What began as a friendship between Father Giuliano Costalunga and parish assistant Paolo Scala ended up turning into love and led the priest to abandon his duties as a parish priest to join forces with his now boyfriend. Giuliano exercised the priesthood for around ten years and met Paolo two years ago, when the religious man visited some patients who were admitted to a hospital in the small town of Selva di Progno e Piazza, in Italy. One of the patients was Paolo Scala, the man with whom she would fall in love. After his recovery, the then priest invited him to help them with parish activities and, over time, they ended up discovering love in each other. “As soon as I realized that I loved him, I left the parish, started living with him and, although I didn't have a fixed parish, I was still a priest and celebrated masses when they called me,” said Costalunga in an interview with international agencies EFE and EPA. Giuliano left the Catholic church as a priest in February this year. In April, about two months later, they got married. “I left the priestly ministry with pain, because I believe that a man who believes in God and loves Jesus can be a good priest. But of course the Catholic Church does not allow it, so for me it was not possible to continue”, he lamented about having to give up his vocation to be happy with the man he loves. Giuliano highlights that, during his preaching, he was always concerned about talking about love as a universal act, without distinction. “I didn’t talk about homosexual, heterosexual, transsexual love. He spoke about love as a whole”, he said, and said he still lived a “three-way love: Me, Paolo and God”. “For us, it is fundamental to have the Holy Spirit in our lives”, he concluded.
