VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis accused critics of his blessing gay Catholics of “hypocrisy” on Wednesday. “No one is scandalized if I give a blessing to an entrepreneur who exploits people: and that is a very serious sin,” he said. “Whereas they are scandalized if I give it to a homosexual.”

 Francis made that comment in an interview with Fr. Vincenzo Vitale, co-editor in chief of the Catholic weekly Credere. 

 The men discussed women’s role in the Church (“in the Roman Curia now there are several women, because they do better than us men in certain positions,” the Pope said), the pontiff’s health (he stressed that “the Church is governed with the head, not with the legs”), and the Fiducia Supplicans: a 2023 declaration from the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith which allows Catholic priests to bless “couples in irregular situations and couples of the same sex.” 

 The pope — and the declaration — both stopped short of outright condoning gay marriage. 

 The blessing of any kind of irregular couple cannot “be performed with any clothing, gestures, or words that are proper to a wedding,” per the Fiducia Supplicans.

 Francis told Vitale that “I don’t bless a ‘same-sex marriage,’ I bless two people who love each other, and I also ask them to pray for me.”

 But the “heart” of the Fiducia Supplicans is “acceptance,” the pope said — a message he has stressed throughout his papacy. 

 “Blessing should not be denied to anyone,” he said in the Credere interview. “Everybody, everybody, everybody.”

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