Must Catholics deny Transsexuals Human Rights?

[Zoe_Brain]

A multi-part post, as I have to give my reasoning, and URLs.

Must Catholics deny Transsexuals and the Intersexed Human Rights?

The Magisterium has not said so.
The Congress of American Catholic Bishops has not said so.
The Pope has said so though.

First, to show that the Vatican thinks it would be best to legally deny gays human rights:

The Vatican expressed similar concerns in a 1992 letter to Bishops of the Catholic Church – authored by then-Cardinal Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI – regarding legislation to “make discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation illegal,” which according to Ratzinger, “may in fact have a negative impact on the family and society.”

“Even when the practice of homosexuality may seriously threaten the lives and well-being of a large number of people, its advocates remain undeterred and refuse to consider the magnitude of the risks involved,” Cardinal Ratzinger wrote. “’Sexual orientation’ does not constitute a quality comparable to race, ethnic background, etc., in respect to non-discrimination. Unlike these, homosexual orientation is an objective disorder and evokes moral concern.”

“Including ‘homosexual orientation’ among the considerations on the basis of which it is illegal to discriminate,” Ratzinger wrote, “can easily lead to regarding homosexuality as a positive source of human rights…(and)…to the legislative protection and promotion of homosexuality.”

– Americans For Truth About Homosexuality

What Human Rights are we talking about here? Let’s look at the list of rights in the legislation ynder consideration that is deemed to have a “negative impact on the family and society”.

To be allowed to use:

(1) restaurants, soda fountains, and other eating or drinking places, and all places where food is sold for consumption either on or off the premises;
(2) inns, hotels, and motels, whether serving temporary or permanent patrons;
(3) retail stores and service establishments;
(4) hospitals and clinics;
(5) motion picture, stage, and other theaters and music, concert, or meeting halls;
(6) circuses, exhibitions, skating rinks, sports arenas and fields, amusement or recreation parks, picnic grounds, fairs, bowling alleys, golf courses,
gymnasiums, shooting galleries, billiard and pool rooms, and swimming pools;
(7) public conveyances, such as automobiles, buses, taxicabs, trolleys, trains, limousines, boats, airplanes, and bicycles;
(8) utilities, such as water and sewer service, electricity, telephone, and cable television;
(9) streets, roads, sidewalks, other public rights-of-way, parking lots or garages, marinas, airports, and hangars; and
(10) places of public assembly and entertainment of every kind.

That from Bill 23-07 in Maryland, and opposed by the Thomas More Legal Centre.

While these do not in themselves appear to be especially dangerous, the danger is that by supporting the granting of any such rights, the church will be seen to be tolerating homosexuality. That is such a bad outcome that catholics must actively oppose such measures, by whatever means necessary. I’ll talk about the means later, and give justification for my statement there.

The argument against Homosexuality has since been expanded, as being against Natural Law. Why is it against Natural Law? Because it causes confusion between the two God-ordained sexes, and anything which does that is dangerous to humanity’s survival. There is a Human ecology, just as there is a Global ecology, and this must be protected against such threats to the Natural Order. Anything that confuses the sexes is dangerous, and must be legally suppressed. Well-intentioned laws granting or maintaining existing human rights for anyone who confuses the sexes are thus dangerous - and so presumably should be opposed.

About Natural Law, and the danger to human survival of Intersex - things between male and female - and a call to speak up on this issue:

(The Church) must also protect man from self-destruction. What is needed is something like a human ecology, correctly understood.

If the Church speaks of the nature of the human being as man and woman, and demands that this order of creation be respected, this is not some antiquated metaphysics. What is involved here is faith in the Creator and a readiness to listen to the “language” of creation. To disregard this would be the self-destruction of man himself, and hence the destruction of God’s own work.

