For those who were hoping for something “new” in this document, perhaps this will be disappointing. And yet this wisdom about dignity is ever ancient, ever new.
The declaration from the Vatican goes beyond the focus on single issues and throws a spotlight on the much broader field of violations of human dignity.
“I do not think that the present anxiety about recognizing the ‘gay’ Catholic is unlike the first-century anxiety regarding the Gentiles becoming Christians,” Jesuit moral theologian James F. Keenan writes.
Mourners wanted Cecilia Gentili’s funeral to be held in St. Patrick’s Cathedral for “iconic” reasons, to make the deceased the “star of the show,” emphasizing the individual over the society.