Singer and actress Charice Pempengco, who plays Sunshine Corazon on Glee, has come out as gay during an interview on a Philippines talk show. Pempengco broke the news in the interview this weekend, with the world's press gradually picking up her announcement made in the Asian nation.

The native Filipino admitted that she is a lesbian during a discussion on the Asian nation's popular ABS CBN celebrity-based show The Buzz, a bold move to make in a predominantly Catholic country, even for one of it's biggest stars. However rather than face a backlash Pempengco has instead been supported by many Catholic institutes across the country, with high-ranking church and government official Father Melvin Castro jumping to her defence.

“In this time of her life that she is experiencing an identity crisis regarding her sexual orientation, we would rather not pre-judge her,” he said in a recent interview in the Philippines press, adding, “Let’s hope that there will be people out there that will help guide her with her sexual orientation called same sex attraction.”

Although relatively unknown in the US and elsewhere in the world, bar her appearances in Glee, Charice is one of The Philippines' biggest stars and has managed to make an impact in the American charts thanks largely to her YouTube videos and subsequent exposure on The Oprah Winfrey Show at the turn of the decade. Charice brought out her first internationally-released studio album, Charice, in 2010, when it managed to reach number eight in the Billboard Album Chart, making her the first Asian solo artist to reach the top ten. She is also one of the judges of the Philippine version of The X Factor.

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