The subject has surfaced repeatedly in recent weeks.
At the beginning of June, the Italian newspaper Il Messagero published a letter from the Holy Father addressed to a young man excluded from the seminary for being homosexual, whom he encouraged to “move forward” with his vocation.
On May 20, during another closed-door meeting with Italian bishops, Pope Francis was reported to have used derisive language about the presence of homosexuality in seminaries.
In response to press reports on the pope’s alleged language, on May 28 the Vatican issued a statement indicating that Pope Francis “never intended to offend or express himself in homophobic terms, and he extends his apologies to those who were offended by the use of a term that was reported by others.”
According to the Holy See’s Press Office, at the June 11 meeting, after a greeting by Bishop Michele di Tolve and a moment of prayer, Pope Francis engaged in dialogue with the priests in attendance.
Among the topics discussed, the Holy Father referred to the identity of the priest and the beauty of being priests. The pope cited the model of Father Lorenzo Milani as “a great, a light for the Italian priest.”
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