Pope Francis sent shockwaves across the Christian world when he expressed support for same-sex partnerships in a documentary that premiered on Wednesday. However, the statement has received a muted response from Lithuania's church leadership.
“Homosexuals have a right to be a part of the family. They are children of God and have a right to a family,” the pope said in Francesco, a documentary about the pope that discusses issues including the environment, poverty, migration, racial and material inequality, and discrimination.
“What we have to create is a civil union law. That way they [homosexual people] are legally covered,” the pope said.
Lithuania does not recognise same-sex marriage or civil partnership. Attempts to introduce gender-neutral civil partnership have been resisted by the Lithuanian Bishops' Conference, a body representing the leadership of the country's Catholic Church.
On Friday, the Bishops' Conference issued a brief statement, saying Pope Francis' call for same-sex civil unions “does not change the Church's teachings”.
“Actively discussed in the media at the moment, the thoughts the Pope expressed in the documentary Francesco, by director Evgeny Afineevsky, about the need not to reject homosexual people reflect the Holy Father's wish to help people in difficult situations,” the statement reads.
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“Church members are invited, without violating the faith and the Church's teaching, to take a sensitive and non-indifferent look at those cases of our co-existence that need listening and understanding,” it continued.
Emotions need to cool down
“We need time for emotions to cool down,” commented Rosita Garškaitė, the editor-in-chief of the Christian online newspaper Bernardinai.lt, about the implications of the pope's words.
Meanwhile Milda Ališauskienė, a social science professor at Kaunas-based Vytautas Magnus University, told LRT.lt that Pope Francis' statement pertained to the Church's relation with the secular state rather than its own doctrine.
Unlike marriage, civil partnership is not under the Church's purview, she said, and it is not up to the Church to introduce civil unions.
“The statement [by the pope] is intended to review the Church's participation [in secular affairs], but it is not about changing the Church's teachings or dogma,” according to Ališauskienė.
‘Pope is not the Antichrist’
Vytautas Ališauskas, a professor at Vilnius University and Lithuania's former ambassador to the Holy See, has commented on the fiery reaction to the pope's words among the society.
“My Facebook feed is filled with exclamations about Pope Francis' statement on gender-neutral partnerships. So far, enthusiasm dominates: even the pope accepts! I think there will soon come cries about the end of the world or the Antichrist on the papal throne,” Ališauskas wrote in a post.
He believes that neither side is correct, since the pope's position is not the official doctrine of the Church and Francis is not considering to change the official teaching.
Read more: Gay marriage ruling to foster 'Western-level tolerance', says Lithuanian top court
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