Persuasive, Secular Arguments For the Banning of Gay Marriages?

[Catmando]

Okay, I’ve been writing up a manifesto of my political beliefs. Unfortunately, I’ve hit a wall. I read that we as Catholics cannot support gay marriage in any way, but I can’t for the life of me understand how I can defend this belief in a secular world. When it comes to having a good, strong political stance it seems saying “Because God says so” doesn’t cut it.

So: Is there any argument from a secular point of view that can defend our Catholic position in a country where the separation of church and state is a must?

 

[Myqyl]

If the country you’re speaking of is the USA you also need to justify the clear contradiction to the 14th Amendment.

In my opinion, while there is a clear cut argument against gay Matrimony, there is no defense against gay marriage.

I’m curious about one thing… When you said “I read that we as Catholics cannot support gay marriage”, where did you read this? If that is the opinion of a Catholic on an internet forum then I would question what you’ve read. If however you found this stated somewhere in the Catechism, then I would be most interested in learning the section where you found it. I know others will call me a heretic and say that the Catechism is not the sole (soul?) teaching of the Church, but what I learned from the nuns in grade school is that if we abide by the letter of the law, as stated in the Catechism, we are living good Catholic lives. So if the Catechism actually does state that we can not “support gay marriage in any way” then I will have to change my attitude. Clearly we are told not to enter into a gay marriage, but not to support the rights of someone else seems to actually contradict the Spirit as well as the Letter of the Catechism.

If I’m mistaken I await enlightenment…

God bless.

 

[Bezant]

Okay, I’ve been writing up a manifesto of my political beliefs. Unfortunately, I’ve hit a wall. I read that we as Catholics cannot support gay marriage in any way, but I can’t for the life of me understand how I can defend this belief in a secular world. When it comes to having a good, strong political stance it seems saying “Because God says so” doesn’t cut it.

So: Is there any argument from a secular point of view that can defend our Catholic position in a country where the separation of church and state is a must?

I’ve yet to find a very strong secular argument, but the matter’s settled by law in my country anyway. Here’s a thought.

Marriage is an exclusive contract; we do not marry multiple marties (although in the UK I believe we do recognise polygamous Muslim unions performed abroad…anyway), animals, minors, or near-of-kin. Its made to be discriminatory.

 

[Samuel63]

Here are two points to consider.

It benefits a country to propagate its membership by immigration and the birth of new citizens. Immigration can be regulated to the country’s advantage with law. Birth of new citizens cannot practically be regulated. It behooves the country therefore, to provide a privileged status to those that come together in holy matrimony to participate in creation - a gift from God.

Second point - Current experience proves same-gender relationships are not stable and spread serious disease. The average number of partners in this same-gender category is quite high and life expectancy is quite low. Life expectancy is worse than a lifetime smoker. Both issues are significant. It costs a lot of money to care for people with disease and to find a cure. Years of research are needed. This is even more troubling when you consider these same diseases spread to the heterosexual community. So, the issue is, the country’s resources are shifted to care for this small community that frankly, is not caring properly for itself. Deregulate health insureance and this would not be an issue.

That is a start. What do you think?

 

[ZDHayden]

. . . If however you found this stated somewhere in the Catechism, then I would be most interested in learning the section where you found it.
. . .
If I’m mistaken I await enlightenment…

Paragraph 2357 of the CCC:

Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity (Gen 19:1-29; Rom 1:24-27; 1 Cor 6:10; 1 Tim 1:10), tradition has always declared that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered” (1 Tim 1:10). They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.

Hope this helps.

 

[Joe_5859]

I would highly recommend reading the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith’s document:

Considerations regarding proposals to give legal recognition to unions between homosexual persons.

Yes, the document is from the Church (and so secularists would probably not accept it if you simply point them to the document). However, it was intentionally written to utilize arguments from reason so that the document could be of benefit to bishops to convincingly articulate the Church’s position in the secular realm. It really is the go-to document on this issue.

Catholics may not be able to use this document as a citation to convince non-Catholics, but the arguments contained therein are the arguments we need to be making.

 

[Myqyl]

Paragraph 2357 of the CCC:

Hope this helps.

