New Preacher of the Pontifical Household: Concupiscence in the Pulpit

Fr. Roberto Pasolini
The Italian Capuchin Fr. Roberto Pasolini has been appointed Preacher of the Pontifical Household by Pope Francis, the Holy See announced on November 9, 2024. Fr. Pasolini was born on November 5, 1971 in Milan, and was ordained a priest in 2006. He succeeds Cardinal Raniero Cantalamessa, aged 90, who had held this office for more than 44 years.
The agency cath.ch is content to provide a bland portrait of the new preacher, to the point of flatness: "Author of numerous works on spirituality, known in Italy for preaching retreats and spiritual exercises, Fr. Roberto Pasolini will henceforth be the new voice and new face of the sermons on the Fridays of Advent and Lent at the Vatican.
"The Good Friday sermon, during the Passion Service celebrated in St. Peter's Basilica, gives the preacher of the Pontifical Household worldwide visibility."
An Ideologically Oriented Biblical Exegesis
On the Katholisches website, Vatican expert Giuseppe Nardi paints a much more alarming portrait: "Roberto Pasolini is a professor of exegesis at the Faculty of Theology of Northern Italy in Milan. There he is responsible for training religion teachers for the ecclesiastical province of Milan. His appointment has sparked significant discussion, due to his positions on homosexuality.”
"Informazione Cattolica" speaks of "disturbing statements," and writes: "Looking through his recorded sermons available on the Internet, we unfortunately hear some public statements on homosexuality that are painful and disturbing. On February 2, 2024, he gave a long lecture at the Capuchin monastery in Varese on the theme of homosexuality and Christian life.”
In this lecture, Fr. Pasolini focused on alleged “homosexual couples” that he claims to have discovered in the Old Testament. Giuseppe Nardi notes on this subject: “The strong tendency in homosexual circles, to discover homosexuality everywhere and at all time, even at the cost of having to rewrite the whole of history, is well known. It has less to do with the actual historical events, but all the more to do with an overexcited (homo)sexual imagination.”
“For example, Pasolini claims a homosexual relationship between Jonathan and David [in the Old Testament], while in the New Testament he fantasizes about a homosexual relationship between the Roman centurion and his sick servant. How does Pasolini achieve this feat of distortion? By arbitrarily constructing homosexual relationships? Regarding the alleged homosexual relationship between Jonathan and King David, he simply said: 'We can imagine it; we can think about it; we might want to think about it.… Nothing prevents us from thinking about it and imagining it.'”
"It's that simple. Pasolini simply says: 'We can fantasize a little.' The fact that the Capuchin has to violate the biblical text in doing so does not seem to be a problem for him."
In these conditions, it is not surprising - continues Giuseppe Nardi - that "the Capuchin, in his attempt to distort the Bible, omitted those biblical texts that condemn homosexuality as an unnatural vice, such as the passage in the Epistle of Jude [1:7]: 'As Sodom and Gomorrah, and the neighboring cities, in like manner, having given themselves to fornication, and going after other flesh, were made an example, suffering the punishment of eternal fire.'”
"For his part, Pasolini elevates himself over St. Paul, the Prince of the Apostles, by accusing him in his lecture of lacking discernment because he categorically condemned homosexuality. Capuchin-homophile theology shatters the clear biblical statements to the point of being unrecognizable and then reduces them to a time-related phenomenon ‘that has nothing to do with the reality of life’ of modern man. St. Paul simply did not have ‘groups of searching homosexual Christians in front of him.’”
In the Pulpit and Beyond
There is real reason to be concerned when we learn that Fr. Pasolini will not only be a preacher of the Pontifical Household, but that he will also be appointed professor at the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and the Family, at the Lateran University.
Informazione Cattolica wonders if this is so that “Fr. Pasolini’s personal ideas on the interpretation of certain biblical passages on homosexuality would become an official theme of the courses, and so that these same ideas of Fr. Pasolini can be presented in the near future in a cycle of biblical catechesis on homosexuality in St. Peter’s Basilica [by Francis].”
And Giuseppe Nardi legitimately asks: “Is this the teaching that Pasolini give in the religious teacher training [in Milan]? Is this the teaching that Pasolini teaches to children and young people? Is this the appropriate preacher for the Papal Household?”
After the declaration Fiducia supplicans on blessings given to same-sex couples [December 18, 2023] and after the recent creation of Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe (also very much in favor of homosexuals in the Church), an old ecclesiastic disgusted by the appointment of the new preacher angrily stated that, "This Pontifical House has become a real 'cage aux folles.’”
(Sources : cath.ch/katholisches - Trad. à partir de benoitetmoi/DICI n°451 – FSSPX.Actualités)
Illustration : OFMcap.org