Open Letter to Pope Francis: A Father Restores

Dear Pope Francis,

We enter Holy Week fixed on Jesus. His wounds are magnetic to us, the wounded. I am grateful for your exhortation to tend these wounds in our Church, to make Her a field hospital where the gap or gash underneath sin can be restored by fellow members.

Thank you for encouraging us to wash each other’s dirty feet. We preen at Mass in designer shoes until the stench of dirt and damage overwhelms us.

Last night in our parish we prayed for a man beset by homosexual sin. Abuse from rotten men in his life fueled porn addiction and vulnerability to false ‘fathers’; our common enemy scrambled his real needs for empowerment with ‘gay’ sex. As we prayed for him, Jesus made Himself known at the lowest point of his life. Undeterred by time, Jesus rescued my friend through His healing Presence. Risen Jesus’ wounds heal homosexual ones.

The restoration of persons with same-sex desires liberates healing for all. We the disordered who have surrendered to Jesus and Church become healers. Repentance unto Mercy restores us, and we commit, Pope Francis, to restoring a Church divided by homosexuality.

We start with the truth of our wound. We have one. Sexual disintegration is built on a fault-line of abuse (studies cite up to 7X more childhood sexual abuse in adults who ‘gay’-identify than those who do not), emotional neglect, enmeshment, and profound early misperceptions of reality.

Homosexuality is a wound. We who act out our inclinations deepen and infect the wound.

We need healing. Pope Francis, Christians who deny our wound deny us this healing. Several reasons exist for such denial--protection of ‘gay’-loved ones who don’t want to repent, an effort to ‘atone’ for historic homophobia, or misplaced advocacy of an oppressed ‘people’ group. Still, those who fail to name homosexuality as a wound prevent the Church from healing her wounded.

Will you, good Father, deny us this healing?

More than personal integration is at stake. Our common enemy has used this denial to divide the Church. For the last 50 years, the push for ‘gay’ rights has drained Her time, money and energy. Though the battle is more obvious in Protestantism, Roman Catholics are now on brink of schism due to denying the ‘gay’ wound. Wound, what wound? We reframe homosexual divides as no divide at all then insist on confirmation of ‘gay’ people. This misunderstanding divides the Church.

Pope Francis, we need your leadership as never before. Declare the wound and trumpet its cure—Jesus who stoops to wash our feet. Homosexuality seems puny in contrast to war, natural disaster, and global injustice, but no other issue has divided and drained the Church as much. Our common enemy gloats.

Let us fight wisely: we smash the Divider through Jesus’ blood and our witness. I represent thousands who Jesus has liberated from homosexuality. His wounds heal us.

Frank Worthen, forerunner of restoring the same sex attracted, had a vision before his death of a huge rainbow flag hovering over the Vatican, awaiting a central pole on which to wave. Higher still, Frank observed St. Michael the Archangel battling in the heavenlies for Her sexual integrity.

We too fight for your clarity and courage in championing how the Wounded God-Man restores our sexual wound.