Per Christum Catholic Blog

Bishop Jaime Soto of Sacramento, speaking before a conference of the National Association of Catholic Diocesan Gay and Lesbian Ministries, defended Church Teaching that homosexual acts are sinful. Even though Bishop Soto recognized that marriage is “not the sole domain of love,” he correctly asserted that Jesus calls us to higher expectations than just what we may want to do at a given moment. While Bishop Soto’s message was not well-received at this event (I give him credit for having the guts to speak gently but frankly), I think it does speak to the Church’s balanced message of holiness and forgiveness. Bp. Soto emphasizes different types of love, including love between friends. Below is an excerpt from the news article linked above, which shows some of Bp. Soto’s insights:

“The nature of love has been distorted,” the bishop continued. “Many popular notions have deviated from its true destiny. Love for many has come to mean having sex. If you cannot have sex than you cannot love. This is the message. Even more destructive is the prevailing notion that sex is not an expression of love. Sex is love.”

He said this view “deprives sexuality of its true meaning” and hampers the possibility of “ever knowing real love.”

Sexual intercourse, he explained, is “a beautiful expression of God’s love” when it is understood “as a unique expression intended to share in the creative, faithful love of God.” Referencing Pope Benedict XVI’s encyclical Deus Caritas Est, he said that when sexual intercourse ceases to be an icon of God’s “creative, unifying love” it becomes “impoverished” and “demeans the human person.”

Bishop Soto then lauded the virtue of chastity, calling it “the path that brings us to that harmony with God’s wisdom and love” and a thing that “moves us beyond one’s desire to what God wills for each one of us.”

This is true, he said, also for men and women who are homosexual.

“Let me be clear here,” the bishop stated. “Sexual intercourse, outside of the marriage covenant between a man and a woman, can be alluring and intoxicating but it will not lead to that liberating journey of true self-discovery and an authentic discovery of God. For that reason, it is sinful.”

While same-sex relations can be “alluring” for homosexuals, it “deviates from the true meaning of the act and distracts them from the true nature of love to which God has called us all.”

Acknowledging the “beautiful, heroic expression” of married love, he added, “Marriage is also not the sole domain of love as some of the politics would seem to imply.” Love includes “the deep and chaste love of committed friends” as well as the love of religious and clergy, the bonds between Christians, and the love between family members.

“Should we dismiss or demean the human and spiritual significance of these lives given in love?” He asked rhetorically.

“We hope and pray that all people, including our brothers and sisters who are homosexuals, will see the reasonableness of our position and the sincerity of our love for them,” the bishop continued, closing with an exhortation to the audience “to be drawn into the ways and the manners of Jesus.”