Well, I mean let’s be clear. Pope Francis is undeniably part of the Church. He doesn’t just claim to be; he is the formal, undisputed head of the Roman Catholic Church, he refuses to accept responsibility or apologize, and he has been refusing for years.

Likewise, the hundreds (if not thousands) of nuns, monks, and priests who brutalized indigenous children to force them to lose their culture and convert to Christianity were without any questions members and leaders in good standing of their Churches. Nothing, no after-the-fact wand waving or formulas can make that true fact untrue.

These women and men were Christians doing what their Churches wanted them to do and in most cases paid them to do. They paid them to force children to convert to Christianity and to punish them brutally if they would not.

I understand your heart is in the right place, but please do not try to make yourself feel better by rationalizing that the people who committed these evil acts were not really Church members. You’re wrong about that, and you’re erasing history and gravely insulting victims when you make that false claim.

God may be love, if God exists. I have no idea. But as a gay man, I know from the depths of my soul that Churches are often about hating on and persecuting minorities. My own neck has been (metaphorically) ground into the pavement by Christians mumbling the word “love” in some Orwellian twisting of its meaning.

So, when people try to wave all that away by simply dismissing the Christian or Church identities of the people doing the hating and persecuting, I become angry and deeply grieved at the same time.

It’s not OK to do that. It’s just not OK. Please stop. Please accept responsibility.