Pope Benedict: Gay marriage causes serious harm to justice and peace

You're forgetting a few things (0.00 / 0)

I don't understand your seeming obsession with trying to justify your personal agenda with the teachings of the Catholic Church but with all due Christian charity, I think that you're forgetting a few important things.

These oversights include that by any measure your proposal for civil unions would almost certainly run afoul of Catholic teaching on several aspects, such as any combination of several possible sins - including but not limited to - lust, fornication, sodomy, cohabitation and scandal.  

The sin of scandal is especially problematic as it would very likely persist even if the civil union couple was chaste, thus removing the concerns about "marriage minus conception rights" be it natural or unnatural conception.  Artificial conception already itself a sin in the Catholic Church.

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by: BNCordeiro @ Tue Dec 18, 2012 at 22:18:34 PM UTC

It fulfills the need (0.00 / 0)

I really don't think my proposal runs afoul of what the Pope just said. I would hope that what the Pope says carries some weight with you Brock, and with Ed, who has been saying we should stop trying to end same-sex marriage.

Let's break down what he said here:

There is also a need to acknowledge and promote the natural structure of marriage as the union of a man and a woman

My proposal acknowledges and promotes the natural structure of marriage as the union of a man and a woman. It would be a huge bombshell of acknowledgement, and it is needed. The Pope isn't just casually pointing this out while saying, hey don't worry about it if you are a Catholic in Massachusetts, where it's more important to work to lower taxes and own guns, and the battle is already lost. He is calling for us to be Peacemakers and find some way to end same-sex marriage here in Massachusetts and my proposal does that.

in the face of attempts to make it juridically equivalent to radically different types of union;

My proposed Civil Unions are not judicially equivalent, they are indeed radically different in that they do not approve and allow the couple to have sex and conceive offspring together. And that would be well known. Everyone would know that they do not approve of sex or conception, which means they don't approve of lust, sodomy, cohabitation, or fornication. Yes, a chaste couple, even a Priest and a Nun, or two nuns, or a brother and sister, could get a Civil Union like this without scandal, unless being a chaste couple is scandalous. I doubt many would, and maybe I don't understand your point, but it seems a small thing to worry about considering the grand sweeping change of preserving marriage and affirming its unique character and purpose.

such attempts actually harm and help to destabilize marriage, obscuring its specific nature and its indispensable role in society.

Enacting my proposal would stabilize marriage and clarify its specific nature and indispensable role in society. And it would make peace with those who want to help same-sex couples get security and protection for their relationships, which is a compassionate response to the fact of homosexual persons and the benefits of committed stable relationships.

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by: John Howard @ Tue Dec 18, 2012 at 22:47:53 PM UTC

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You can't (0.00 / 0)

You can't pick & choose which Papal statements you prefer nor can you pick & choose which Church teachings and sins you prefer.  Well, not if you're a practicing, practical Catholic - which I am.

Now, if you want to make your argument in a legal/civil climate, well go right ahead.  I'll still probably disagree but you can't try to bend & twist Catholic teaching to suit your agenda.

Your idea, for whatever its secular merits - granting for the sake of discussion that it may have some - simply runs contrary to the list of sins of the Catholic Church & the Pope hasn't removed a single one of them for either homosexuals or heterosexuals.

Again, I simply fail to understand your multiple attempts to contort Catholicism to your preferences.  The Church isn't Burger King, you can't have it your way.

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by: BNCordeiro @ Tue Dec 18, 2012 at 23:09:20 PM UTC

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Go by the most recent, generally (0.00 / 0)

Papal statements evolve, as old ones get clarified and put in context by new ones intended to draw our current attention to what matters now. In this latest one,  the Pope uses the very precise phrase "judicially equivalent" as being the thing that Civil Unions for same-sex couples should not be. I agree, that's what I've been saying for 6 years, and that's what you have been refusing to admit mattered. Now the Pope himself says it is what matters, so I suggest you start to agree with us.

Oh looky, here is another Bishop saying something that I have been saying for 6 years:

Bishop Philip Egan of Portsmouth said in a statement posted Monday on his diocesan website that the prime minister was "luring the people of England away from their common Christian values and Christian patrimony, and forcing upon us a brave new world, artificially engineered."

"If the prime minister proceeds with these intentions, he will pervert authentic family values, with catastrophic consequences for the well-being and behavior of future generations," he said. "He will smother the traditional Christian ethos of our society and strangle the religious freedom of the Catholic church in Britain to conduct its mission."

Bishop Mark Davies of Shrewsbury said Christians were approaching a time when they had to give "clear and courageous witness to the truth about marriage."

