Pastor,
While I am a great respecter of the Lutheran tradition, I’m afraid that your fear of papal authority here has me a little perplexed.
[I appreciate the Pope rebuffing the American bishops. I am not "afraid" of Papal authority, in the sense of intimidated, I "fear" it because it is heresy].
The American bishops’ request was done in an effort to water down the Catholic Church’s defense of the historic Christian position that homosexual activity is incompatible with Christian ministry. The Pope used his authority as a teacher to make sure that it was clear that the historic Christian position was the correct one, as far as the official teaching office of the Catholic Church is concerned. As far as I know, none of the historic, orthodox Protestant traditions (Lutheran, Reformed, Wesleyan, etc.) dispute that historic Christian position — there is agreement between such orthodox Protestants and the teaching of the Catholic Church on this point. The Pope therefore used his authority as a teacher to defend the historic Christian consensus testified to in the Bible and in the continual witness of the Christian faith. In what sense can this be considered a bad thing?
[Ah....I never said it was]