Indeed it does… I’ll need to read this and pray on it…

Thank you very much

God bless

 

[Joseph_L_Varga]

ruthinstitute.org/

ruthblog.org/2011/05/02/dr-morses-testimony-to-mn-senate-judiciary/

ruthblog.org/2011/02/10/dr-morses-testimony-to-the-rhode-island-legislature-yesterday-re-ssm/

Dr. Morse’s testimony to MN Senate Judiciary
May 2nd, 2011
Prepared remarks for the Judiciary Committee of the Minnesota State Senate, hearings on same sex marriage

April 29, 2011 St. Paul, Minnesota

We are here to consider giving the citizens of the State of Minnesota the opportunity to vote on a marriage amendment to their Constitution. The proposed amendment simply states “Only a union of one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in MN.”

I am Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse, founder and president of the Ruth Institute, a project of the National Organization for Marriage. My doctorate is in economics, from the University of Rochester, in NY. I have taught at Yale and George Mason Universities. I have had fellowships with the University of Chicago, Cornell Law School, and the Hoover Institution at Stanford. I have written two books on the social purpose and significance of marriage. I am the mother of an adopted child and a birth child. My husband and I were foster parents in San Diego County for three years.

I urge you to allow the citizens of MN the opportunity to exercise their right to vote on the definition of marriage. Removing the requirement that spouses be of opposite sex is a redefinition of marriage. Redefining marriage redefines parenthood. Redefining marriage affects the balance of power between the state and civil society. The citizens of MN have the right to make up their own minds about these important issues.

The proposed amendment is nothing radical. The people of MN are entitled to say whether they want marriage to remain as the union of one man and one woman, or whether they want to take their chances with marriage being redefined by activist judges. Letting the citizens vote is just the decent thing to do.

continued…

 

[TimothyH]

If I, as a man, can marry another man, then why can I not marry a dog or a goat? Or three women? Or a five year old boy? Or a boat or a TV? Or just jump off the bridge onto the interstate if that is what I want to do?

-Tim-

 

[Joseph_L_Varga]

continued… from Ruthblog

The essential public purpose of marriage is to attach mothers and fathers to their children and to one another. We can see the importance of this purpose by taking the perspective of the child: What is owed to the child? Unlike adults, the child does not need autonomy or independence. The child is entitled to a relationship with and care from both of the people who brought him into being. Therefore, the child has a legitimate interest in the stability of his parents’ union. But no child can defend these entitlements himself. Nor is it adequate to make restitution after these rights have been violated. The child’s rights to care and relationship must be supported pro-actively, before harm is done, for those rights to be protected at all.

Marriage is adult society’s institutional structure for protecting the legitimate interests of children. Without this public purpose, we would not need marriage as a distinct social institution.

We often hear the objection that some marriages don’t have children. This is perfectly true. However, every child has parents. Depriving a child of relationships with his or her parents is an injustice to the child, and should not be done without some compelling or unavoidable reason. The objection that some marriages don’t have children stands the rationale for marriage on its head. It views marriage strictly from the adult’s perspective, instead of from the child’s perspective.

Marriage is not simply a special case of the market, and family law is not simply a subset of property and contract law. Marriage exists to meet the social necessity of caring for helpless children, who are not and cannot be, contracting parties. Children are protected parties. And, marriage should protect the interests of both parents in pursuing their common project of rearing their children. If we replace this essential public purpose with inessential private purposes, marriage will not be able to do its job. But children will still need secure attachments to their mothers and fathers, a need which will go unfulfilled.

Same sex marriage redefines parenthood, as a side effect of redefining marriage. Up until now, marriage has made legal parenthood track biological parenthood, with adoption for exceptional situations. The legal presumption of paternity means that children born to a married woman are presumed to be the children of her husband. With this legal rule, and the social practice of sexual exclusivity, marriage attaches children to their biological parents.

Same sex couples of course, do not procreate together. So called Marriage Equality requires a dubious move from “presumption of paternity” to the gender neutral “presumption of parentage.” This sleight of hand transforms the legal understanding of parenthood. The same sex partner of a biological parent is never the other biological parent. Rather than attaching children to their biological parents, same sex marriage is the vehicle that separates children from a parent.

