The Vatican’s Jubilee 2025 website currently lists on its calendar the Pilgrimage of “La Tenda di Gionata” (“The Tent of Jonathan”), a heterodox Italian LGBTQ group that has claimed that Scripture does not condemn homosexual relationships.
The pilgrims will be joined for Jubilee events by Outreach, a pro-LGBTQ group founded by the dissident Father James Martin, SJ, according to the organization’s website.
According to the Outreach website, these events “are an official part of the Jubilee celebrations.”
Agnese Palmucci, a spokesperson for the Vatican’s Jubilee press office, confirmed to The Pillar in December that the Dicastery for Evangelization’s Section for Fundamental Questions of Evangelization in the World “announced it on the calendar,” but added that it “did not endorse the pilgrimage.”
A program detailing the pilgrimage’s concluding Jubilee events in Rome, shared by Disclose.tv, shows the events will kick off on September 5 with the “international meeting” entitled “Listen to the experiences of LGBTQ Catholics.” That evening, a “rainbow cross” will be presented during a prayer vigil at the Piazza del Gesù in Rome by “ a group of LGBT + pilgrims and their parents.”
The next day, Bishop Francesco Savino of Cassano all’Jonio, Italy is to offer a Mass at Gesu Church, followed by the Jubilee Pilgrimage to St. Peter’s Basilica’s Holy Door.
The pilgrimage wraps up at St. Peter’s Square, where the pilgrims will join Pope Leo XIV for the Angelus. According to The Pillar, the LGBT events are supported by the Italian bishops’ conference as well as the Society of Jesus, the Jesuits.
While a spokesperson previously claimed the events’ listing on the Vatican Jubilee website did not indicate Vatican endorsement, the recent removal of a reference to the SSPX Jubilee pilgrimage seems to indicate that it is in fact a tacit endorsement of the LGBTQ group.
Pressed about the inclusion of the LGBTQ pilgrimage on the Jubilee website, Rino Fisichella, Proprefect of the Dicastery for Evangelization and Delegate for the Jubilee, stated, “We include all those who ask us to experience faith. … Therefore, I don’t see why anyone should be excluded,” SSPX News noted.
The Vatican’s differing approach to the two groups is deeply ironic. While the SSPX is seen by the Vatican hierarchy as possessing an “irregular” canonical status, the priestly society adheres to Catholic doctrine as it was taught for about two millennia. “La Tenda di Gionata” and Outreach, by contrast, heretically defy Church teaching by supporting grave sin.