Heresy of Pope Leo XIV

by Brian Murphy
November 25, 2025

In a general sense, it can be said that one may teach with words or with actions.  As the saying goes “sometimes actions speak louder than words.”  In examining the actions of Pope Leo XIV, one finds that his support and condoning of LGBTQ (lesbian gay bisexual transgender queer) ideology speaks louder than words and can be made the basis for accusing him of serious heresy.  The Church does not accept transgender ideology.  On the contrary, every form of sexual expression between biological males (sodomy) or biological females is gravely immoral and sinful.  Pope Leo XIV has made several actions which support and condone LGBTQ ideology.  While these actions do not constitute formal apostolic teaching, they nevertheless “speak louder than words” and as such, constitute heretical teaching.  While Pope Leo and others have made many statements welcoming the LGBTQ crowd into the Church, much akin to Christ eating with sinners, there is a major difference between welcoming the crowd and welcoming the ideology.  Welcoming the ideology is heresy because the ideology refutes the Fifth Commandment (“You shall not commit adultery”) which is an article of Divine and Catholic faith.  The correct approach to this issue is to emphasize the Church’s teaching on chastity.  The same rules regarding sexual behavior apply to everybody – male, female, married, single or widowed.

There have been several examples in this area where Pope Leo has not upheld Church teaching in a righteous manner.

There is the incident on September 6, 2025 when a large crowd of LGBTQ people were invited into St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, with the hope and intention of gaining Church support for their deviant life style.  Men were holding hands and one wore a shirt emblazoned with the words “F… the Rules.”  Their objective was not to repent.  Rather it was to change Church teaching.  Pope Leo welcomed them and made no attempt to invite them to reform their lives, thereby condoning their lifestyle.  This is heresy in action.

On July 10, 2025 Pope Leo appointed Fr. Thomas J. Hennen from the Diocese of Davenport, Iowa, as Bishop of Baker, Oregon.  During his tenure in the Diocese of Davenport, Fr. Hennen created much controversy as a member of a Gender Committee (formed by Bishop Thomas Zinkula) that worked on pastoral guidance related to gender and sexual identity.  The Committee’s 2023 document. Guidelines for Pastoral Accompaniment of Sexual and Gender Minorities, “ emphasizes:

• “Fundamental respect for the dignity of every human person…body and soul.
• A case-by-case pastoral approach, not a rigid policy; a willingness to make appropriate accommodations in some scenarios.

The strategy of “appropriate accommodations” created great controversy as it immediately implies that there are exceptions to Church teaching when there are not.  Even the name of the Committee is problematic because the Church does not recognize “Gender Minorities.” So now we have a new Bishop of Baker who is willing to make “appropriate accommodations” for “gender minorities.” This is a bad appointment by Pope Leo which exposes his condoning gender ideology.

On November 2, 2016 Fr. James Martin, a well-known priest delivered his perspectives at a gathering of New Ways Ministry in Pikesville, MD.  The national Catholic LGBT advocacy group was honoring Martin with its Bridge Building Award, which according to its website, recognizes people “who by their scholarship, leadership or witness have promoted discussion, understanding and reconciliation between the lesbian/gay community and the Catholic Church.  Martin picked up the bridge theme in his lecture, titled “A Two Way Bridge” in which he proposed a way forward for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people and the institutional church to address their more-often-than-not contentious and combative interactions. “Much of the tension characterizing this complicated relationship results from a lack of communication and, sadly, a good deal of mistrust, between LGBT Catholics and the hierarchy.  What is needed is a bridge between the community and the church,” he said.  Specifically, one with two lanes constructed out of respect, compassion and sensitivity.  He said that respect for the LGBT community “means, at the very least, recognizing that the LGBT community exists,” and also acknowledging the gifts they bring to the Church, as every community does.

The problem with Fr. Martin’s whole bridge schema is that it fails to distinguish between respect, compassion and sensitivity to individuals, which must always be maintained and respect, compassion and sensitivity to the false gender ideology which this “community” brings to the Church which must always be resoundingly rejected.  Martin’s bridge model is seriously flawed because it allows the ideology to cross the bridge into the Church.  That ideology incessantly hopes that the Church will change her teaching.  Indeed, Martin asks the Church to “lay to rest” terms like “afflicted with same-sex attraction,” homosexual person” and “objectively disordered” and instead use the words most common to the community, such as LGBT, LGBTQ and gay and lesbian.  This amounts to a direct request to the Church to change her teaching, which is not complicated.  All men are called to be chaste.  There are only two genders.  There are no gender minorities.  The “community” that Martin refers to openly promotes a gender ideology that directly clashes with Church teaching.  As such Fr. James Martin is a deceiver and should be removed from ministry.

On September 1, 2025 Fr. James Martin met with Pope Leo in Rome.  According to Martin, Pope Leo told him that he intends to continue Pope Francis’ policy of openness and welcome toward LGBTQ Catholics.  He encouraged Martin to continue his ministry with the LGBTQ community.  According to Martin, Leo expressed a broad vision of welcome, quoting in Spanish “todos, todos, todos” (“all, all, all), which echoes Francis' famous line.  If there was any fraternal correction of Martin’s ministry, as their should have been, it was not made public.  Hence, the overall result is that Pope Leo condoned and supported Martin’s efforts to build a bridge that would foster gender ideology entering the Church and replace current teaching.  This is heresy. The heresy is rather cunning.  Words like “respect”, "sensitivity" and “human dignity” which are true foundations for any form of pastoral care become euphemisms for tolerance of the ideology, not just tolerance of the person.  Yes, there is an LGBTQ community, but it is a community with an agenda to achieve acceptance of its ideology.  The examples above show how this is clearly demonstrated.  There is no moral requirement for the Church to accept this form of bridge building.  On the contrary, any attempt to bring gender ideology into the Church should be rejected entirely just as St. Paul admonished the Corinthians for their immorality and demanded that the immoral one, who was living with his Father’s wife, be delivered to Satan for the destruction of his flesh so that his spirit may be saved on the day of the Lord.  I Cor. 5:1-5.  We see from this teaching how St. Paul commands us to apply compassion, sensitivity, respect and human dignity. We call it "tough love." Let no one be deceived by the LGBTQ appeal for acceptance. The Church always accepts the person but not the gender ideology.