ADDRESS OF HIS HOLINESS BENEDICT XVI
TO THE MEMBERS OF THE ROMAN CURIA
FOR THE TRADITIONAL EXCHANGE OF CHRISTMAS GREETINGS 2008

To carry our reflection further, we must remember that the problem of the environment is complex; one might compare it to a multifaceted prism. Creatures differ from one another and can be protected, or endangered, in different ways, as we know from daily experience. One such attack comes from laws or proposals which, in the name of fighting discrimination, strike at the biological basis of the difference between the sexes. I am thinking, for example, of certain countries in Europe or North and South America.

• ADDRESS OF HIS HOLINESS POPE BENEDICT XVI
  TO THE MEMBERS OF THE DIPLOMATIC CORPS
  FOR THE TRADITIONAL EXCHANGE OF NEW YEAR GREETINGS 2010

 

[Christopher68]

I suppose this would fall under the Church teaching of ‘hate the sin but love the sinner’, and to treat everyone with dignity as a fellow human being.

 

[Zoe_Brain]

Part II - The means of opposition, and showing that opposition to the existence of Intersexed and Transsexual people is a separate but related issue to opposing Homosexuality. They’re all dangerous to humanity’s very survival in their own right.

First, to show that such opposition is more important than merely spreading Christ’s message, and that all levels of Catholic organisations are involved in organising the opposition to human rights for these people:

HAMTRAMCK (Oct. 10) – Nearly a dozen religious leaders in the City of Hamtramck and a nationally prominent lawyer will speak at a campaign kick-off rally for the group Hamtramck Citizens Voting NO to `Special Rights’ Discrimination.

The rally will be held Sunday, Oct. 12th, from 5 to 6:30 p.m. at the Knights of Columbus Hall, 9632 Conant St. Admission is free.
…
The keynote speaker will be Brian Rooney, attorney for the Thomas More Law Center and legal expert on discriminatory “gay rights” legislation.

Below is a list of speakers scheduled…
…
• Rev. Andrew Wesley, pastor of St. Ladislaus Church and co-chair of the group Hamtramck Citizens Voting NO.
…
• Masud Khan, president of the Al Islah Islamic Center.
• Abdul Latif Azom, imam of Al Falah mosque.
• Abdul Salam, imam of Masjid Un Nur mosque.
• Adbo Zindani, secretary of Eiman Islamic Complex.
• Amin Alwagah, representing Algalazali mosque.
• Saleh Algahaim, president of Eiman Islamic Complex.
• Dzenan Kalanac, imam of Bosnia Islamic Center.
• Mohammed Shehab Khan, imam Baitul Islam mosque

• AFTAH
  Yes, that is correct, a Catholic priest leading. and the Knights of Columbus providing facilities, for an almost entirely Islamic conference to organise legal persecution.

He noted the campaign was highlighted by a rally at which** three Catholic priests** and six Muslim imams spoke out against the proposed ordinance.

“We salute Father Andy Wesley for his courage and leadership in being the first to stand against this discriminatory ordinance at a time when the city’s political establishment and news media were intent on demonizing and caricaturing anyone who dared oppose homosexual activists’ fraudulent ‘rights’ agenda,” Glenn said. “
…
Glenn also said the defeat of the ordinance would not have been possible without the efforts of campaign manager Jay McNally, a Catholic activist who commuted from Ypsilanti to manage the winning campaign, and the Thomas More Law Center, which provided legal counsel to the campaign and a regular speaker at campaign rallies, attorney Brian Rooney.

• AFTAH
  The point is, that it wasn’t just homosexuality that was the issue here. Again, from AFTAH:

Not content with adding the discriminatory “sexual orientation” language to city law, homosexual activists and their political allies succeeded in adding the words “gender identity” as well.
…
This “gender identity” language is so radical in its potential effects that even openly homosexual Congressman Barney Frank, D-Mass., refuses to include it in his federal “gay rights” legislation.

