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LittleSoldier
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I have every intention of watching it as soon as I get a free hour. It is a long video.
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StAnastasia
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LittleSoldier, it was a valid question.
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qui_est_ce
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You beat me to it! Great post!
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Wardog
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The topic is Gay Marriage in America. What were you reading?
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LittleSoldier
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If you are referring to my remark it wasn’t a question at all. It was a statement and only meant to show that I am still struggling with some Church teachings.
And it was and is completely inappropriate for this thread.
I apologize again and will not respond to any further posts directed to me about this, in this thread. If I feel that it is necessary I will begin a new thread.
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LittleSoldier
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I believe I was reading your post in which you stated that drinking, gambling, and divorce are sinful. None of them are. Your last paragraph in that post does not appear to be on-topic. The topic of a thread is not defined solely by its title. One must also read the OP in order to understand.
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Wardog
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infamy]. The first thing they will agitate for after they get SS"M" is hate speech laws, which are nothing more than “intent to persecute” laws. Canada and the UK have a head start on us salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/03/22/canada en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hate_speech_laws_in_the_United_Kingdom .
Would I want to live in a world that homosexuals will create?
I do not understand this question, because I don’t give up my rights because gay marriage is legalized. If that is your worry, then I don’t share it. Extending the right for others to live together in marriage will not change my lifestyle in any way, nor do I see any harm to anyone else. I understand that it is sinful, but not everyone agrees with me on what sin means in any event.
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StAnastasia
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Wardog, I think I understand your perspective. But it becomes problematic to extend the definition of marriage beyond one breeding pair. If you extend it beyond heterosexuals, there seems no rationale not to extend it to three or more people or to siblings who choose not to have children.
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Wardog
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You are correct, where this stops will be the next issue. Already polygamy is being asked about. But my answer is the numbers involved are going to be pretty small. I have not heard anyone asking about incest, or about bestiality, so it seems not right to use them as a reason to not authorize gay marriage. As for polygamy, from a financial perspective it actually sounds attractive. Two or more incomes, with a full time stay at home parent. However, I think the reality of the problems inherent in more than two adults trying to live together will prevent this from ever working to a point where a political mass gets strong enough to merit changing the rules to more than two people.
It does bother me that you refer to the definition of marriage as a “breeding pair”. I don’t agree that every marriage requires children, or even that all people should be parents. Some people can lead very productive lives with no children, and everyone is better off.
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michelleds
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I don’t understand how this is an issue to struggle over.
Catholic Bishops have said: “(W)e believe that it is only within a heterosexual marital relationship that genital sexual activity is morally acceptable. Only within marriage does sexual intercourse fully symbolize the Creator’s dual design, as an act of covenant love, with the potential of co-creating new human life. Therefore, homosexual genital activity is considered immoral” (Human Sexuality, #55).
What part of that is problematic as a Catholic? This whole thread is interesting in that one of the frequent ads at the top of the page is for the new book Absolute Relativism. Everyone is so concerned about “imposing their own morality” and advocating their own truth, blah blah blah. Just because you agree to be murdered, doesn’t make it okay. everyone just pull up your big girl/boy panties and stop washing around with whatever direction the cesspool is going. do you have morals or not?
Catholic Bishops have said: “(W)e believe that it is only within a heterosexual marital relationship that genital sexual activity is morally acceptable. Only within marriage does sexual intercourse fully symbolize the Creator’s dual design, as an act of covenant love, with the potential of co-creating new human life. Therefore, homosexual genital activity is considered immoral” (Human Sexuality, #55).
What part of that is problematic as a Catholic? This whole thread is interesting in that one of the frequent ads at the top of the page is for the new book Absolute Relativism. Everyone is so concerned about “imposing their own morality” and advocating their own truth, blah blah blah. Just because you agree to be murdered, doesn’t make it okay. everyone just pull up your big girl/boy panties and stop washing around with whatever direction the cesspool is going. do you have morals or not?
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Wardog
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If you were to live under Sharia law, their morality is that you as a woman cannot drive a car, have to wear a burqua, your witness testimony equals half of a man’s, and you would not be allowed to leave the house without a male relative escorting you. Once you allow any religion to “impose their own morality” on society, you have to be prepared for the day when it is your religion’s turn to be on the bottom.
In America, so long as you have at least 51% of the people agreeing with you, gay marriage will not be approved. So you really don’t have to worry too much about it until your numbers drop below 49%.
You should remember that according to the last census, about 51% of Americans are Protestant and 25% are Catholic. The rest are Jews, Muslims, atheists, etc. You should also remember that a good number of those non-Catholics view the Pope as the Anti-Christ, the Catholic Mass is evil, that the Eucharist is a vampiric obsenity. Just Google anti Catholic sometime to get an eyeful. America is a secular society where the government’s ability to regulate sin is intentionally limited; this is a good thing. Particularly when in the minority.
