CHICAGO, Illinois (LifeSiteNews) — A Chicago priest who was seen in a video last week “blessing” a Methodist minister and her lesbian “spouse” in a ceremony imitating a wedding, has now issued a public apology saying he “made a very poor decision in the words and visuals captured on the video.”
According to an official statement released by the Vincentians’ Western Province, Father Joseph S. Williams, pastor of St. Vincent de Paul Parish in Cardinal Blase Cupich’s Archdiocese of Chicago, said he “regrets the language of the blessing and the use of vestments and the church itself, which he now recognizes were a violation of the norms approved by the Church.
“The shape that the blessing took as portrayed in the video came about due to my attempt to provide for them a meaningful moment of God’s grace,” Fr. Williams said. “I wanted to do it well.”
To Fr. Williams, providing a “meaningful moment” apparently meant making the “blessing” of the homosexual couple look and feel as much like a marriage ceremony as possible.
“Do you freely recommit yourselves to love each other as holy spouses?” Williams asked Kelli Beard and Myah Knight.
“We do, I do,” replied the lesbians.
“Loving God, increase and consecrate the love which Kelli and Myah have for one another,” said Williams, dressed in an alb and a stole, facing both the couple and the altar.
“The rings that they have exchanged are the sign of their fidelity and commitment,” stated Williams. “May they continue to prosper in your grace and blessing. We ask this through Christ our Lord.”
“May God’s blessing be yours, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit,” said the priest while making the Sign of the Cross over the lesbian couple who also crossed themselves.
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“A week or so after the fact, I viewed the video,” Williams stated. “I immediately realized that I had made a very poor decision in the words and visuals captured on the video.”
At least one commentator has said that the apology from Fr. Williams and the Vincentians did not go far enough.
“Gee … he’s ‘sorry’ for his ‘poor choice of words.’ How about being sorry for committing sacrilege and causing scandal?” wondered the Lepanto Institute in a post on X. “How about making public acts of reparation?”
“This is garbage!” declared the Institute.
Gee … he’s “sorry” for his “poor choice of words.” How about being sorry for committing sacrilege and causing scandal? How about making public acts of reparation? This is garbage! pic.twitter.com/arhEyNxysk
— Lepanto Institute (@LepantoInst) May 13, 2024
The Lepanto Institute, which describes itself as an organization “dedicated to the defense of the Catholic Church against assaults from without as well as from within,” continued to press the inadequacy of the apology in subsequent posts on X.
“Had a priest said the TLM (Traditional Latin Mass) without permission and offered an ‘apology’ like this he still would have been pulled from ministry and disciplined for it,” noted the Lepanto spokesperson.
“I wonder what this priest would think if the laity held a ceremony that mocked his ordination inside his parish!”he or she continued.
As previously reported by LifeSiteNews, the Catholic Church has always taught, in accordance with Sacred Scripture and the natural law, that homosexuality is a grave sin and intrinsically disordered. People in homosexual relationships cannot be said to “love each other,” as love means “to will the good of another,” in the words of St. Thomas Aquinas.
Moreover, Williams’ invocation of Jesus Christ and the Blessed Trinity is a grave act of blasphemy that misuses God’s Name to endorse sodomy, a sin that “cries out to heaven for vengeance.” His misuse of the church and sacred objects for the scandalous homosexual “blessing” was sacrilege.
Fr. Williams initially justified the ceremony by pointing to Pope Francis’ highly controversial endorsement of homosexual ‘blessings’ in Fiducia Supplicans.
Numerous bishops’ conferences have repudiated Fiducia Supplicans, and prominent prelates and theologians, including Cardinal Robert Sarah and Father Gerald Murray, have condemned the document for containing heresy.
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