Yes, that’s right. Many gay rights groups and prominent Gay politicians oppose human rights for Intersexed and Transsexed people. This is not a matter of “homosexuality by stealth”. Neither is it a matter of Red vs Blue - Hamtramck voted for Obama 4:1.

The same day that the New Hampshire Senate voted in favour of same-sex marriage, they voted unanimously to stop Intersexed and Transsexed people from enjoying the same human rights Gays have had in that state for over a decade.

From Catholicism.org about the Catholic attitude to that bill:

New Hampshire Alert: “Transgender Rights” and the “Bathroom Bill”
by Brother André Marie March 18th, 2009

Legitimizing perversity is a fetish for some legislators. New Hampshire House Bill 415, dubbed by conservatives, “the Bathroom Bill,” is an effort to protect the rights of people who voluntarily mutilate themselves in the futile pretense that they have changed their God-given gender to another one.

I await comments.

Is it the case that

a) Despite this evidence, of course the Catholic Church isn’t against human rights for gays and those born with anatomy neither wholly male nor wholly female. Just because the Thomas More Legal Centre, various prominent Catholic Activists, multitudes of priests and religious, the Vatican itself in letters to bishops, and Pope Benedict himself encourage such legal persecution, that’s all just matters of individual conscience. The Church itself would never condone denial of human rights, and it’s insulting to say they do. Only anti-Catholics would say so.

b) That the Church does this, but is perfectly justified in doing so, because the fight against homosexuality is so important. It is unfortunate that the Transsexual and Intersexed are collateral damage.

c) That the Church does this, but is perfectly justified in doing so, as the existence of Gay, Intersexed or Transsexual people contravenes Natural Law, and they endanger all Humanity. (This appears to be the view of His Holiness).

d) Something else.

Please give URLs and quotes to justify your thesis, as I’ve had to do.

 

[Zoe_Brain]

I suppose this would fall under the Church teaching of ‘hate the sin but love the sinner’, and to treat everyone with dignity as a fellow human being.

Not so much FALL as FAIL it seems. And what particular sin have people committed who were born with mixed-sex anatomy? Are they “regrettably necessary collateral damage”? Dangers to humanity who for the good of all must be persecuted and legally suppressed regardless of morality? Or is the Church being calumnied unfairly, they don’t really persecute such people, nor wish them to be denied legal human rights?

This is the Catholic Answers forum. I’m interested in people’s opinions on the issue, no matter what they are, as long as they can justify them with evidence. That means accounting for all the facts I’ve already mentioned, as well as giving new ones.

As the result of my research so far, I’ve changed my opinion, and if given better evidence, will do so again.

 

[Dale_M]

Hi Zoe!

We started this discussion on another thread, and I am glad we are continuing it here, because I think it is important.

Must Catholics deny Transsexuals and the Intersexed Human Rights?

The Magisterium has not said so.
The Congress of American Catholic Bishops has not said so.
The Pope has said so though.

Zoe, you’re a very smart lady, and incredibly well informed. Frankly, I am in awe of you and am much pleased that you continue to visit us. The information you share with us is important.

However, I think you have several misunderstandings and I am going to disagree with you.

First, to show that the Vatican thinks it would be best to legally deny gays human rights:

You are quoting from an organization which has been identified as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. It isn’t a reliable source. Yes, it quotes Cardinal Ratzinger, but it takes his comment out of context.

The quotes from from this document:
Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on the Pastoral Care of Homosexual Persons

In that document he is strictly talking about opposing gay marriage and civil unions, not about about denying gay people civil rights. The organization you cited is twisting the meaning of Cardinal Ratzinger’s words.

What Human Rights are we talking about here? Let’s look at the list of rights in the legislation ynder consideration that is deemed to have a “negative impact on the family and society”.

I think this proposed Maryland law concerns civil rights, not human rights. More importantly, there is no evidence, and no reason, to think that the Pope or the Catholic Church opposes this bill.

