Same-sex marriage: where does my objection go wrong?

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spencelo said:
Yes they can, though maybe not in Catholic churches.

No they don’t – permanently sterile means procreation is biologically impossible
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They can ignore, lie, and avoid the obvious, and come out with the paper work, but if consummation does not and cannot take place than an annulment will be granted, which says the marriage never existed in the first place. If they’re granted marriage it’s only because the government isn’t watching everyone have sex to see if they’re doing it correctly. PRAISE BE TO GOD!

Not to mention are you really basing your entire argument in favor of same sex marriage on the relative handful of impotent couples who are filing paperwork to get married in order to “cheat the government out of tax plans” or “rub the nose of homosexuals into the ground.”?!?!?!?!?! Seriously?!?!?!?! :rolleyes: I seriously doubt the small fraction of impotent couples who are seeking marriage are doing so to stand and say and “na, na,na,na, boo, boo, I can get married but you can’t.”

The REALITY is that procreation is biologically impossible! but the POTENTIAL only requires that MOST basic requirement - 1 male and 1 female (I’ll even add the addendum in light of your impotency arrangement, and who are capable of consummation).
 
Sullibe said:
They can ignore, lie, and avoid the obvious, and come out with the paper work, but if consummation does not and cannot take place than an annulment will be granted, which says the marriage never existed in the first place. If they’re granted marriage it’s only because the government isn’t watching everyone have sex to see if they’re doing it correctly. PRAISE BE TO GOD!
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What do you have against paraplegics?
Sullibe said:
Not to mention are you really basing your entire argument in favor of same sex marriage on the relative handful of impotent couples who are filing paperwork to get married in order to “cheat the government out of tax plans” or “rub the nose of homosexuals into the ground.”?!?!?!?!?! Seriously?!?!?!?! :rolleyes:
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Of course, it’s like you to attribute bad motives to people who want to get married but don’t meet the Catholic requirements for marriage.
Sullibe said:
I seriously doubt the small fraction of impotent couples who are seeking marriage are doing so to stand and say and “na, na,na,na, boo, boo, I can get married but you can’t.”
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I never made such an absurd claim. Rather, I was contesting your notion that impotent couples can’t get married – they can. There goes your “ordered towards procreation” rationale.
Sullibe said:
The REALITY is that procreation is biologically impossible! but the POTENTIAL only requires that MOST basic requirement - 1 male and 1 female (I’ll even add the addendum in light of your impotency arrangement, and who are capable of consummation).
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If procreation is biologically impossible for permanently sterile couples, then in what sense do they have the “potential” to procreate? Biological impossibility = no potential to procreate.
 
spencelo said:
But this is precisely what the SSM debate is about: whether or not same-sex couples can enter into same legal relationship that is available to opposite-sex couples. If opposite-sex couples have the legal right to marry, why shouldn’t same-sex couples have that same legal right as well? The asymmetry smacks of blatant discrimination (in violation of the equal protection clause.) The debate about “civil marriage” is about our marriage laws – not some other (religious) notion of marriage.
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Marriage has always been a religious institution in every major society and in every major religion in history. Only our modern society has the gall to claim that marriage is a matter of state and that its God given and universally accepted definition is subject to change based on the will of a minority of people.
 
spencelo said:
Parapalegics can’t “consummate” their marriages, and yet their marriages aren’t voidable.
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It depends on the state in which they are married and whether or not consummation is a requirement for validity.
 
stewstew03 said:
It depends on the state in which they are married and whether or not consummation is a requirement for validity.
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Do you think paraplegics should be allowed to marry even though they can’t consummate the marriage?
 
spencelo said:
Do you think paraplegics should be allowed to marry even though they can’t consummate the marriage?
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A female paraplegic can certainly consummate a marriage with her husband. A male would have more of a difficult time.
 
spencelo said:
Do you think paraplegics should be allowed to marry even though they can’t consummate the marriage?
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Sure - but I also think the other party should be able to obtain an annulment if the marriage cannot be “perfected.”
 
spencelo said:
What do you have against paraplegics?
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I’m not sure what this has to do with anything. You do realize that some paraplegics are NOT impotent and ARE capable of consummation. So yes, some paraplegics, CAN in fact get married. But if consummation cannot take place, then the marriage can be annulled.
spencelo said:
Of course, it’s like you to attribute bad motives to people who want to get married but don’t meet the Catholic requirements for marriage.
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First of all, again, I was speaking a bit tongue and cheek, which I realize does not translate well when typed. But you don’t know me or anything about me, so don’t tell me “it’s like [me] to attribute” anything. YOU were the one who seemed to imply that since all of these impotent couples are able to get married it speaks directly against the arguments against gay-marriage. I was simply pointing out that I sincerely doubt that impotent couples seeking marriage are not arguments for or against gay-marriage.
Chill Out.

