05/09/2025
Beloved,
Let us not sugarcoat it.
The white smoke has cleared. Once again, here we are: LGBTQIA+ believers and allies watching from the margins as yet another pope steps into power with a theology that feels about as fresh as a mothballed cassock.
Pope Leo XIV, despite the promising name (we were hoping for “Leo the Liberator,” not “Leo the Gatekeeper”), has already signaled that his vision of the Church involves less shepherding of the marginalized and more policing of “doctrine.” His early statements about gender identity and sexuality, drenched in tired appeals to “natural law”, land with all the grace of a homily that quotes Leviticus at Pride. Then there are his appointments, the list of whom reads like a who’s-who of clerics who still believe “compassion” means calling us “intrinsically disordered” with a gentle smile.
It’s not just disappointing.
If this feels personal, that would be because it may well be, or was, directly personal. It’s about the youth in Roman Catholic pews who now feel even more unsafe. It’s about q***r elders who have stayed faithful through decades of silence and scorn, only to be met again with theological gaslighting. It’s about every LGBTQIA+ Roman Catholic, trans, intersex, asexual, nonbinary, bi, le***an, gay: every single one who dares to believe that we are fearfully and wonderfully made, and keeps showing up to a Roman Catholic Church that keeps trying to edit us out of the Gospel.
And yet, they are still here.
Because, surprise: we are not going anywhere. Not because we’re gluttons for punishment, but because we know the truth of our beloved status. The Spirit is still moving through drag queens and trans seminarians, q***r nuns and ace theologians, closeted priests clinging to hope, and out-and-proud lay leaders building something new in the ruins of institutional hypocrisy.
So, to those who feel the sting of betrayal: your heartbreak is holy. Your anger is righteous. Your outrageously brave refusal to disappear is prophetic. And your love: for yourself, for others, for the God who made you exactly as you are, is saving the Church far more than any decree from a marble balcony.
Let Pope Leo be Leo. But let us be louder.
We’ll keep gathering. We’ll keep baptizing and blessing and breaking bread. We’ll keep telling q***r kids that their lives are sacred and their pronouns are valid. We’ll keep building a Church where no one has to choose between their faith and their truth. And we’ll do it all with joy, glitter, and a refusal to let the Vatican have the final word on grace.
The Kingdom of God is not coming from above. It’s already rising from below, from the margins, from the dance floor, from the protest, from the pews and pulpits of those who know love is not a sin.
With fierce love and holy mischief.
+Michael Angelo D'Arrigo
