No More Lavender Mafia!

With the appointment of Fr. Thomas Hennen, bishop-elect, as bishop of Baker, Oregon, we face a troubling reality: instead of correcting the trajectory set by Pope Francis, Pope Leo XIV is doubling down on it – deepening the ambiguity that has plagued the Church.

Fr. Hennen is not merely a well-meaning pastor – he was intimately involved in drafting pastoral guidelines that blur the clear lines of Catholic teaching on sexuality and gender. His work with Davenport’s LGBTQ+ directive may carry the veneer of welcoming language, but in substance it echoes the rhetorical strategies of gender ideology, undermining Catholic clarity and weakening the call to chastity. When who we are as men and women becomes negotiable, the Gospel becomes negotiable.

This doctrinal smokescreen is the hallmark of the Lavender Mafia – a clandestine network within the Church hierarchy that protects and advances a homosexual ideology while masquerading under the banner of compassion. It gained unprecedented influence during the Francis era: from the explicit approval of same-sex blessings to episcopal cover-ups. Its tentacles now reach into the Leo papacy, and Fr. Hennen’s appointment is proof.

Pope Francis presided over a doctrinal collapse: Fiducia Supplicans green-lighted blessings of same-sex unions, plain and simple. That rupture has not been undone by Pope Leo – it is being compounded. As shepherds, we are called not to pick our metaphors but to call sin precisely; and when mercy soft-soils truth, souls are lost.

As bishops, we have a sacred duty to cry out to Our Holy Father: if you are serious about reform, dismantle this network of confusion. Remove ideologues who use pastoral language to conceal doctrinal erosion. Appoint shepherds who preach the unvarnished, uncompromised Gospel of Christ, not politically correct euphemisms dressed in synodal platitudes.

I speak not in a spirit of rebellion, but in fidelity to Christ and His Bride. If that is too strong for Rome, then the silence from the top is deafening proof that nothing has changed.

The faithful deserve better. The Bride of Christ demands better. We will remain loud, unwavering, and clear. No more blessings without conversion. No more ambiguity. No more Lavender Mafia!