TORONTO, DEC. 21, 2000 (ZENIT.org).- A Toronto city councilman warned Wednesday that John Paul II should not speak out against homosexuals when he visits for World Youth Day in 2002, the National Post reported.
Kyle Rae, an openly homosexual councilor for Toronto Center-Rosedale, plans to meet the city's organizers of the Catholic event to discuss his "concerns about the hateful and un-Christian comments of the Pope concerning people who are gay and lesbian."
Rae was referring to comments the Pope made in July, when he denounced a homosexual festival held in Rome. The Pope said the event, called World Pride Roma 2000, was offensive to Christians and that homosexual acts are "contrary to natural law."
Toronto Mayor Mel Lastman was in Rome when the Pope announced World Youth Day would be held in Toronto. At the time, Lastman called John Paul II one of the most beloved people in the world, and said his announcement that Toronto would be the site for the event was "like winning the Olympics of conferences."
Rae's comments come in the wake of a strong condemnation by the Vatican's semiofficial newspaper against legalization of homosexual marriage in the Netherlands. "The Catholic Church contests these revolutionary innovations, which in the name of freedom, seek to legitimize a union regarded by the universal consciousness as going against nature," said L'Osservatore Romano.
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21. desember 2000