"It is a tragic moment for British society with serious implications for religious freedom," he said in a text message Monday to Catholic News Service. "However, as Christians we must see the moment to give our witness for the common good of society and for the sake of generations to come."

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by: John Howard @ Tue Dec 18, 2012 at 23:36:50 PM UTC

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Over (0.00 / 0)

I cannot & will not agree, ever, with your wrenching Papal statements & Church teachings out of context so that they may be bastardized into alternative agendas.  

One of your main gripes - artificial intervention in conception - was settled by the Catholic Church back in 1968 when in-vitro fertilization was prohibited by Pope Paul VI in Humanae Vitae.  Other papal encyclicals, such as Evangelium Vitae by John Paul II in 1995 further clarified Culture of Life matters.  The point here is that Church teaching doesn't "evolve" it is built upon.  Furthermore, Papal statements cannot & will not contradict established Church teaching.  The statement that you present by Bishop Egan is perfectly in accord with the writings of Paul VI & Benedict XVI, again that aspect of your agenda has already been settled. Now, Egan's statements were in regard to Britain requiring churches to conduct homosexual marriages.  Your concept of civil unions is not rational. Your idea may actually be even less logical then would be a homosexual's desire for the Catholic Church to accept gay marriage!

Furthermore, you misquote Pope Benedict XVI, although I assume it is by accident when you write "judicially equivalent" when the Pope actually wrote, in your own quote, "juridically equivalent." Juridically means "Of or relating to the law and its administration".  Judicially means " Of, relating to, or proper to courts of law or to the administration of justice".  The two words are similar but not the same.  Furthermore, your civil unions are a distinction without a purpose.

Again, you're actually better off trying to make legal/civil arguments to bolster your plans for trying to tie them to any aspect of the Catholic Church is simply doomed to failure as you're diametrically opposed.

I will not debate this matter any longer with you as it is clearly evident that you are insincere & simply wish to pick & choose aspects of Catholicism to suit your own agenda rather than discussing the finer points of actual Catholic teaching.  You can hypocritically try to invoke the statements of His Holiness and bastardize them for your alternative agenda yet then you resort to calling me a religious extremist because I'm a Catholic who follows Church teaching, that is the Catholic Church headed by the Vicar of Christ, His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI.  You can't have it both ways.  Either you try to root your argument in religion or you do not, but you can't co-opt and selectively adhere to portions of Catholic teaching and not others.  The Catholic Church is an all-or-nothing proposition.  The Church does indeed labor in a "perfect world" because that is what the Church Triumphant is, Heaven...the perfect world & the Church's existence is to save souls to achieve Heaven, not to support your alternative agenda.

This is probably the most frightening statement you've ever uttered: "It simply doesn't approve and allow sex."  How do you disallow sex?  Talk about the proverbial "get the government out of my bedroom" argument.  You try to state that your ideas don't "prevent people from having sex" and then you immediately state that "it simply doesn't approve and allow sex."  Did you break your neck with that whiplash?  You try to conclude by saying that your concept of civil union is "it's just like they are unmarried in terms of sex."  Unfortunately for your theory, unmarried sex between heterosexuals is sinful & so is homosexual sex among unmarried couples (plus the other sins tossed in).  Again, you're mixing legal concepts: civil unions with religious concepts: the status of fornication as a sin.  As a religious concept, your concept is bogus and as a legal concept it's dangerous.

I'm sorry but you're simply neither sincere nor are you even laboring under any sort of paradigm of realism.  I presented  several ways in which Catholicism rejects your attempt to corrupt Papal statements for your rather peculiar ends.  Feel free to continue in this error but I will try to avoid indulging you in these weird concepts of yours as they're really worth the time or effort.  I just wish you wouldn't sully the Catholic Church in the process.

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by: BNCordeiro @ Wed Dec 19, 2012 at 00:27:16 AM UTC

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You should be doing more to stop gay marriage (0.00 / 0)

I have not wrenched anything out of context! I have shown how my proposal perfectly fits with the Pope's latest urgent call to make Peace and restore marriage without resorting to legally equivalent Civil Unions that he and I agree are bad but you see no distinction in (even as you claim there is a distinction between judicial and juridical!). It's the legal equivalence that is unacceptable, and it is significant and meaningful that he says so, in the context of 2012. And the distinction of lacking conception rights certainly has purpose: it sends a strong clear message about the meaning of marriage and the difference between unmarried and married couples and the difference between a man and a woman and same-sex couples.