The argument against Homosexuality has since been expanded, as being against Natural Law. Why is it against Natural Law? Because it causes confusion between the two God-ordained sexes, and anything which does that is dangerous to humanity’s survival.

Eh… yes and no. The Church believes homosexual behavior (not homosexuality) is against natural law, yes. But it does so because because it is “disordered”, which is to say it is contrary to the nature of man and the nature of woman and how they naturally are to relate to one another.

Anything that confuses the sexes is dangerous, and must be legally suppressed.

The pope has never said that.

Well-intentioned laws granting or maintaining existing human rights for anyone who confuses the sexes are thus dangerous - and so presumably should be opposed.

The pope has never said that either.

Okay, lets look at what the Pope actually said.

(The Church) must also protect man from self-destruction. What is needed is something like a human ecology, correctly understood.

If the Church speaks of the nature of the human being as man and woman, and demands that this order of creation be respected, this is not some antiquated metaphysics. What is involved here is faith in the Creator and a readiness to listen to the “language” of creation. To disregard this would be the self-destruction of man himself, and hence the destruction of God’s own work.

I think Pope Benedict is simply talking about the Catholic Church’s version of natural law, which posits a different nature of men and a different nature for women. He is saying if we don’t respect the innate differences between the two sexes, which he sees as immutable, then we are in for a world of hurt, because in ignoring the natural law (as the Church understands it) we are turning our backs on God. Yes, his comment strongly hints that he is worried about the cultural encouragement of transgender and homosexual “lifestyles” (I don’t like the word, and he didn’t use it, but I think its what he is getting at.) However, it doesn’t mean he sees transsexual persons or intersexed persons as a threat to humanity.

Okay, lets look at what the Pope said in 2010
Pope Benedict:

To carry our reflection further, we must remember that the problem of the environment is complex; one might compare it to a multifaceted prism. Creatures differ from one another and can be protected, or endangered, in different ways, as we know from daily experience. One such attack comes from laws or proposals which, in the name of fighting discrimination, strike at the biological basis of the difference between the sexes. I am thinking, for example, of certain countries in Europe or North and South America.

This statement comes after a paragraph where he decries moral relativism. Its not clear what he is talking about when he mentions laws which strike at the biological difference between men and women, but it would be consistent with the Church’s understanding of homosexuality if he were referring to laws concerning gay marriage or civil unions.

 

[Zoe_Brain]

Exactly the kind of response I was looking for, thanks.

The problem is though that, as I showed, if you are correct, then large numbers of clergy and religious within Catholicism have been misled, as I was. Are you familiar with the concepts of :“political dogwhistling” and “plausible deniability”? One could be forgiven for thinking that that’s what is involved here, at the very least.

You are quoting from an organization which has been identified as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. It isn’t a reliable source.

Ironic, isn’t it? Yet if I quoted from a GLBT source, many here would immediately dismiss anything I say as being biased. I figured that the best way to answer such people is to quote from sources they consider reliable. And they do, because when I’ve pointed out that AFTAH is deemed a “hate site” by the SPLC, it’s been dismissed as mere political grandstanding by a biased source.

This is a difficult charge to refute, as the SPLC most definitely is biased, and I can’t think that anyone pretending to objectivity could argue otherwise. I happen to agree with you here, that their assessment of AFTAH is accurate, but can’t think of a way to convince others of that. But I don’t have to bring in external and possibly biased sources, I can quote what AFTAH says itself - and what the Pope says.

The quote from Catholicism.org refutes the idea that this is “collateral damage” in the fight against gay marriage. It’s clear that to them at least, the issue stands on its own. Remember the NH senate vote. It wasn’t just “narrowly in favour of gay marriage” and “narrowly against rights for people like me”. The vote against the latter was unanimous, due to intense political pressure by Church groups (amongst others - including some in the Gay community).

