Our disagreement with the Holy See
Marriage of Priest: The Catholic Church considers the law of clerical celibacy to be not a doctrine but a discipline. Exceptions are sometimes made, especially in the case of married male Lutheran, Anglican and other Protestant clergies who convert to the Catholic Church, and the discipline could, in theory, be changed for all ordinations to the priesthood. / Why Pope Francis may open the door to married priests
Homosexuality: There have been practical and ministerial disagreements within the clergy, hierarchy, and laity of the Catholic Church concerning the church's position on homosexuality. / Pope Francis made news recently by voicing his support for same-sex civil unions, legal arrangements that give gay and lesbian couples many of the same rights as married opposite-sex couples. / There have been notable Catholics who were gay or bisexual, including priests and bishops. Catholic dissenters from the official teaching say that love between people of the same sex is as spiritually valuable as love between people of the opposite sex and that LGBT Catholics are as many members of the body of Christ as heterosexuals are. Catholic organizations that support the official teaching may campaign against gay rights or argue that gay people should be celibate. REM: The Great Commission ( Matthew 28:16–20) is to preach the Good News to all people to the fundamental dignity possessed by each person as created by God. God has created every human person out of love and wishes to grant them eternal life in the communion of the Trinity. All people are created in the image and likeness of God and thus possess an innate human dignity that must be acknowledged and respected. In keeping with this conviction, we teach that persons who are homosexual must be accepted with respect and compassion.
Women included in the priesthood: The teaching of the Catholic Church on ordination, as expressed in the 1983 Code of Canon Law, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, and the apostolic letter Ordinatio sacerdotalis, is that only a Catholic male validly receives ordination. Pope Francis said in a 2013 interview regarding women's priestly ordination, "Concerning the ordination of women, the Church has spoken and says, 'No.' John Paul II said it, but with a definitive formulation. That is closed, that door." He later expanded on this in a November 2016 informal statement on the return flight from his papal visit to Sweden to commemorate the Reformation: "On the ordination of women in the Catholic Church, the final word is clear, it was said by St. John Paul II, and this remains." In contrast to the ordination of women to the Catholic priesthood, the ordination of women to the diaconate is being actively discussed by Catholic scholars, and theologians, as well as senior clergy. See