Gay Marriage: What's the problem?

[cornbread_r2]

Ummm…sure. But don’t you realise how beside the point that is? Unless you’re asserting that legal proclamations create the truth?

My point was that when a person is legally married then they are legally married. You might say, “But they aren’t really married in the eyes of God”, but that doesn’t change the fact that they are, indeed, married in the eyes of the law. Similarly, if a person is found not guilty in a court of law, then they are, indeed, not guilty as far as the criminal justice system is concerned. Please note that that is not the same as proclaiming that they are innocent, as persons are never found “innocent” in court cases, but only “not guilty”.

 

[Corki]

My point was that when a person is legally married then they are legally married. You might say, “But they aren’t really married in the eyes of God”, but that doesn’t change the fact that they are, indeed, married in the eyes of the law. Similarly, if a person is found not guilty in a court of law, then they are, indeed, not guilty as far as the criminal justice system is concerned. Please note that that is not the same as proclaiming that they are innocent, as persons are never found “innocent” in court cases, but only “not guilty”.

However, this only is possible by redefining what marriage is. “Not guilty” does not necessarily mean “innocent,” But we have created a scenario where two people who cannot physically or logically form a married bond are called “married”. They are not “married” but “legally married”. It’s nothing more than a fiction to placate a very vocal minority. It’s a legal fiction but still a fiction.

 

[fix]

My point was that when a person is legally married then they are legally married.

Well, an unjust law is really no law at all. It would be like the state declaring square circles exist. It might be “legal” in some pedantic sense, yet it is still mere fiction.

 

[marymary1975]

I’m not having any luck imagining a law that would create an incidental burden on the CC that would also result in forcing a priest to perform a sacramental marriage. Though unlikely, I can imagine a situation where ministers might lose their faculties to perform civil marriages if they refused to perform SSMs, but that isn’t the same thing. Can you suggest an example of such a state law?

Sincerely, i cannot come up with such a law either. It would have to be some general regulations about agents who act in behalf of the State performing marriages ( as priests when signing marriage licenses become an extension of the State), maybe aomething like “all agents of the government during wedding ceremonies are required to do X, Y and Z or shall perform this and that.” Maybe I can’t imagine what the this and that can be because I don’t agree with SSM and have no interest in a law like that, so maybe to answer that question you need like a gay activist or similar. The perfect examples of incidental burden are things like birth control which some have been mentioning here, or the adoption agencies case where catholic charities was forced to close. It has to be something in which priest, not as Catholics, but instead as an extension of the government would have a specific requirement to perform certain ceremony, but again I can’t come up with such a requirement in a way that is not too vague or overbroad.

 

[Slavonic]

Well, an unjust law is really no law at all. It would be like the state declaring square circles exist. It might be “legal” in some pedantic sense, yet it is still mere fiction.

This is a totally bogus analogy. The state is creating no fiction by instituting same-sex marriage. It is simply recognizing something that exists. It is recognizing that people of the same sex pair in what are in fact marriages. People of the same sex were coupling long before any same-sex marriage law was on the books.

 

[Jon_S_1]

This is a totally bogus analogy. The state is creating no fiction by instituting same-sex marriage. It is simply recognizing something that exists. It is recognizing that people of the same sex pair in what are in fact marriages. People of the same sex were coupling long before any same-sex marriage law was on the books.

What is marriage?

No doubt gays are “coupling” but their “coupling” no more resembles marriage than cohabitation does or friends who live together.

 

[Kevin_B]

I agree. Never will a person in the US be forced to perform a religious ceremony against their will.

In fact, I would go as far as to say this is do obvious that people who claim otherwise are lying to advance their cause, which itself is immoral.

There is simply no precedent for this ever to happen, and multiple precedents that it will not happen.

 

[livingwordunity]

If overturning laws banning interracial marriage didn’t result in forcing churches to perform interracial marriages (and it didn’t), then I don’t see how legalizing SSM is going to force churches to perform SSMs.

There are already “gay” activists who go into Catholic Churches protesting and disrupting holy Mass because we won’t agree with them. This harassment tactic is similar to Westboro Baptists but worse since at least the WBC keeps their distance and doesn’t actually go inside to cause havoc. So, we already know that SSM advocates won’t be satisfied to leave us Catholics alone if they get their way with the government.