 

[Joseph_L_Varga]

continued… from Ruthblog

No longer will the law hold that children need a mother and a father. In the wake of marriage redefinition in other states, courts are saying silly things like, “the traditional notion that children need a mother and a father to be raised into healthy, well-adjusted adults is based more on stereotype than anything else.”[1]

This statement made by the Iowa Supreme Court in Varnum v Brien, is false as a general statement. Mountains of data show that children do need their mothers and their fathers,[2] and that children care deeply about biological connections.[3]

Please don’t change the subject by saying that we already have lots of children unattached to their parents. We should be taking steps to place responsible limits on things like divorce, rather than careening headlong into further and more deeply entrenched institutionalized injustices to children.

Equating same sex parenting with opposite sex parenting will also marginalize men from the family. By legalizing same sex unions, the authority of the government declares that mothers and fathers are interchangeable. Society asserts that children do equally well with two mommies, two daddies or one of each. And when mothers and fathers are interchangeable, it is fathers who will be pushed aside.

In Canada, where same sex unions have been legal since 2005, the birth certificates reflect this marginalization of fathers. Each birth certificate in British Columbia has a place to mention the biological mother. The second parent is listed as “father or co-parent,” and people check off whether the “other parent” is the father or co-parent. Fatherhood is officially reduced to a check-off box.

You might object that the birth certificates are purely symbolic, and that we could solve this symbolic problem of marginalizing men on the birth certificates by simply recording Parent A and Parent B. Very well. Suppose we do that. That must mean we would record two individuals as parents, without taking note of which one has any biological relationship to the child. The theory would be that the genetic connection between the child and one member of the lesbian couple for instance, cannot be permitted to “privilege” her in any way over the other member of the couple.

This suggestion makes plain how deeply same sex marriage will alter our social structure. The biological principle of determining parentage will have to be suppressed, and eventually replaced with another principle. That principle will be that the state will decide who counts as a parent.

We can already see this in disputed custody cases. Courts are awarding parenting rights to individuals who not related to the child, either through biology or adoption. Perfectly fit parents are having their parental rights diminished because they once had a sexual relationship with someone.[4] When courts ‘eradicate the parent/non-parent dichotomy,’ they must establish multi-part tests for determining whether a person warrants the status of “de facto parent.” The court ends up scrutinizing the minutiae of family life.

Let us be clear: the alternative to the biological principle for determining parentage is the principle that the government decides who is a parent. Instead of simply recording parentage, the state will determine parentage, not in exceptional cases, but routinely. This is far too much discretion to allow the family courts. Those of you who think like libertarians should be particularly alarmed by this expansion of the state into the lives of ordinary citizens. This is what “getting the state out of the marriage business” will eventually come to mean.

 

[Joseph_L_Varga]

continued… from Ruthblog

In short, redefining marriage from the union of a man and a woman to the union of any two persons jettisons three foundational principles: first, the principle that children are entitled to a relationship with both parents, second, the biological principle for determining parentage, and third, the principle that the state recognizes parentage, but does not assign it.

I am often told I am on the “wrong side of History.” The justice of “marriage equality” is overwhelming; the younger generation favors it; same sex marriage is inevitable. But there is ample reason to doubt this March of History storyline: we were told all these things about abortion too.

“You need to accept Roe v. Wade. Abortion is simple justice for women. Besides, the next generation will completely accept abortion. You are on the Wrong Side of History.”

A funny thing happened on the way to History: the people did not perform as promised. In January 2010, I took a group of Ruth Institute students up to the West Coast Walk for Life in San Francisco. Official estimates place the attendance at over 35,000. But I wasn’t counting. I was looking at the faces. I saw what anyone can see, if they care to look: the pro-life movement is a youth movement.

The average age of the walkers at the West Coast Walk for Life was probably around late twenties. Toward the front of the parade were the Berkeley Students for Life (yes, there is such a thing) and the Stanford pro-life club, (yes, they exist as well). Busloads of high school students, college students road-tripping in from all over the West Coast, families with small children, babies in arms, backpacks and strollers. The next generation is not going along quietly with the March of History.

And why should they?

It is the interests of children that the Abortion Regime sets aside in order to accommodate the desires of adults. And it is the interests of children that the redefinition of marriage will set aside as well. Remember the old pro-abortion slogan, “every child a wanted child?” Who can take that seriously today? Today’s same sex marriage mantra, “Kids just need two adults who love them” will come to sound every bit as hollow.