One can also look at publications such as The Psychopathology of “Sex Reassignment” Surgery : Assessing Its Medical, Psychological, and Ethical Appropriateness, R.P. Fitzgibbons, P.M. Sutton, D.O’Leary , National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 9.1 (Spring 2009): 97–125.

In it, transsexual people are variously described as disturbed, delusional, psychotic, morally corrupt, mentally deficient, sadistic, masochistic, and that their parents as universally child abusers. They are also prone to narcissistic rage, irrationally angry at being described as “disturbed, delusional, psychotic, morally corrupt, mentally deficient, sadistic, masochistic” etc etc and being told that their parents are all child abusers.

Moreover, anyone who provides them medical treatment is also described as being mentally ill:

Are therapists who evaluate such persons too willing to take these claims at face value? Sander Breiner, in an article titled “Transsexuality Explained,” points out such a misperception is in itself a psychological problem:

Note where this was published: the National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly. It’s something straight out of Die Sturmer. The authors manage to quote extensively Blanchard, Bailey, McHugh and also Janice Raymond. I didn’t think it would be possible to reconcile such wildly different viewpoints, whose only commonality is transphobia. But they did.
They even managed to regard Zucker as being a great healer of transsexual children. What they don’t say is that he considers them “healed” if they’re turned Gay, rather than being straight transsexuals, and that turning trans children gay is his aim (since he wasn’t able to turn them straight rather than trans).
Janice Raymond described transsexuals as universally rapists who should be “morally mandated out of existence.” She quoted former novitiate Mary Daly, her PhD supervisor, who stated:

“Today the Frankenstein phenomenon is omnipresent not only in religious myth, but in its offspring, phallocratic technology. The insane desire for power, the madness of boundary violation, is the mark of necrophiliacs who sense the lack of soul/spirit/life-loving principle with themselves and therefore try to invade and kill off all spirit, substituting conglomerates of corpses. This necrophilic invasion/elimination takes a variety of forms. Transsexualism is an example of male surgical siring which invades the female world with substitutes.””

In turn, Mary Daly quoted her pupil:

“The Dionysian solution for women, which is violation of our own Hag-ocratic boundaries, is The Final Solution.”

“Dionysus sometimes assumed a girl-like form… As ethicist Janice Raymond has pointed out, the majority of transsexuals are “male to female,” while transsexed females basically function as tokens, and are used by the rulers of the transsexual empire to hide the real nature of the game. In transsexualism, males put on “female” bodies (which are in fact pseudofemale).”

Just to show you that when they talk about “The Final Solution” and “Mandating out of existence” they mean it literally, here’s Mary Daly again:

If life is to survive on this planet, there must be a decontamination of the Earth. I think this will be accompanied by an evolutionary process that will result in a drastic reduction of the population of males. People are afraid to say that kind of stuff anymore.

Wonder why? Because it’s straight from Mein Kampf perhaps? And these are the people being quoted approvingly by Catholic BioEthicists.

OK, I plead guilty to the “narcissistic rage” bit. I’m angered by this, and am less than willing to give “benefit of the doubt” in ambiguous cases, such as the Pope’s speeches. Despite repeated attempts by OII and other Intersex groups to seek clarification on the issue, a statement that the Pope was not calling for the legal persecution of Intersexed people, no such statement has been forthcoming. The silence speaks for itself louder than any words.

 

[royal_archer]

Not so much FALL as FAIL it seems. And what particular sin have people committed who were born with mixed-sex anatomy? Are they “regrettably necessary collateral damage”? Dangers to humanity who for the good of all must be persecuted and legally suppressed regardless of morality? Or is the Church being calumnied unfairly, they don’t really persecute such people, nor wish them to be denied legal human rights?

This is the Catholic Answers forum. I’m interested in people’s opinions on the issue, no matter what they are, as long as they can justify them with evidence. That means accounting for all the facts I’ve already mentioned, as well as giving new ones.

As the result of my research so far, I’ve changed my opinion, and if given better evidence, will do so again.