I can't believe you are having so much trouble getting the simple concept of how, by being defined as "marriage minus conception rights" these CU's would not approve and allow sex or make it legal like marriage does. Taking away the conception rights from marriage means taking away the official public state and social approval of having sex and conceiving offspring together. So with regards to having sex and conceiving children, being in one of these Civil Unions would be just like not being in a Civil Union. It doesn't "disallow sex" it just doesn't approve and allow it, it doesn't affirm that the couple has sex and is allowed to like marriage always has and should. It simply wouldn't approve and allow sex the way marriage approves and allows sex. Sex would remain as sinful as unmarried sex in a Civil Union because they explicitly do not do what marriage explicitly does, make sex licit and legal. It would still be fornication in one of these Civil Unions.

Hey Brock, let me double-check some things: Do you think marriages should be allowed to have sex and conceive offspring together? Do you think same-sex couples should be?

You do know that all the things that the Church "settled" back in 1968 are all perfectly legal and quite common now, right? The Pope and the Bishops are calling on people like you to actually make a stand to change the law, not just be satisfied with statements about the way it should be in Heaven.

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by: John Howard @ Wed Dec 19, 2012 at 01:08:35 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Scandal (0.00 / 0)

I respectfully suggest that you do not understand the Catholic definition of scandal, which is a sin against the Fifth Commandment.  Here are some citations from the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

RESPECT FOR THE DIGNITY OF PERSONS

2284 Scandal is an attitude or behavior which leads another to do evil. The person who gives scandal becomes his neighbor's tempter. He damages virtue and integrity; he may even draw his brother into spiritual death. Scandal is a grave offense if by deed or omission another is deliberately led into a grave offense.

2285 Scandal takes on a particular gravity by reason of the authority of those who cause it or the weakness of those who are scandalized. It prompted our Lord to utter this curse: "Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened round his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea."86 Scandal is grave when given by those who by nature or office are obliged to teach and educate others. Jesus reproaches the scribes and Pharisees on this account: he likens them to wolves in sheep's clothing.87

2286 Scandal can be provoked by laws or institutions, by fashion or opinion.

Therefore, they are guilty of scandal who establish laws or social structures leading to the decline of morals and the corruption of religious practice, or to "social conditions that, intentionally or not, make Christian conduct and obedience to the Commandments difficult and practically impossible."88 This is also true of business leaders who make rules encouraging fraud, teachers who provoke their children to anger,89 or manipulators of public opinion who turn it away from moral values.

2287 Anyone who uses the power at his disposal in such a way that it leads others to do wrong becomes guilty of scandal and responsible for the evil that he has directly or indirectly encouraged. "Temptations to sin are sure to come; but woe to him by whom they come!"90

http://www.vatican.va/archive/...

Civil unions undermine marriage & that is Church teaching, no matter how you want to try to tweak it.  Even chaste civil unions fall victim to the sins of cohabitation & scandal.  Your ideas do not square with Catholic teaching, it merely further muddies the water.  There is no institution equitable to traditional marriage in the eyes of the Church.

Furthermore, your attempt to create a civil union - a legal institution - that somehow prevents two people from having sex would be well...totalitarian, dictatorial, and utterly fly in the face of any concept of liberty or justice.  I don't even think you'd satisfy the First Amendment's freedom of assembly/association.

Now, if any two individuals - regardless of gender or personal relationship - want to engage in some sort of contract, that would be entirely within the legal realm and assuming they can both validly enter into the contract with proverbially clean hands, then more power to them.

However, that's a legal discussion and on religious grounds - in this instance Catholicism - your proposals simply fail for they are so wrapped in clearly defined sins that your idea never gets out of the starting gate.

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by: BNCordeiro @ Tue Dec 18, 2012 at 23:21:13 PM UTC

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Take it in context (0.00 / 0)

In some ideal world that didn't already have same-sex marriages and thousands of same-sex couples raising families together, then your fundamentalist extremism on opposing Civil Unions might make perfect sense. But it doesn't make sense when we already have same-sex marriages and the prospect of completely eliminating any government recognition of same-sex relationships is absolutely zero.

My proposal would not muddy the water, it would send a clear unambiguous message about the true nature of marriage to people around the world, when America ends same-sex marriage and affirms that marriage is what approves and allows the couple to have sex and conceive offspring. These CU's wouldn't prevent two people from having sex, they just would not approve and allow sex and conception.  Surely you didn't think my proposal was to "somehow prevent people from having sex" all this time, did you? No it doesn't try to do that. It simply doesn't approve and allow sex. It is just like they are unmarried in terms of sex. OK?

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by: John Howard @ Tue Dec 18, 2012 at 23:52:54 PM UTC

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