Elton John is speaking out against the Vatican after they issued a statement saying that the Catholic Church will not bless same-sex marriages.
On Monday, the Vatican’s orthodoxy office issued a response to a question asking if members of the Catholic clergy can bless gay marriages. Their statement, which was approved by Pope Francis, stated that God “cannot bless a sin,” though it upheld that the Catholic Church still welcomes LGBTQ+ people.
John responded to the news on Twitter, resurfacing the 2019 claim that the Vatican helped to finance John’s biopic “Rocketman,” which highlights John’s marriage to his husband, David Furnish.
“How can the Vatican refuse to bless gay marriages because they ‘are sin,’ yet happily make a profit from investing millions in ‘Rocketman’ – a film which celebrates my finding happiness from my marriage to David??” John tweeted, adding the hashtag “hypocrisy.”
How can the Vatican refuse to bless gay marriages because they “are sin”, yet happily make a profit from investing millions in “Rocketman” – a film which celebrates my finding happiness from my marriage to David?? #hypocrisy@VaticanNews @Pontifex pic.twitter/sURtrWB6Nd
— Elton John (@eltonofficial) March 15, 2021
John attached photos of two side-by-side articles to the tweet, with one featuring the Vatican’s refusal to bless same-sex marriages, and the other a Daily Beast article titled “How the Vatican Spent Millions on Elton John’s Biopic.”
Though the allegation has not been confirmed by the Vatican, they have not denied it. The news originally broke in the Italian publication Corriere Della Sera, in an article breaking down the Vatican’s various investments using its Peter’s Pence fund. As the article states, “over €4 million went to finance the production of films such as the latest ‘Men in Black’ and the biography of Elton John, ‘Rocketman.'”
John was an executive producer of the film, and Furnish also served as a producer. “Rocketman” spent around $40 million on production, and raked in $195.2 million at the box office after its release on May 31, 2019.