Please provide the source to back up you assertion that the church or members of the church advocating taking away peoples rights based on a birth defect.

 

[Zoe_Brain]

Please provide the source to back up you assertion that the church or members of the church advocating taking away peoples rights based on a birth defect.

Certainly! The evidence is not hard to find.

From their own website, the Thomas More Law Centre:

Ignoring enormous community opposition, the Gainesville, Florida City Council earlier this year enacted an ordinance that granted special privileges to men who perceive themselves as women to use women’s bathrooms in any school, business or public facility.

As a result, a coalition of citizens and businesses, in Gainesville, formed “Citizens for Good Public Policy,” for the purpose of enacting a Charter Amendment that would prevent the addition of such bizarre special categories to the City’s civil rights ordinance.
…
If passed by the voters, the Charter Amendment will invalidate the City Council’s recently enacted “gender identity” category, which most citizens agree creates awkward and potentially harmful situations.

The Thomas More Law Center, a national public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan has been acting as legal counsel for Citizens for Good Public Policy. It has also been assisting leaders of other Florida Christian groups including David Caton of the “Florida Family Association” and Dennis Baxley of the “Christian Coalition of Florida.”

I have been unable to find a single instance anywhere worldwide where a Catholic group, a Christian group engaged in Catholic advocacy and headed by a Catholic, a single priest or religious, has openly advocated for human rights for Transsexual or Intersexed people. Advocated, they don’t actually have to have contributed money or resources.

Now to give you an idea of just how foul the mendacity got - because according to the Florida Attorney-General and numerous Judges the statement in the video is completely false, not just misleading - look at this. This is the kind of stuff that was produced by the group being helped by the TMLC:

youtube.com/watch?v=ExGBlXKRrYs

To make it quite clear that they were not targetting Homosexuals, there’s this from the Catholic News Agency:

Gainesville petition to overturn ‘bizarre’ bathroom law makes the ballot

“The concept of ‘gender identity’ was fashioned by radical homosexual organizations and advocates to normalize and protect the bizarre sexual behavior of a few people because they feel more like a woman or a man than what is their actual sex. These radical groups have taken over city councils like Gainesville. In practical effect, these types of ordinances end up being used to prosecute Christians who faithfully practice their faith.”

A statement on the Citizens for Good Public Policy web site warns that a group closely allied with the City Commission is trying to persuade petition signers to rescind their signatures, charging that signatories are helping to legalize discrimination. The group also claims that Citizens for Good Public Policy are really targeting homosexual rights.

Citizens for Good Public Rights denies the charges, saying that its organizers have never protested or brought legal action against the city’s civil rights laws protecting sexual orientation, protections which have existed since 1988.

“Let us be clear: Citizens for Good Public Policy believes local laws should neither oppose nor favor sexual orientation,” the group says on its web site. “We consider sexual orientation a matter of personal choice, and therefore unsuitable as a civil rights category.”

The rescinding of the rights for Gays was just “collateral damage” according to them.

Now to prove that transsexuality not just Intersex conditions are congenital anomalies:
Sexual Hormones and the Brain: An Essential Alliance for Sexual Identity and Sexual Orientation Garcia-Falgueras A, Swaab DF Endocr Dev. 2010;17:22-35

The fetal brain develops during the intrauterine period in the male direction through a direct action of testosterone on the developing nerve cells, or in the female direction through the absence of this hormone surge. In this way, our gender identity (the conviction of belonging to the male or female gender) and sexual orientation are programmed or organized into our brain structures when we are still in the womb. However, since sexual differentiation of the genitals takes place in the first two months of pregnancy and sexual differentiation of the brain starts in the second half of pregnancy, these two processes can be influenced independently, which may result in extreme cases in trans-sexuality. This also means that in the event of ambiguous sex at birth, the degree of masculinization of the genitals may not reflect the degree of masculinization of the brain. There is no indication that social environment after birth has an effect on gender identity or sexual orientation.

