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IN A most unusual move, senior Vatican spokesman Fr Federico Lombardi this week distanced the Holy See from highly controversial, anti-gay and anti-transsexual comments made by retired Vatican curia figure Cardinal Javier Barragán from Mexico.

In comments carried by the Italian news website Pontifex News, Cardinal Barragán, former president of the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Health Workers, said: “Transsexuals and homosexuals will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven, it’s not me who says it but St Paul. People are not born homosexual, rather they become homosexual and for different reasons – education issues or because they did not develop their own identity during adolescence. It may not be their fault, but acting against nature and the dignity of the human body is an insult to God.”