Advocates of redefining marriage assure us that children will do fine, whatever the loving adults in their lives decide to do. IVF children will be so wanted by their legal parents that the lifetime separation from their natural parents will not trouble them. Children of unconventional family structures, held together by a series of contracts among adults,[5] those children will just have more adults to love them. Divorce, separation, complex custody quarrels, kids shuttling between four households with their sleeping bags and backpacks:[6] that’s just anti-equality hysteria and will never happen.

But biology will reassert itself. Some women who have children with female partners will find that sharing the care of their children with another woman, is not as easy as sharing the care with the child’s father. Some men who agree to be sperm donors as “friends” will find that they want more of a relationship with their own children than they had anticipated.[7] And some children are going to have feelings about their absent parents, uncomfortable questions about their origins, and complex emotions about being partially purchased.[8]

Advocates of so called marriage equality typically respond, “That’s just biology,” as if biology were nothing. They are asking people to set aside the natural attachment of parents to their own children, the natural difficulties of treating another person’s child as if they were your own, the natural desires of children to know who they are and where they came from. Suppressing all these feelings in all these people will not be possible indefinitely. As time marches on, the brutality of the marriage “equality” regime will become just as obvious as the brutality of the abortion regime is today. Marriage is the right side of history.

 

[Joseph_L_Varga]

continued… from Ruthblog

Dr. Morse’s testimony to the Rhode Island legislature yesterday re: SSM
February 10th, 2011
I am here today to address those of you who have already made up your minds to redefine marriage. History will not be kind to you. Previous generations of social experimenters have caused unimaginable misery for millions of people. Particular people advocated the policies that led to today’s 50% divorce rate and 40% out of wedlock childbearing rate. None of these people has ever been held accountable.

I am here today to hold you to account, for the predictable harms you will cause by redefining marriage.

Let me remind you of the essential public purpose of marriage. Marriage attaches mothers and fathers to their children, and to one another. Once you replace that essential public purpose with inessential, even frivolous private purposes, marriage will not be able to do its job. But children will still need secure attachments to their mothers and fathers, a need which will go unfulfilled.

You are redefining parenthood, as a side effect of redefining marriage, without even considering what you are about to do. Until now, marriage makes legal parenthood track biological parenthood. The legal presumption of paternity means that children born to a married woman are presumed to be the children of her husband. With this legal rule, and the social practice of sexual exclusivity, marriage attaches children to their biological parents.

Same sex couples of course, do not procreate together. “Marriage equality” requires a slippery move from “presumption of paternity” to the gender neutral “presumption of parentage.” This sleight of hand transforms parenthood. The same sex partner of a biological parent is never the other biological parent. Rather than attaching children to their biological parents, same sex marriage is the vehicle that separates children from a parent.

No longer will the law hold that children need a mother and a father. Under the inspiration and guidance of people like you in other states, courts are saying silly things like, “the traditional notion that children need a mother and a father to be raised into healthy, well-adjusted adults is based more on stereotype than anything else.”1

This statement made by the Iowa Supreme Court in Varnum v Brien, is false as a general statement. Mountains of data show that children do need their mothers and their fathers,2 and that children care deeply about biological connections.3 The gay community is not responsible for today’s generation of fatherless children. But they will be responsible for the next such generation.

And don’t tell me that we already have lots of children unattached to their parents. We should be taking steps to place responsible limits on things like divorce, rather than careening headlong into further and more institutionalized injustices to children.

 

[Joseph_L_Varga]

continued… from Ruthblog

Are you really prepared to accept responsibility for the consequences of detaching legal parenthood from the natural moorings of biology? Do you really want a world in which children may have three or four legal parents?4 Are you ready for contract parenting, in which adults parcel out parental responsibilities amongst themselves? That is the world you are bringing into being. 5

The next generation of children of divorce may be shuttling between 3 or 4 households, with their backpacks and their sleeping bags. Whether you’re ready or not, I hold you accountable.

And don’t try to tell me “nothing so terrible has happened in Massachusetts.” Redefining marriage redefines the way in which generations relate to one another. It is ludicrous to believe that we would feel the full impact of such a change in a few years. It will take at least a generation, a full thirty years or more, before the full effects of redefining marriage work themselves out throughout the social system.6

The only argument you have is so-called “equality.” You have taken a venerable American concept and twisted it out of recognition. Equality used to mean limiting the power of the state to make irrelevant distinctions among citizens. In your hands, equality has become a battering ram for smashing every aspect of social life that has any hint of sexual differentiation. No more mothers and fathers, only Parent 1 and Parent 2.