I’ve already given examples of priests and religious opposing giving Intersexed and Transsexed people basic human rights they are currently denied; this example is of existing rights being abrogated.

You do know there is a referendum going on and several of the Catholic churches have run drives… have you asked yours ?

[www.notmyshower.net](www.notmyshower.net)

Please get involved, we can use all the help we can get.

theresa rickman, also a catholic.

– Source

 

[royal_archer]

Certainly! The evidence is not hard to find.

You have not provided any evidence of them advocating that human rights be taken away from them only that they were against them getting “special privileges”. The church should not support the granting of special privileges for any group.

Now please provide a refernce where the Church has advocated taking away HUMAN RIGHTS from any individual because of a birth defect.

 

[kage_ar]

Certainly! The evidence is not hard to find.

From their own website, the Thomas More Law Centre:

As was pointed out to you before, the Thomas More Law Center is NOT the Catholic Church.

Try again.

 

[Zoe_Brain]

The church should not support the granting of special privileges for any group.

Now please provide a refernce where the Church has advocated taking away HUMAN RIGHTS from any individual because of a birth defect.

As I said, the “special privileges” as you call them include:
Being allowed to use:

(1) restaurants, soda fountains, and other eating or drinking places, and all places where food is sold for consumption either on or off the premises;
(2) inns, hotels, and motels, whether serving temporary or permanent patrons;
(3) retail stores and service establishments;
(4) hospitals and clinics;
(5) motion picture, stage, and other theaters and music, concert, or meeting halls;
(6) circuses, exhibitions, skating rinks, sports arenas and fields, amusement or recreation parks, picnic grounds, fairs, bowling alleys, golf courses,
gymnasiums, shooting galleries, billiard and pool rooms, and swimming pools;
(7) public conveyances, such as automobiles, buses, taxicabs, trolleys, trains, limousines, boats, airplanes, and bicycles;
(8) utilities, such as water and sewer service, electricity, telephone, and cable television;
(9) streets, roads, sidewalks, other public rights-of-way, parking lots or garages, marinas, airports, and hangars; and
(10) places of public assembly and entertainment of every kind.

I’d call at least some of those Human Rights rather than Civil Rights. Like being allowed to walk on a sidewalk.

If you think that being prevented from using any of the above isn’t a violation of Human Rights, we’ll have to agree to disagree.

 

[Zoe_Brain]

As was pointed out to you before, the Thomas More Law Center is NOT the Catholic Church.

Try again.

The TMLC, Catholic Activist Jay McNally, the Knights of Columbus, Father Andrew Wesley, 2 other priests, Brother André Marie March, Cardinal (as was) Ratzinger, Pope Benedict XVI, the Catholic BioEthics Quarterly and the congregations of numerous Catholic churches are what exactly?

Please point out just one case where a member of the Catholic clergy or religious has advocated that intersexed people not be denied these rights. I’ve shown many reported cases of the opposite.

But you still haven’t answered the question, nor made any attempt to do so:

Is it the case that

a) Despite this evidence, of course the Catholic Church isn’t against human rights for gays and those born with anatomy neither wholly male nor wholly female. Just because the Thomas More Legal Centre, various prominent Catholic Activists, multitudes of priests and religious, the Vatican itself in letters to bishops, and Pope Benedict himself encourage such legal persecution, that’s all just matters of individual conscience. The Church itself would never condone denial of human rights, and it’s insulting to say they do. Only anti-Catholics would say so.

b) That the Church does this, but is perfectly justified in doing so, because the fight against homosexuality is so important. It is unfortunate that the Transsexual and Intersexed are collateral damage.

c) That the Church does this, but is perfectly justified in doing so, as the existence of Gay, Intersexed or Transsexual people contravenes Natural Law, and they endanger all Humanity. (This appears to be the view of His Holiness).

d) Something else.

