true and sanctified Christian – the same as Jesus his Master – judges everything including humans (LGBTQ identities included) and non-humans. He does this because he has removed the speck or plank from his eyes – that is, he has completely abandoned sin (Matthew 7:1-5).
In line with the above, the Pope is wrong not to judge LGBTQ sexualities! By his denial to judge, he turns his “spiritual enterprise” into a worldly and democratic industry, which, contrary to a theocracy, is defined by majority-related paradigms. His declaration is a sad argumentum ad populum which is reminiscent of Pilate’s washing of hands (Mathew 27:24). He seems to suggest that he would not judge gays (for humility sake) though gayism is biblically speaking sinful (Gen 9:20-27; Gen 19:1-11; Leviticus 18:22; 20:13; Rom 1: 26-27)!
This is hypocritical and contrary to the salvific and evangelical missions of the Christian. The Christian removes the plank or the speck from his eyes, to be fit to judge everything, including LGBTQ sexualities and sympathisers (Matthew 7:5).
The Church is not the world!
FLORIBERT PATRICK ENDONG IS ALSO CALLED “THE EVANGELIST”
