"Marriage and Religious Freedom" (a statement from numerous religious leaders on threat of same-sex marriage law to religious freedom)

[mdgspencer]

Taken from the U.S. Catholic Conference website, this statement explains that redefining marriage to legalize same-sex marriage will mean altering hundreds, even thousands, of laws. As a result, this endangers the religious freedom of religious people and groups. Some Catholic bishops.are among these leaders.
see usccb.org/issues-and-action/marriage-and-family/marriage/promotion-and-defense-of-marriage/upload/Marriage-and-Religious-Freedom-Letter-Jan-12-2012-4.pdf

 

[Bartolome_Casas]

To me, framing this issue as a “religious freedom” issue is weak and not accurate. Why not say directly want is involved: The commandments of God Almighty?

But, what is even more disturbing to me is that MUCH, MUCH more DEADLY destroyer of marriages and families are things that have nothing to do with homosexuality. Those things are:
(1) Easy no fault divorce (this is principles of the Free Market applied to marriage)
(2) Legal heterosexual cohabitation
(3) Legal sex before marriage
(4) Adultery is no longer a crime in the USA.
(5) Widespread hardcover free all over the Internet, available to all,
(6) An economic system and system of cultural expectation that usually requires the wife and mother to work full time outside the home.

It is possible that homosexual have never destroyed a single heterosexual marriage in the USA, or perhaps less than 10 a year.

YET, there no campaigns to pass laws or constitutional amendments to fix the 6 problems above. To me, this is just plain insanity.

It must be all due to politics. Virtually all heterosexuals are DISGUSTED by homosexual activity. There is nothing Christian in that. The criminals of motorcycle gangs hate gays too. Such revulsion is natural. I think certain politicos just want to capitalize on that for the purposes of getting control of the government. They don’t care one iota about the welfare of the American family and marriage, or at least not much. If they did, they’d campaign on those 6 things, rather than rousing up the masses in their disgust regarding homosexuals.

I hate politics. I’m glad Jesus and his Apostles were always 100% apolitical. The Gospels show their solution for the evils of the world.

 

[Nec5]

Is this similar to that Manhattan Declaration a year or so ago?

 

[DasErlibnis]

If you’ve ever read the gay agenda, which is available online and can be easily Google searched by anyone who wants to, then you would find that the above mentioned “sins” have been manifestly and deliberately focalized and ultimately glorified by the gay minority for 35 years.

It is the plan to encourage these things as often as is possible, with television shows like “modern family” et al, and then when the gay intentions are deliberated, to say "don’t look at us, look at yourselves. It’s a strong tactic, used often, called ‘building a wall of integrity’.

In other words, force you to examine yourselves so much that you cannot see the parody of your sin being played on the grander stage.

Co-mingled with another tactic, again often employed, called ‘make them sick, make them well’, which perpetrates a supposed illness in order that it’s perpetrator can present its cure, and by that virtue, win legitimacy.

Consider how car salesman operate. They need to be needed. If there is nothing wrong with the car you drive, then you have no reason to buy theirs.

So, the gay agenda has been to make society as sick as possible, and then, feeling its sickness ( religion is bad, religion is the cause of all wars, straight people suck at marriage, the priest scandals, et al), and then call to mind a cure, in this case -the alternative lifestyle.

Then, not only do they create for themselves the opportunity for an alternative, but also, if you dispute them, they say both “don’t judge” and at the same time “judge against yourselves”.

And therein lies its obvious inherent self-contradiction.

And not only that, but I think we all grew up with the very best answer to their finger-pointing:

“two wrongs don’t make a right”.

 

[WesleyF]

To me, framing this issue as a “religious freedom” issue is weak and not accurate.

I don’t think it is weak at all. I think it is quite strong and very much accurate and I share the same sentiments. They have explained very clearly in the letter as to why it is a religious freedom issue-

1. Religious marriage counselors would be denied their professional accreditation for refusing to provide counseling in support of same-sex “married” relationships.
2. Religious employers who provide special health benefits to married employees would be required by law to extend those benefits to same-sex “spouses.”
3. Religious employers would also face lawsuits for taking any adverse employment action—no matter how modest— against an employee for the public act of obtaining a civil “marriage” with a member of the same sex.
4. in New Jersey, the state cancelled the tax-exempt status of a Methodist-run boardwalk
   pavilion used for religious services because the religious organization would not host a same-sex “wedding” there.
5. San Francisco dropped its $3.5 million in social service contracts with the Salvation Army because it refused to recognize same-sex “domestic partnerships” in its employee benefits policies.
6. Similarly, Portland, Maine, required Catholic Charities to extend spousal employee benefits to same-sex “domestic partners” as a condition of receiving city housing and community development funds.

I completely agree with the letter.

 

[WesleyF]

(1) Easy no fault divorce (this is principles of the Free Market applied to marriage)
(2) Legal heterosexual cohabitation
(3) Legal sex before marriage
(4) Adultery is no longer a crime in the USA.
(5) Widespread hardcover free all over the Internet, available to all,
(6) An economic system and system of cultural expectation that usually requires the wife and mother to work full time outside the home.

YET, there no campaigns to pass laws or constitutional amendments to fix the 6 problems above. To me, this is just plain insanity.

It is because these problems do not violate religious freedom. That’s the issue here. Nobody forces the church to allow divorces, or teach that cohabitation is okay, or to teach that sex before marriage is okay, or to teach that adultery is okay, or to teach that porn is okay, or to teach that the wife must work full time. These problems, although serious, do not lead to violation of religious freedom.

However, legalization of same sex “marriage” does lead to several violations of religious freedom as the letter has discussed.

 

[WesleyF]

It must be all due to politics. Virtually all heterosexuals are DISGUSTED by homosexual activity. There is nothing Christian in that. The criminals of motorcycle gangs hate gays too. Such revulsion is natural. I think certain politicos just want to capitalize on that for the purposes of getting control of the government. They don’t care one iota about the welfare of the American family and marriage, or at least not much. If they did, they’d campaign on those 6 things, rather than rousing up the masses in their disgust regarding homosexuals.

This is a typical inaccurate charge made by many people. First, having a disgust for homosexual activity is certainly Christian. I noticed how you suddenly shifted the subject from activity to persons. We hate homosexual activity, not persons. This is a classical misrepresentation of the Catholic position. The Catholic church does NOT advocate hating gays. It only advocates treating homosexual acts as disordered. It’s important to make the distinction between actions and persons.