Outreach publishes a “Confiteor for LGBTQ Catholics” invoking “queer saints”

Outreach, the US-based LGBTQ Catholic ministry founded by Jesuit Fr James Martin, has published an adaptation of the Confiteor presented as “a Confiteor for LGBTQ Catholics.”

The text closes an essay by Outreach contributor Ariell Watson Simon, “An LGBTQ Catholic guide to the Mass: Praying the Confiteor,” published on 25 October. Outreach introduces it as the first post in a series that “explores praying with the Mass from an LGBTQ perspective.”

The Confiteor is the penitential prayer said at the beginning of Mass. In the English Roman Missal it begins “I confess to almighty God, and to you my brothers and sisters, that I have greatly sinned” and ends “Therefore I ask blessed Mary ever-Virgin, all the Angels and Saints, and you, my brothers and sisters, to pray for me to the Lord our God.”

The adaptation reads in full:

> I confess to our Loving God and to you, my siblings, that I have fallen short in my prejudiced thoughts and my biased judgements, in my careless words and my degrading self-talk, in what I have done to cooperate with injustice and in what I have failed to do to resist it; through my fear, through my complacency, through my worst errors. Therefore I ask all my spiritual ancestors, queer saints, and you, the human family, to pray with me, that together we might build a better tomorrow. Amen.

Watson Simon introduces it with the words: “I offer this adaptation of the familiar words, as a Confiteor for LGBTQ Catholics.” Earlier in the essay she writes: “The next time you recite the Confiteor in Mass, say it like you mean it.”

In the essay she writes that “my queerness doesn't make me sinful, but my humanity does,” and that “LGBTQ people are no more sinful than our straight and cis-gender counterparts.” She describes sin as also “social,” saying she takes part in “structural sins like racism, xenophobia and transphobia.” She also quotes Pope Leo XIV: “We tend to think that when the church is talking about morality, that the only issue of morality is sexual… I believe there are much greater, more important issues, such as justice, equality, [and] freedom.”

Outreach promoted the text on X on 25 October. The Catholic Herald reported it today (Michael Haynes). LifeSiteNews (27 October) and InfoVaticana (28 October) had already written about it, and LifeSiteNews called the adaptation “blasphemous.” The adaptation is not part of the Roman Missal. As of 29 October, we have found no public comment from Fr Martin, US bishops or the Holy See.

Sources: Outreach (25/10/2026); Outreach on X; Catholic Herald (29/10/2026); LifeSiteNews (27/10/2026); InfoVaticana (28/10/2026).