Diocese of San Diego
O cardeal Robert McElroy
Pope Francis appoints Trump critic to lead Catholic Church in the USA. Cardinal defends outreach to migrants and inclusion of LGBTQIA+.
The Vatican this Monday as representative of the Catholic Church in the USA Cardinal Robert McElroy, of San Diego, known for a pastoral approach to migrants and by “radical inclusion” of the LGBTQIA+ communityas some classify his doctrine, tells the .
The cardinal also argues that the Church must rethink the focus it gives to the idea that anyone who has sex outside a heterosexual marriage is seriously sinning.
“The effect of the tradition that all sexual acts outside marriage objectively constitute grave sin has been to centering the Christian moral life disproportionately on sexual activity“, he wrote in the magazine. “This must change.”
McElroy is 70 years old and headed a diocese in California, near the border with Mexico, for a decade. Now, he will replace Wilton Gregory, the first African-American cardinal in that position.
In a speech thanking Pope Francis (who has supported, against the more conservative side of the Church) for the appointment, he addressed the Hispanic community in Spanish and also said that the African-American community was “fundamental” to the USA.
He also mentioned a probable “contrast” that stands between his work and the new Trump administration when it comes to immigration.
“The Catholic Church teaches that a nation has the right to control its borders and our nation’s desire to do so is a legitimate effort,” he said.
“At the same time, we are always called to have a sense of the dignity of each human person. Thus, the plans that have been talked about at some levels, in the sense of a massive deportationindiscriminate and extended to the entire country, would be incompatible with Catholic doctrine“, he concluded.
“Children’s Revenge”
McElroy has been critical of the recently elected Donald Trump. When, at his first inauguration in 2017, the next US president referred to refugees as enemies and announced promises of mass deportation, the cardinal had made an appeal: “we must all become disruptors” of these ideas.
But the criticism was not long in coming. The blogger Luigi Casalinitherefore, classified the choice of Pope Francis as “a childish revenge” because Trump recently nominated Brian Burch for US ambassador to the Vatican – Brian Burch is a conservative activist and critic of Pope Francis.
“McElroy’s appointment is a very clear message,” he says Massimo Faggioli, Catholic theologian at Villanova University. It is “a high level response Given the current political situation in America, there is no denying it.”
Still, another thinker points out, Alejandro Bermudez, former director of the conservative Catholic News Agency, “the bottom line is that, despite the appointment’s significant emblematic statement, McElroy’s actual practical influence over Trump’s policies will be minimal“.
“I can’t think of a better candidate for the position in the country’s capital”, he argues in return Tom Reeseanalyst for Religion News Service. “He is bright, articulate and clearly a big supporter of Francisco and supports their concerns that the church should stand with the poor and marginalized.”
