Catholic Apology to LGBTQ+ People During Italian Prayer Vigil

Bishop Giampio Luigi Devasini

During a prayer vigil for overcoming homophobia and transphobia held on May 20, 2026 in Chiavari, Italy, a striking public act of repentance took place. In a text read aloud during the vigil, Catholics asked forgiveness from LGBTQ+ people and their families for the discrimination, exclusion, silence, violence, and suffering caused or ignored within the Church.

The vigil was attended by Bishop Giampio Luigi Devasini of the Diocese of Chiavari, and the text was written by a group within Chiavari diocesan Family Pastoral Office called “Amore In Cammino” (“Love on the Journey”). The group is composed not only of LGBTQ+ Catholics, but also of other believers and parents of LGBTQ+ people, and is accompanied by a priest.

What makes the text especially significant is that it does not simply speak in generic terms about welcome or inclusion. Instead, it openly acknowledges concrete forms of harm experienced by LGBTQ+ people. The apology reflects a growing awareness within the Catholic Church and an attempt to publicly recognize the suffering many LGBTQ+ people have experienced in religious contexts.

“This text serves as a model for other Catholic leaders and institutions to create their own apology statements,” said Francis DeBernardo, executive director, New Ways Ministry.

The Apology

“In the name of our churches, we ask forgiveness from all lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people, and from their families: we acknowledge our silence. While you were suffering from loneliness, discrimination at work, and rejection from your own families, we too often remained silent.

“We chose the comfort of our certainties over the difficult path of compassion. We kept silent when we should have spoken; we turned away when we should have acted.

“We ask forgiveness for our indifference, which became an additional wound added to your wounds.

“We acknowledge how easily and lightly we have condemned. Too often, instead of extending a hand, we built a wall. We judged you before listening to you, condemned you before loving you, and excluded you before welcoming you.

“We forgot that God’s love has no boundaries and, through our words and our silence, we helped make you feel like strangers in the Father’s house.

“Forgive us for hiding from you the merciful face of God.

“We acknowledge our violence in words and actions. We ask forgiveness for all the times when our teaching, distorted by prejudice and fear, was used to justify insults, aggression, violence, and bullying against you.

“We take responsibility for having created a cultural and religious climate in which hatred toward you could find fertile ground.

“We repent for not having raised our voices strongly enough to defend your dignity when you were victims of abuse, and we humbly ask forgiveness for the physical and moral suffering we have caused you.

“We acknowledge that we denied you spirituality and the right to love openly. We ask forgiveness for having told you, explicitly or implicitly, that your way of loving was less holy, less pure, less pleasing to God.

“We offended the Holy Spirit by trying to separate your sexual orientation or gender identity from your capacity to be children of God.

“We made you believe that your faith and your love were in contradiction, when both are precious gifts.

“Forgive us for stealing from you the joy of feeling fully blessed.

“Finally, with deep shame, we acknowledge crimes of hatred and persecution. Before God and before you, we remember the dark moments in our history when, in the name of a misunderstood faith, we supported unjust laws and encouraged persecution, discrimination, and even the death of people because of their sexual orientation or gender identity.

“We ask forgiveness for the blood that was shed and the tears that were spilled, for the terror instilled and the consciences wounded.

“We recognize that this is a sin that cries out before God. Amen.”

–Elisa Belotti, New Ways Ministry, May 26, 2026