Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1513442
11 NEWS maltatoday | WEDNESDAY • 20 DECEMBER 2023 POPE Francis's decision to give Roman Catho- lic priests the green light to bless same-sex couples and others in "irregular" situations is a significant development for the LGBTIQ com- munity. From a liberal lay perspective, the move is not a seismic shift – the Vatican has made it very clear this does not mean endorsement of relationships the Church considers to be sinful. However, for LGBTIQ Catholics the move represents some form of recognition as hu- mans who can fall in and out of love; and commit to one another like anybody else. After all, there was never any sense in hav- ing priests bless buildings, cars and other material objects but not same-sex couples. The Pope's decision to endorse the guide- lines opens the Church's door ajar to peo- ple in the LGBTIQ community who want to have a fulfilling Christian experience. And knowing how the wheels of change turn very slowly in an institution like the Church, the development is significant. In many ways, it justifies the principled stand taken by Dominican Mark Montebello and diocesan priest Colin Apap several years ago when they saw no theological problem in blessing same-sex couples much to the cha- grin of the conservatives who ran the roost in Malta's Church. Getting there has not been easy and the con- servative winds within the Vatican walls and beyond continue to blow hard against Pope Francis and his reformist agenda. Indeed, to some he is the devil incarnate whose actions are undermining the Church's foundations. But to many others, Francis has brought about a breath of fresh air. One can only hope that the Maltese church fully embraces these guidelines and the spirit that underpins them. We do not doubt Archbishop Charles Sci- cluna's commitment. After all, Scicluna and then Gozo Bishop Mario Grech had been trailblazers internationally in 2017 when publishing guidelines on how priests should accompany divorced and remarried Catho- lics after taking the cue from Pope Francis's exhortation Amoris Laetitia. The guidelines were frowned upon by some conservative parish priests in Malta but praised by the Pope at the time. Almost seven years later, the Archbishop must now make sure that the latest devel- opment concerning the blessing of same-sex couples is also reflected at parish level. These couples should not be made a pariah in their own Church. However, this leader, which speaks from a liberal lay viewpoint, hopes it will not take the Roman Catholic Church hundreds more years to enlighten itself and accept that peo- ple in the LGBTIQ community should be able to partake in all the sacraments without discrimination. In Biblical tradition, God may have creat- ed a man and a woman to go forth and have children but he also created a diversity of people along the way. It is only patriarchal arrogance over the millennia that has inter- preted God's will in such a way that stifles human diversity and the relationships that may be borne out of it. For how can a God of love exclude two men who have harmed nobody and whose only 'sin' is loving each other? How can a God of love shut the door on two women who love each other and want to live by Christian val- ues? How can a God of love be a tyrant with trans persons whose only 'sin' is being born that way? There must be more to this God of love than what men in charge of his church - be- cause they have always been and continue to be men - have professed over the millennia. Pope Francis has gently pushed the door to allow some light into the darkness. For the sake of those LGBTIQ persons who feel they belong to the Catholic Church we can only hope the stream of light evolves into a bea- con of hope that floods the room with com- passion, love and acceptance… and this will happen in their lifetime. At last, a stream of light for LGBTIQ Catholics maltatoday MaltaToday, MediaToday Co. Ltd, Vjal ir-Rihan, San Gwann SGN 9016 MANAGING EDITOR: SAVIOUR BALZAN EXECUTIVE EDITOR: KURT SANSONE EDITOR: PAUL COCKS Tel: (356) 21 382741-3, 21 382745-6 Website: www.maltatoday.com.mt E-mail: dailynews@mediatoday.com.mt Two small issues immediate- ly arise, even at a glance. (On top of the third I already men- tioned: i.e., that Aaron Farrugia evidently got his job description all muddled-up.) The first is that the 'success', or otherwise, of any given Cabi- net Minister, is invariably going to be measured by their ability to actually deliver on their own, stated agenda. And in Aaron Farrugia's case – though I freely admit it is a daunting (though not impossible) task – that agenda involves, inter alia, ad- dressing Malta's many, endem- ic traffic congestion problems… and also, 'making Malta's roads safer to actually use'. Now: I could, very simply, end this article right here: by pointing towards various re- cent NSO statistics, which amply confirm that neither of those objectives is currently being reached, in practice. But to be fair: I reckon it would be just slightly 'unreasonable', to lay ALL the root-causes of all Malta's traffic woes, directly at Aaron Farrugia's door. Nonetheless, I do think it should be bleedingly obvious, that those two objectives – i.e., to simultaneously reduce both traffic congestion, and traffic accidents – can never realisti- cally be achieved, by a policy which aims to somehow placate both the 'automotive industry lobby', and the 'pedestrian-cy- clist perspective', at one-and- the-same time. And I don't think I should even have to spell out why, either. One of those lobbies wants 'more space for cars'; the other, 'more space for people'. And this, in a country where – in case no one's ever noticed before – 'space' just happens to be the one, single commodity that we most sorely, and des- perately, LACK… Put all that together, and see where it takes you in the end. Meanwhile, however, one thing should be abundantly clear: in a scenario like that, 'drawing a line down the middle' is simply NEVER going to work. (And ironically enough: it is precisely for this reason, that the job of a cabinet minister is NOT to simply 'juggle between two in- compatible views', in the hope of finding a non-existent 'bal- ance'…) But this only brings us to the second little problem with Far- rugia's circus act. Even if were to accept his own, manifest- ly-flawed definition of 'what it means to be a Transport Min- ister'… where, exactly, is this 'balance' that he is supposed to have struck, between 'cycling enthusiasts' and (equally enthu- siastic) 'automotive lobbyists'? And how did this supposed 'balancing act' manage to result in a newly inaugurated road network – the 'Central-Link' project - in which: a) bicycle-lanes were omit- ted entirely, to accommodate 'wider lanes for traffic', and; b) Farrugia himself even told journalists that bicycle-lanes had become an 'afterthought', for his government; and that he was now more interested in 'keeping traffic flowing, at speed…'? Even by his own standards of 'political acrobatics', then: Aaron Farrugia has not been very successful at 'walking the tight-rope', has he? He wasn't very mindful, of the all-impor- tant need 'to maintain a per- fect balance, between the two extremities he was trying to navigate'… and, most damning of all, he certainly DID 'give un- due weight (and quite a lot of it, at that!) to one side, over the other'… Now: we all know what would happen, if a 'circus tight-rope walker' – a real one: like you'd see in the 'Circo Orfei' – were to somehow 'lose balance', while dangling precarious- ly above a great height…. but what the heck? I'll give you all a little hint, anyway. They'd go: 'Wheeeeeeeeeeeee eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-SPLAT!' (You know: just like Aaron Far- rugia's traffic-management pol- icies did, over the past couple of years…)