A law banning interracial marriage and so-called “same-sex marriage” are both attempts to redefine marriage to something other than the way it was from the beginning. Each of these misses the mark when it comes to what is true about the nature of marriage. The Catholic Church teaches and encourages truth. Many in today’s hedonistic pop culture don’t want to hear the truth but instead want to be told lies. The Catholic Church has always consistently taught the same truth about marriage as marriage was from the beginning.

 

[gracepoole]

If the Church focused on performing sacramental marriages and stopped pumping millions into anti-same-sex civil marriage causes, I think the attacks against it regarding this issue would largely disappear.

 

[epan]

If the Church focused on performing sacramental marriages and stopped pumping millions into anti-same-sex civil marriage causes, I think the attacks against it regarding this issue would largely disappear.

Good point. I have a problem with the political activism by a nonprofit religious organization. A case could be made that both the Catholic Church and the LDS should lose their tax exempt status in California, for their thinly veiled funding and political involvement in the Prop 8 election.

Having and expressing an opinion is one thing. Interference in the political process is another for a religious group.

 

[jonathan_hili]

My point was that when a person is legally married then they are legally married. You might say, “But they aren’t really married in the eyes of God”, but that doesn’t change the fact that they are, indeed, married in the eyes of the law. Similarly, if a person is found not guilty in a court of law, then they are, indeed, not guilty as far as the criminal justice system is concerned. Please note that that is not the same as proclaiming that they are innocent, as persons are never found “innocent” in court cases, but only “not guilty”.

Well, I suppose if you want to put it that way, it may be more accurate to say, in the case of courts: “according to the court, he is legally not guilty” and in the case of same-sex “marriage”: “according to the government, they are legally married”. This would be in contrast to just saying “they are legally married”, which implies that a bona fide marriage has actually taken place.

 

[jonathan_hili]

This is a totally bogus analogy. The state is creating no fiction by instituting same-sex marriage. It is simply recognizing something that exists. It is recognizing that people of the same sex pair in what are in fact marriages. People of the same sex were coupling long before any same-sex marriage law was on the books.

I disagree, Slavonic.

Marriage is not equivalent with coupling, if so, you would have to accept incestuous marriages too.

 

[jonathan_hili]

If the Church focused on performing sacramental marriages and stopped pumping millions into anti-same-sex civil marriage causes, I think the attacks against it regarding this issue would largely disappear.

Of course they would. Likewise, if the Church stopped preaching moral issues (through words and actions), most of the attacks against the Church would cease. The world wants a Church that makes it feel comfortable, not uncomfortable.

Certainly, saying and doing nothing against moral evil will cause attacks on the Church to cease. But then, the Church would cease too.

The principal reason for Jesus’ execution was probably that he attacked the corrupt Sadducean priestly and temple institution because it was morally corrupt. Should he have said nothing to avoid persecution?

 

[jonathan_hili]

Oh, by the way, Cornbread, G.K. Chesterton had an interesting twist on your signature:

It is commonly in a somewhat cynical sense that men have said, “Blessed is he that expecteth nothing, for he shall not be disappointed.” It was in a wholly happy and enthusiastic sense that St. Francis said, “Blessed is he who expecteth nothing, for he shall enjoy everything.” It was by this deliberate idea of starting from zero, from the dark nothingness of his own deserts, that he did come to enjoy even earthly things as few people have enjoyed them; and they are in themselves the best working example of the idea. For there is no way in which a man can earn a star or deserve a sunset. But there is more than this involved, and more indeed than is easily to be expressed in words. It is not only true that the less a man thinks of himself, the more he thinks of his good luck and of all the gifts of God. It is also true that he sees more of the things themselves when he sees more of their origin; for their origin is a part of them and indeed the most important part of them. Thus they become more extraordinary by being explained. He has more wonder at them but less fear of them; for a thing is really wonderful when it is significant and not when it is insignificant; and a monster, shapeless or dumb or merely destructive, may be larger than the mountains, but is still in a literal sense insignificant. For a mystic like St. Francis the monsters had a meaning; that is, they had delivered their message. They spoke no longer in an unknown tongue. That is the meaning of all those stories whether legendary or historical, in which he appears as a magician speaking the language of beasts and birds. The mystic will have nothing to do with mere mystery; mere mystery is generally a mystery of iniquity.

