A coalition of community groups will stage a peaceful protest against the Catholic Church’s stance on homosexuality and HIV/AIDS prevention, when the Pope addresses thousands of Catholic youth on World Youth Day in Sydney on Saturday, July 19.

The NoToPope Coalition includes Community Action Against Homophobia (CAAH), the Metropolitan Community Church, Atheists Sydney, the Socialist Alliance, Resistance, the Raelian Movement, PopeAliceXorporation (PAX), the Scarlet Alliance, and androgynous rights activist Norrie May Welby.

Rachel Evans, from CAAH, told MCV that the Coalition will hand out condoms to Catholic youth to protest the Pope’s anti-condom stance. The groups will also bear banners with slogans like ‘Gay is Great’.

“The Pope has said that homosexuality is an objective disorder and has come out against civil unions and same-sex marriage. We want to say to the Catholic youth that bigotry and homophobia is not on,” Evans said. “We want to convince them to take up the fight within the Catholic Church.

“We want the Sydney LGBTI community, the women’s rights community, the secular crew and the progressive Christians and Catholics, to come together and say that this Pope doesn’t speak for us.”

Trent Hawkins, a member of the Socialist Alliance in Melbourne, echoed Evans comments.

“The Catholic Church is no friend of gay and lesbian people,” he said. “We support the action the Sydney groups are taking.”

Hawkins also added that activists meeting at next week’s Queer Collaborations conference at Melbourne University would discuss options for joining the protest.

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