Catholics: How will this new pope effect GLBT people?

[readmoreoften]

I'm a queer atheist and I don't know how much control the pope has over his billion(s) of followers. I read that this pope could rule under a decree of infallibility (boy, I'm sure I got that phrase wrong, but hopefully, you'll understand what I'm talking about) that homosexuality is a radical evil and it seems that this would be somehow much different than Pope JP just SAYING that homosexuals are part of the new ideology of evil. What is the difference between an infallible decree or a pope just speakin' off the cuff?

Beyond the backlash of a billion Catholics being told it's righto good chap a-ok to hate gays, what more can he do to us?

I'm sorry for those of you who are Catholics who were hoping for a more liberal pick. I'm also curious as to why some Catholics on DU answered a poll saying that they were happy with Ratzinger. Why are you happy with him? Just wondering.

[readmoreoften]

1. actually, I just realized that I want to move this to GD to get more input

[Quetzal]

2. An article written by Andrew Sullivan in 1988

highlights his discontents with Pope Ratzinger

PDF Document

SECOND, on homosexuality. The
Vatican's 1986 letter—which described
gay men and women as victims of
an "objective disorder"—was a radical
break with all three elements originally
discerned by Ratzinger: tradition, scholarship,
and the moral experience of the
Church. It took even conservatives by
surprise. In 1975, for the first time in modernity,
the (pre-Ratzinger) Sacred Congregation
for the Doctrine of the Faith
recognized that there was something
called inherent homosexuality. Previously,
there had only been homosexual acts,
chosen by heterosexual people, which
were invariably wrong. (The first condemnation
of such acts was not made until
1179, at the Third Lateran Council,
which also condemned moneylenders,
heretics, Jews, Muslims, and mercenaries.)
The Church's new position was that
the state of homosexuality was not
wrong, since it was involuntary, and sin
has to be chosen. What was wrong, rather,
was the chosen, genital expression of
homosexuality. This may sound casuistic,
but there are few other ways to accept
the immorality of homosexual activity
while showing compassion and understanding
for homosexuals who also happen
to be made in the image of God. The
1975 document was a model of such casuistic
compassion.

Ratzinger's letter, in the middle of the
AIDS crisis, was noticeable for its extraordinary
lack of compassion. Nowhere
in the document was it stated,
along the lines of 1975, that homosexuality
is not voluntarily acquired. Some
of its clauses read chillingly like comparable
Church documents produced in
Europe in the 1930s. In a reference to violence
and prejudice against homosexuals,
it argued that if correct doctrines were not defended clearly, then "neither
the Church nor society at large should be
surprised when other distorted notions
and practices gain ground." And its central
point was to remove the moral neutrality
of the state of homosexuality:
"Although the particular inclination of
the homosexual person is not a sin, it is a
more or less strong tendency ordered toward
an intrinsic moral evil; and thus the
inclination itself must be seen as an objective
disorder." What can this possibly
mean, except that the condition is morally
disordered?

Yes, it is written by Sully - but even he knew of the dangers of this man.

It seems as though Pope Ratzinger will be more forceful in his condemning of homosexuality and any other "alleged" sins in the eyes of the church.