Former lesbian warns against dictatorial Zan bill on homotransphobia
by Jules Gomes, Church Militant:
The Holy See is warning the Italian government that its proposed Zan bill against so-called homotransphobia would violate the Concordat of 1985 between Italy and the Vatican city-state.
“Some of the current contents of the legislative proposal reduce the freedom guaranteed to the Catholic Church by article 2, paragraphs 1 and 3 of the revised Concordat,” Vatican foreign minister Bp. Paul Gallagher noted Thursday to the Italian embassy to the Holy See.
The intervention is without precedent in the history of the relationship between the two states since Italian dictator Benito Mussolini and cardinal secretary of state Pietro Gasparri signed the Lateran Treaty in 1929 recognizing papal sovereignty over Vatican City.
A revised concordat was signed in 1985 between the Vatican and the socialist government of Prime Minister Bettino Craxi, putting an end to Roman Catholicism as Italy’s state religion.
According to article 2, paragraph 1, “The Italian republic recognizes the Catholic Church’s full liberty to develop its pastoral, educational and charitable mission, and to evangelize and to sanctify.”
The concordat continues, “In particular, the Church is assured the freedom to organize its affairs, to exercise public worship, to carry out its teaching and spiritual ministries, as well as to exercise its jurisdiction in ecclesiastical matters.”
The third paragraph of article 2 assures “Catholics and their associations and organizations,” the “full liberty of assembly and to express their thoughts orally and in writing, and by any other means of circulation.”
The Vatican is contending that the Zan bill not only threatens “freedom of organization” — forcing Catholic schools to organize activities supporting the newly formed national day against “homotransphobia” — but also threatens Catholic “freedom of thought.”
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