(St Francis Of Assisi, 1923)

 

[mek42]

Of course they would. Likewise, if the Church stopped preaching moral issues (through words and actions), most of the attacks against the Church would cease. The world wants a Church that makes it feel comfortable, not uncomfortable.

Certainly, saying and doing nothing against moral evil will cause attacks on the Church to cease. But then, the Church would cease too.

The principal reason for Jesus’ execution was probably that he attacked the corrupt Sadducean priestly and temple institution because it was morally corrupt. Should he have said nothing to avoid persecution?

There is a difference between preaching a moral stance to citizens as individuals and trying to influence the law of the land. For that matter, if the Church feels the need to attempt to influence the law of the land, there is nothing to prevent this, just turn in the tax exempt status and act as a private club.

Of course, turning in the tax status might subject the Church to the full weight of anti-discrimination laws, which might end up with the Church sued to perform SSM.

 

[fix]

This is a totally bogus analogy. The state is creating no fiction by instituting same-sex marriage. It is simply recognizing something that exists. It is recognizing that people of the same sex pair in what are in fact marriages. People of the same sex were coupling long before any same-sex marriage law was on the books.

People can say they are oranges. The State can declare they are oranges. They are not oranges and never will be. Never.

 

[fix]

What is marriage?

No doubt gays are “coupling” but their “coupling” no more resembles marriage than cohabitation does or friends who live together.

Exactly.

 

[JimG]

But it is not the Church which started trying to change marriage law. It was the gay lobby which is trying to force a new definition of marriage, one which the nation had regarded as impossible up to the present. The Church did not start the issue of ‘gay marriage.’ That issue was brought to its attention by lobbying efforts to change established law.

 

[Jon_S_1]

But it is not the Church which started trying to change marriage law. It was the gay lobby which is trying to force a new definition of marriage, one which the nation had regarded as impossible up to the present. The Church did not start the issue of ‘gay marriage.’ That issue was brought to its attention by lobbying efforts to change established law.

An issue so commonly forgotten.

 

[epan]

But it is not the Church which started trying to change marriage law. It was the gay lobby which is trying to force a new definition of marriage, one which the nation had regarded as impossible up to the present. The Church did not start the issue of ‘gay marriage.’ That issue was brought to its attention by lobbying efforts to change established law.

Actually, it goes back much farther than that, as a social phenomenon - to the women’s rights movement which started the ending of gender roles in marriage. The gay marriage issue is just the logical outcome, if you trace it through. The civil rights movement, in general, which started with the abolition of slavery also played a role. The trend over time has been the steady expansion of the definition of individual rights… race, gender, physical abilities, mental and emotional abilities, sexual orientation, gender identity, animal rights… And, no doubt I have missed a few.

To understand this thing, I think it should be viewed in a more historic context. I really tire of the narrow view of social change, which often focuses on one particular group and “demonizes” them. They are caught up in the sweep of historic social change, just as every other group which has demanded its “rights”.

The social/historic context facilitates the changing point of view of the majority, and the courts, who grant these rights.

The momentum of this makes the national adoption of gay marriage an unstoppable certainty, in my opinion. The latest judicial decisions are the wedge which will finally split apart the opposition in the courts. But this momentum was not gained in the few years since Prop 8, or the decade(s) since DOMA. It began more than a century ago, which is precisely why it is unstoppable, now.

A relevant question would be, what group of living things in our society will this expansion of rights apply to next?

A friend did represent the porpoises against the fishing industry, to stop changes to laws in the US regarding nets. He took it as far as the US Ninth Circuit on his own nickel, before the corporate defendants stopped their appeals. He did this for his daughters, and because he could afford to do it. Nobody was standing up for the porpoises, which leads me to another point, by way of example. While the picture is painted of some villainous intent during such times of change, and this picture is painted by both sides of the other, that is far from the truth. Tempers rise. People get frustrated when things don’t go their way. But, in fact, both sides believe that they are fighting for the moral good. Reminding myself of this fact, helps me to be more charitable.