Ron DeSantis is in trouble. I don’t know whether he is or is not Catholic, but “DeSantis” sounds a lot like Spanish for “Of Saints.” I shouldn’t speculate, but he’s still in trouble because many of his constituents are Catholic, both Hispanics, Cubans, and Retirees. If the Pope doesn’t like these anti-LGBTQ laws, they might have to rethink their position. Of course, there are a TON of Catholics who think this pope is a screaming liberal and hate him. Perhaps he is… Nah, he’s just a Jesuit, which requires two post-undergrad degrees Ph.D. in theology, and at least a masters in “Something else.” Francis has a masters in Chemistry. We say it all the time, education leads to…

It was just two months ago he called European leaders practically murderers for being so anti-immigrant. (His parents were immigrants to Argentina).

It is true that in the quote below, he mentions criminalizing LGBTQ issues specifically, but some of DeSantis’s “Don’t Say Gay” and Diversity laws are so punitive (You’re fired!) that they may as well be. I suspect Francis would consider them “unjust.” From NBC News:

Pope Francis, the head of the Anglican Communion and top Presbyterian minister together denounced the criminalization of homosexuality on Sunday and said gay people should be welcomed by their churches.

Don’t tell the evangelicals…

The three Christian leaders spoke out on LGBTQ rights during an unprecedented joint airborne news conference returning home from South Sudan, where they took part in a three-day ecumenical pilgrimage to try to nudge the young country’s peace process forward.

Francis referred his Jan. 24 comments to the AP and repeated that such laws are “unjust.” He also repeated previous comments that parents should never throw their gay children out of the house. “To condemn someone like this is a sin,” he said. “Criminalizing people with homosexual tendencies is an injustice.”

YES. We would go much further – obviously! But that is a lot of power going against a lot of traditional teachings, and it IS meaningful. It just goes to show how far we’ve come in 30 years. Still a LONG LONG way to go. And we need to go much faster. But that doesn’t mean this isn’t a significant step. There are 1.3 Catholics in the world and 30 million in the U.S.

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[email protected], @JasonMiciak, with Nicole Hickman