Please give URLs and quotes to justify your thesis, as I’ve had to do.

 

[royal_archer]

As I said, the “special privileges” as you call them include:
Being allowed to use:

I’d call at least some of those Human Rights rather than Civil Rights. Like being allowed to walk on a sidewalk.

If you think that being prevented from using any of the above isn’t a violation of Human Rights, we’ll have to agree to disagree.

Your quote is where the term special privileges was introduced, I’m just using your words.

Of that list you provided, provide a reference where the church advocated that people should not be allowed to partake of one of those because of a birth defect.

 

[royal_archer]

The TMLC, Catholic Activist Jay McNally, the Knights of Columbus, Father Andrew Wesley, 2 other priests, Brother André Marie March, Cardinal (as was) Ratzinger, Pope Benedict XVI, the Catholic BioEthics Quarterly and the congregations of numerous Catholic churches are what exactly?

Please point out just one case where a member of the Catholic clergy or religious has advocated that intersexed people not be denied these rights. I’ve shown many reported cases of the opposite.

But you still haven’t answered the question, nor made any attempt to do so:

I still have not seen a case where a Catholic organization, much less the church advocated denying people rights. Please provide a reference.

By the way I couldn’t provide you a reference for the church advocating for any specific birth defect or cosmetic condition. Why do you feel that this specific group should get special treatment?

 

[kage_ar]

For speaking evil of the Holy Father, may God have mercy on your soul.

 

[Newbie2]

I still have not seen a case where a Catholic organization, much less the church advocated denying people rights. Please provide a reference.

By the way I couldn’t provide you a reference for the church advocating for any specific birth defect or cosmetic condition. Why do you feel that this specific group should get special treatment?

I’d have to agree with RA. Furthermore, I see ZB confusing “human rights”, as defined by the Church, with “civil rights” as defined by our secular society. Granted, there is a lot of overlap, but ZB has failed, methinks, to prove her point.

 

[royal_archer]

I’d have to agree with RA. Furthermore, I see ZB confusing “human rights”, as defined by the Church, with “civil rights” as defined by our secular society. Granted, there is a lot of overlap, but ZB has failed, methinks, to prove her point.

your right about civil vs human rights although I am not sure I would even consider all the things on the list to be civil rights (case in point: golf) but I figured it was a moot point since zb had not provided evidence regardless of level.

 

[Zoe_Brain]

Of that list you provided, provide a reference where the church advocated that people should not be allowed to partake of one of those because of a birth defect.

Read the evidence, I’ve already shown where Catholic Advocates, Churches (via funding drives), and priests have advocated exactly this.

 

[royal_archer]

Read the evidence, I’ve already shown where Catholic Advocates, Churches (via funding drives), and priests have advocated exactly this.

Sory, must have missed it please provide that evidence, not inuendos and not a failure to support or give special treatment but evidence of the church advocating of denyal of HUMAN RIGHTS based on birth defects.

 

[Zoe_Brain]

For speaking evil of the Holy Father, may God have mercy on your soul.

Thank you for your good wishes. I’d appreciate it more if the Holy Father had mercy on my body though. I’m Intersexed, and so have been persecuted by Catholics using His Holiness’s words as justification. His Holiness has not seen fit to bother to correct them, if they’re in error. He’s been made aware of the situation I and many others are in because of what he has said more than once. In similar situations, where his words have been misconstrued, the Vatican has been quick to point that out. Silence here speaks louder than words.

Any evil comes from his words, not mine. He’s not infallible, except when speaking ex cathedra.

None of the commenters have answered my question yet. Can I assume that you’re afraid of giving an answer the Church would not approve of?

Plausible Deniability. Tell me, if Catholics were denied those rights - the right to use a road, or a footpath, or a public drinking fountain, or to have medical treatment if they could pay for it - would you say that if they asked to be allowed to do that, they’d be demanding “special treatment”? To be especially favoured?

There’s none so blind…