Far from limiting the power of the state, your version of equality has become a tool for the hostile takeover of civil society by the state. Churches are already under attack for daring to dissent from the new state-imposed Orthodoxy that marriage is whatever the government says it is.7

Parents are losing the right to direct the education of their own children.8 Foster parents in the UK must submit to the state’s views about marriage.9 Reputable adoption agencies have been put out of business.

And the pettiness of some of the complaints brought by same sex couples is simply staggering. Christian bed and breakfast owners have been sued for not allowing unmarried couples to stay in double rooms. They would have gladly rented them separate rooms, but that was not good enough for the thought police.10 Same sex couples have brought legal complaints against wedding photographers, as if there were a constitutional right to have your picture taken by the person of your choice.11 All in the name of “civil rights.”

Let me remind you that a vast majority of African Americans completely reject same sex marriage. They are deeply offended by the high-jacking of the moral authority of their civil rights movement.

When slavery was abolished, all slaves became free men and women. When women obtained the right to vote, the discrimination ended with the very next election. But for children of same sex marriage, the situation will be different. When we come to our senses 30 years from now and realize that we have perpetrated a grotesque injustice, not a single child born fatherless or motherless within a same sex marriage will get his missing parent back. Only prevention will protect children’s rights.

The thin disguise of marriage equality will not mislead anyone, nor will it atone for the wrong this day done.12

And to those of you who plan to vote for man/woman marriage, I say: stay strong! History is on your side.

all quotes from:

ruthinstitute.org/

 

[jimjack]

continued… from Ruthblog

all quotes from:

ruthinstitute.org/

lol, this lady is on a Catholic radio station every other week according to that website. Seems very secular

There are no persuasive, secular arguments against gay marriage IMO. Certainly none that I have ever heard.

 

[ZDHayden]

lol, this lady is on a Catholic radio station every other week according to that website. Seems very secular

There are no persuasive, secular arguments against gay marriage IMO. Certainly none that I have ever heard.

I think the definition of secular used here is non-theistic. Of course Catholics, who must believe gay marriage is wrong, will be the most vocal. Does this mean that everything out of a Catholic’s mouth is going to be theistic in nature? Certainly not.

 

[Prayer_Warrior]

If the country you’re speaking of is the USA you also need to justify the clear contradiction to the 14th Amendment.

In my opinion, while there is a clear cut argument against gay Matrimony, there is no defense against gay marriage.

I’m curious about one thing… When you said “I read that we as Catholics cannot support gay marriage”, where did you read this? If that is the opinion of a Catholic on an internet forum then I would question what you’ve read. If however you found this stated somewhere in the Catechism, then I would be most interested in learning the section where you found it. I know others will call me a heretic and say that the Catechism is not the sole (soul?) teaching of the Church, but what I learned from the nuns in grade school is that if we abide by the letter of the law, as stated in the Catechism, we are living good Catholic lives. So if the Catechism actually does state that we can not “support gay marriage in any way” then I will have to change my attitude. Clearly we are told not to enter into a gay marriage, but not to support the rights of someone else seems to actually contradict the Spirit as well as the Letter of the Catechism.

If I’m mistaken I await enlightenment…

God bless.

The Catechism is a very condensed version of Catholic teaching. While it is a useful teaching, it is not the end- all, be- all teaching. You would find that in the the many lengthy documents written by the Magisterium over the years. You could probably find these documents on the Vatican website.

Someone already posted CCC 2357. Here is 1625 which flat out says that marriage is between a man and a woman. If a marriage is not between a man and a women then it is a violation of natural and ecclesial law.

1625 The parties to a marriage covenant are a baptized man and woman, free to contract marriage, who freely express their consent; “to be free” means:

• not being under constraint;

• not impeded by any natural or ecclesiastical law.

Also consider this:

2396 Among the sins gravely contrary to chastity are masturbation, fornication, pornography, and homosexual practices.

Combined with this:

1868 Sin is a personal act. Moreover, we have a responsibility for the sins committed by others when we cooperate in them:

• by participating directly and voluntarily in them;

• by ordering, advising, praising, or approving them;

• by not disclosing or not hindering them when we have an obligation to do so;

• by protecting evil-doers.

