VATICAN CITY (CNS) – People who act shocked that a priest would bless a gay couple but have no problem with him blessing a crooked businessman are hypocrites, Pope Francis said.
“The most serious sins are those that are disguised with a more ‘angelic’ appearance. No one is scandalized if I give a blessing to an entrepreneur who perhaps exploits people, which is a very serious sin. Whereas they are scandalized if I give it to a homosexual – this is hypocrisy,” he told the Italian magazine Credere.
The interview was scheduled for publication Feb. 8, but Vatican News reported on some of its content the day before when the magazine issued a press release about the interview.
The basics are that the first colonies were created by a splinter faction of the Church of England known as the Puritans. There were other Puritan groups who formed colonies in New England, but the Pilgrims are the group most people think of when talking about the birth of the US, who were distinct from other groups of Puritans for pushing for complete separation from the Church of England. The Puritans basically believed that the Church of England didn’t go far enough in separating from the Catholic Church.