By Daniel Burke, CNN Belief Blog Co-Editor
(CNN) - Pope Francis reaffirmed the Catholic
Church's opposition to gay marriage on Wednesday, but suggested in a
newspaper interview that it could support some types of civil unions.
The Pope reiterated the church's longstanding teaching that "marriage
is between a man and a woman." However, he said, "We have to look at
different cases and evaluate them in their variety."
States, for instance, justify civil unions as a way to provide
financial security to cohabitating couples, the Pope said in a
wide-ranging interview published Wednesday in
Corriere della Sera, an
Italian daily. State-sanctioned unions are thus driven by the need to
ensure rights like access to health care, Francis added.
A number of Catholic bishops have supported civil unions for same-sex
couples, including Pope Francis when he was Archbishop of Buenos Aires
in 2010, according to reports in
National Catholic Reporter and