Pope Francis: Being Gay Is a Sin but Not a Crime

Pope Francis has said that "being homosexual is not a crime," calling for an end to laws banning homosexuality, while also saying "it's a sin."

Speaking to the Associated Press, he called criminal restrictions on homosexuality "unjust," continuing that "it's not a crime."

"Yes, but it's a sin," he said. "Fine, but first let's distinguish between a sin and a crime."

The leader of the Catholic Church, speaking from Vatican City, said it is "also a sin to lack charity with one another."

"We are all children of God, and God loves us as we are and for the strength that each of us fights for our dignity," he said, adding religious leaders in the church "must" work to end laws discriminating against homosexuals.

Many of the Catholic Church's bishops, the pope specified, "have to have a process of conversion" and possess "tenderness, please, as God has for each one of us."

Dozens of countries around the globe have laws in place that criminalize homosexuality. In 67 jurisdictions, there are laws banning private, consensual, same-sex activity, according to the Human Dignity Trust. At least six of these carry the death penalty, the charity said. A further six nations have the possibility of using the death penalty to punish homosexuality.

In the decade since Pope Francis became pontiff, he has become known for a more sympathetic attitude to LGBTQ rights and freedoms than many of his predecessors.

But he has a "complicated approach" to the topic, according to LGBTQ advocacy group The Human Rights Campaign.

Back in 2013, Pope Francis told reporters on the way back from his first tour as pontiff that "we shouldn't marginalize people" for being gay.

"They must be integrated into society," he said as he returned to the Vatican from Brazil. "If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord and has good will, who am I to judge?"

He then went on to say that the "problem is not having this orientation," but any form of "lobbying."

"We must be brothers. The problem is lobbying by this orientation, or lobbies of greedy people, political lobbies, Masonic lobbies, so many lobbies. This is the worse problem," the newly elected pope said at the time.

Speaking in 2020, Pope Francis said gay people "have a right to be in a family," who could be "legally covered" by a "civil union law." Before becoming pope, he had been vocally opposed to the legalization of gay marriage.

In 2018, the pontiff said that the "question of homosexuality is a very serious one" and urged gay priests and nuns to "leave the priesthood or the consecrated life rather than live a double life."

In January 2021, he encouraged parents with gay children to "not hide behind an attitude of condemnation" but to offer support.

In 2003, the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith concluded an examination of gay rights in the Church by saying that "respect" for gay people "cannot lead in any way to approval of homosexual behaviour or to legal recognition of homosexual unions."

It added that legal protections of "homosexual unions or placing them on the same level as marriage" would be an "approval of deviant behaviour."

Update 1/25/23, 5:25 a.m. ET: This article has been updated to include further background information.