Pope Says Church Leaders Can Baptize Some ‘Transsexual’ Catholics, Allow Some LGBT Godparents

In a November letter to Brazilian Bishop José Negri, Pope Francis laid out rules for transgender and LGBT engagement in the Catholic church. Bishop Negri had asked the pontiff several questions on how the church should respond to transgender and homosexual-identifying individuals. Under the pope’s new clarifications of rules for the church, some “transsexual” Catholics are allowed to be baptized, become godparents to children, and act as witnesses at weddings. Although the Nov. 3 letter uses “transsexual” in the original Italian, the letter—when translated into English—uses the word “transgender” in its title, according to the Rev. Brown, a Catholic priest with a background in church law....