Pontiff in same-sex civil union backing

Pope Fra n c i s has endorsed same-sex civil unions for the first time as pontiff while being interviewed for the f e a t u r e - l e n gt h documentary Francesco, which had its premiere at the Rome Film Festival yesterday.

The papal thumbs- up comes midway through the film, which delves into issues such as the environment, p o v e r t y, migration, racial and income inequality, and the people most affected by discrimination.

Wh i le serv ing as archbishop of Buenos Aires, Francis endorsed civil unions for gay couples as an alternative to samesex marriages but he had never publicly backed unions as Pope.

“Ho m o s e x u a l people have the right to be in a family,” he said in one of his sit- down interviews for the film.

“They are children of God. What we have to have is a civil union law, that way they are legally covered.”

The Jesuit priest who has been at the forefront in seeking to build bridges with homosexuals in the Church, the Rev James Martin, praised the Pope’s comments as “a major step forward in the c h u r c h’s support for LGBT people”.

“The Pope’s speaking positively about civil unions also sends a strong civil message to the Church such laws,” statement.

One of the main people in the documentary is Juan Carlos Cruz, the Chilean survivor of clergy sexual abuse who Francis initially discredited.

Mr Cruz, who is gay, said that during his first meetings in Chile with the Pope in May 2018, Francis told him God made him gay.

He tells his own story in snippets throughout the film, chronicling both Fr a n c i s ’ evolution on understanding sexual abuse as well as to document the Pope’s views on gay people.

D i rec to r places where has opposed he said in a

Evgeny

Afineevsky had remarkable access to cardinals, the Vatican television archives and the Pope himself.

He said he negotiated his way in through persistence and deliveries of Argentine mate tea and Alfajores cookies that he got to the Po p e via some wellconnected Argentines in Rome.

Afineevsky said in an interview ahead of the premiere: “Listen, when you are in the Vatican, the only way to achieve something is to break the rule and then to say I’m sorry’.”

T he direc tor worked official a nd unofficial channels, starting in early 2018, and ended up so close to Francis by the end of the project that he showed the Pope the movie on his iPad in August.

The two recent ly exchanged Yom Kippur greetings.

Afineevsky, a Russianborn Jew who lives in Los Angeles, t r av e l l e d the world to film Francesco.

T he se ttings include Cox’s Bazaar in Bangladesh where Myanmar’s Rohingya sought refuge, the USMexico border and Francis’ native Argentina.

SUPPORT: Pope Francis said “homosexual people have the right to be in a family”.