The sensus fidei fidelis is a sort of spiritual instinct that enables the believer to judge spontaneously whether a particular teaching or practice i… - James Martin

[LGBTQ people] are fully members of the church. It’s just a question of getting people to understand that.

Is it any surprise, then, that Jesus felt such intense compassion for the poor and marginalized? That he constantly asked his disciples to care for the poor, the sick, the forgotten, the stranger? He was one of these throwaway people, and he lived among them for 30 years before his public ministry began. Christians tend to see Jesus’ commands to care for the poor as divine. And they were — Jesus was fully divine. But they also came from his human experience. He was fully human as well. I’m always amazed by people who feel they can be Christian without caring for the poor. Not only did Jesus command us to do this, Jesus himself was from this class. When God chose to join us, he joined us in Nazareth, to make sure that we wouldn’t forget.

Treating LGBT people with respect, compassion, and sensitivity is much more than just looking at same-sex marriage and same-sex relations, because they’re more than just their sexual lives, just as straight people are. We would never focus completely on chastity or something like that with straight people – or even, say, straight young people. But we tend to do that with LGBT people, unfortunately