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michelleds
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Apparently you are more than willing to allow the Judeo-Christian roots of America to languish and die in order to prevent another religion from coming in and taking over? that is a slippery slope that you can get behind (forgive my mixed metaphors there) but the slippery slope of allowing gays to marry leading to many other types of laws and marriages–that doesn’t bother you?
before I converted to Catholicism, I looked at other denominations. I was specifically looking for a church that was accepting of gays and lesbians. Know what I found? lots of those types of churches…and gays and lesbians were the MOST traditional and staid of what they now catered to…i found one church (and there were other, similar ones) that not only accepted gay S&M couples, but encouraged them to come to church in full leather costume and personna. how’s that for a church to take your 7 year old to? think that’s particularly holy and divine? they had pictures, of the sanctuary, with Daddy/boy couples, with their bare naked parts hanging out of their leather chaps. yes, it’s a slippery slope, one that people are LINING UP to exploit. LINING UP.
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qui_est_ce
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The same could be said about homosexual marriage 50 years ago. As one poster put it, times and society change, and in his opinion, so should the definition of marriage.
Polygamy was prevalent enough at one time that it prevented Utah from becoming a state unless Utah outlawed it.
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Wardog
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Well, that is a church that I would not go to, nor take my kids. Don’t need anyone else to tell me that. I would not like a church like that. Would not go looking for one either, but whatever works for you. As for a lot of people lining up to join, I don’t see this happening. There are a lot of other things I worry about, but this is not one of them.
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Elizabeth502
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But our Bishops do see the harm to the institution. None of us lives in a vacuum. A society is a community and nothing less than that. The formal institutions and informal practices of a society affect all of us, whether you are personally aware of that or not.
Professor Robert George eloquently and logically spells this out. His position has been endorsed by the bishops:
harvard-jlpp.com/wp-conte…eorgeFinal.pdf
(etc. p 260ff of the above linked document)
vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/family/documents/rc_pc_family_doc_20001109_de-facto-unions_en.html
vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20030731_homosexual-unions_en.html
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StAnastasia
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In my experience, the people who argue most vociferously against homosexuality are very frequently people who are anxious and uncertain about their own sexual orientation. After all, if you were secure in your heterosexuality (as I am), why would you even be interested in interfering in someone else’s sexuality?
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Elizabeth502
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Yeah, there’s a truly scholarly statement, filled with factual evidence.
You obviously have limited experience.
Having, as a citizen, a legitimate interest in the institutions of one’s own society (last I checked, Catholics are still citizens, at least ***for the time being ***
), is not equivalent to “interfering in someone else’s sexuality.” The title of this thread is Gay Marriage in America, not private sexuality. I’ve never been insecure about my sexuality; I’ve always been concerned about the social institutions of my society: there is zero contradiction in those two statements. If you find a contradiction in those two statements, or feel you have some personal insight into the sexual security of any CAF member, then frankly that appears to be your problem, not ours. Many people would find such skepticism on your part, about the personal sexual identity of people who are strangers to you, to be highly offensive and presumptuous.Oh, and in my experience, those who repeatedly challenge the statements of church officials on significant moral issues, are either (a) confused about the content of those statements and the theology behind them, or (b) have an agenda to oppose the moral teachings of the Church for some personal reason(s) on their part.
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StAnastasia
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rossum
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You would do well to actually have a look at the scholarly evidence before posting. That way you would not make as many errors.
Abstract
The authors investigated the role of homosexual arousal in exclusively heterosexual men who admitted negative affect toward homosexual individuals. Participants consisted of a group of homophobic men (n = 35) and a group of nonhomophobic men (n = 29); they were assigned to groups on the basis of their scores on the Index of Homophobia (W. W. Hudson & W. A. Ricketts, 1980). The men were exposed to sexually explicit erotic stimuli consisting of heterosexual, male homosexual, and lesbian videotapes, and changes in penile circumference were monitored. They also completed an Aggression Questionnaire (A. H. Buss & M. Perry, 1992). Both groups exhibited increases in penile circumference to the heterosexual and female homosexual videos. Only the homophobic men showed an increase in penile erection to male homosexual stimuli. The groups did not differ in aggression. Homophobia is apparently associated with homosexual arousal that the homophobic individual is either unaware of or denies.
I don’t know if St Anastasia is aware of this particular study, but it does offer some “factual evidence” to support his statement.
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StAnastasia
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True, but as Robert George points out, if humans couldn’t have babies, they would never have invented the institution of marriage. Marriage would not have been invented just because people were tennis partners, or office workers in the same cubicle, or best friends. So breeding is the foundation for the very institution of marriage.
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