As Catholics we absolutely CANNOT approve of the sin of homosexual acts which is the basis for “gay marriage”. However, we absolutely are called to love and respect all people. The common phrase is “love the sinner, hate the sin”. We must treat homosexuals with the dignity they deserve, yet must stand firm against the sin of homosexual acts. I know it is hard sometimes, but we have to consider that their souls are in peril. Grave sin can become mortal sin (based on knowledge and consent) and separate a soul from God. Thus, it is a greater act of love and mercy on our part to speak up about the sin then to be silent about it.

 

[Joe_5859]

lol, this lady is on a Catholic radio station every other week according to that website. Seems very secular

There are no persuasive, secular arguments against gay marriage IMO. Certainly none that I have ever heard.

Did you read the CDF statement? The arguments are based in reason, not revelation. I really recommend a close reading of this document to anyone who is genuinely and sincerely interested in an answer to this important question.

I think some people expect the impossible. They want religious people to provide non-religious explanations of their position. Yet the simple fact that the explanation is articulated by a religious person means – to them – that the explanation is ipso facto a religious argument. I don’t know if there’s any argument they would accept.

I know that the Catholic Church’s explanations based on reason can sound religious to many people simply because classical philosophy is so alien to most of us. But the arguments are not simply “Because the Bible says so.”

 

[Warrenton]

So: Is there any argument from a secular point of view that can defend our Catholic position in a country where the separation of church and state is a must?

Let me say first off that you are on dangerous ground.

Without the Church, you will be hard pressed to find any firm mooring. The seeds amid the sands and all that.

But, since you asked: Your answer depends on what tack your opponents choose to take. One theory de jour is that homosexuality is inborn, or at least virtually so. This, they say, makes it unjust to restrict a union over people who have no real “choice” than to be other than what they are.

Granting this, it simply does not follow that being inately different entitles anyone to be outside government regulation. Quite the contrary, in fact. If the majority feel that homosexuality is not optimum, and if homosexuals cannot help themselves, then the democratically elected government can enforce the will of the majority on the non-compliant. The fact that the non-compliant cannot exercise free fully due to inate differences makes government action more necessary, not less. We do not exempt child molesters from government regulation simply because they are predisposed to such conduct.

Your opponents will probably respond by throwing up individual rights, or the notion that the conduct is not harmful. These roadblocks are easily navigated.

First, the question has little to do with individual rights. It has to do with majority rights, which ultimately trump individual rights in a democratic system. True, it a balance, but in the end, the majority must prevail or democracy is a lie. That is why the largest voting block carries the election. The majority has the right to structure society according to its will, if the constitutional forms are observed. If you achieve this (and each state that has put it to the vote has restricted homosexual marriage) the democratic question is answered. As far as harm, anything that restricts the exercise of self determination via the democratic process is harmful, because it restricts the liberty of the people.

The only remaining question is whether there is some human rights issue to cloud the matter. If homosexuals are inately different, then any human rights specific to them are analogous to the rights of the disabled. They are entitled to some accomodation, but nothing further. Additionally, they should be rehabilitated insofar as possible. Someone who is blind, or lame, has the right to accomodation, but does not enjoy the “right” to fly a government regulated aircraft, for example. Marriage, as a state created and regulated institution, can be reserved for those fit to exercise its purposes. If the majority define it as a semi-permanent union of a man and women, then homosexuals have no right to redefine it or to enjoy its privileges.

 

[Myqyl]

Paragraph 2357 of the CCC:

Hope this helps.

Hi ZD,

Thanks for that passage of the Catechism… I had a chance to look at it during lunch and noticed this in the next paragraph :

2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. ***Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. ***These persons are called to fulfill God’s will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.

Now I’m confused about the highlight (added by me)… Would it not be an “unjust discrimination” to deny them health insurance, tax benefits and hospital visitation rights (to name a few)?

I’m not saying you’re mistaken and I will certainly be praying about this new found information. I think I will bring a copy of the Catechism on the plane with me to pass the hours, as I obviously haven’t gotten everything out of it there is to get. But that second paragraph seems to say that although we must not condone same gender attractions, we are likewise explicitly called upon to avoid any discrimination against them… Clearly laws denying them rights enjoyed by the rest of us is the very definition of discrimination.

How can we reconcile these two things?

God bless…