Second, no where have I mentioned the Catholic requirements for marriage. I’m talking about the characteristics defining marriage, LONG BEFORE the Catholic Church ever came into existence. The Catholic Church simply recognizes the Truth behind these characteristics, as do many, many, many others.
spencelo said:
I never made such an absurd claim. Rather, I was contesting your notion that impotent couples can’t get married – they can. There goes your “ordered towards procreation” rationale.
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If a marriage cannot be consummated then it can be annulled and declared that it never existed.
spencelo said:
If procreation is biologically impossible for permanently sterile couples, then in what sense do they have the “potential” to procreate? Biological impossibility = no potential to procreate.
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In order to for the human species to reproduce you have to start at the most basic criterion.

1 male and 1 female (addendum - must be able to consummate). Now after this criterion there are additional criteria that can (though not necessarily) increase the chances of reproduction.
Must be fertile, must be younger than 30, must have high sperm count, must have wide “birthing hips”, must have adequate breasts for milk production, must not be a jerk… (<---- again tongue and cheek) etc… etc… etc…

All that is required for marriage (in addition to indissolubility) is that the very 1st criterion of reproduction be met.
1 male and 1 female (addendum - must be able to consummate)

2 men do not meet this requirement
2 women do not meet this requirement
1 sterile man and 1 sterile woman meet this requirement. Do they miss other criteria - well, YES. But those other criteria are NOT required for marriage.

Now if you think it’s unfair that the other criteria for reproduction are not required in marriage, then that’s a WHOLE other discussion.

But, well, there ya go.

HOpe that explains a little better.
 
Marriage requires the marital act
Because the marital act is required to make children
Raising children is the purpose of marriage.
Two people of the same sex cannot complete the marital act.
Therefore, two people of the same sex do not make a marriage.

Yet spencelo can’t do the math on its own.
 
spencelo said:
I find it astonishing that you would admonish me for my “tone” and not make one peep about your fellow Catholic posters on this thread.
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I haven’t really been reading their posts, assuming that you can hold your own against them.
I didn’t accuse you of malice (entirely possible that your misleading statement was unintentional), but your initial disagreement with my claim was nevertheless, in my view, sufficiently misleading to raise the possibility of bad faith. When I used the phrase “right to marry,” you must have known that I was referring to the legal right to marry (i.e., civil marriage), which is what the SSM debate is all about. That is, you must have known that by “right” I meant “legal right” (there is no possible room for *reasonable *misinterpretation on this). And yet, when you contested my claim that same-sex couples are not seeking the right to get married in churches, you gave me the impression of disagreement: that you thought same-sex couples are in fact seeking the legal right to get married in churches, which is not only preposterous, but paints SSM advocates in an unfairly bad light. So when you made the seemingly preposterous claim, I reasonably thought that you were either (a) not at all in touch with reality or (more likely) (b) twisting reality in an unfair attempt to make SSM advocates appear radical and sinister.
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But now you say it was all a misunderstanding, that when you contested my claim, you weren’t really disagreeing with me – by “right to marry,” you didn’t mean to imply (as clearly suggested by your language) that same-sex couples are fighting for the legal right to marry in churches. You meant something else entirely. This goes back to my point about misinterpreting my meaning of the phrase “right to marry”: either you misinterpreted my meaning, which is extremely hard to fathom, or you didn’t but nevertheless chose to “contest” my claim without realizing that I would be misled.
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If you can’t understand why I would find your “mistake” slightly irritating, then that’s all the more evidence of your insincerity.
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I do apologize if you feel misled. I don’t think SSM advocates are radical and sinister. I believe that they are seeking a genuine Good. Maybe not the best good, but in all cases they are only trying to do good. I wonder how it feels to be in your shoes. If you are automatically assuming that I think SSM advocates are “radical and sinister” then you must get that a lot. I’m sure you come off as angry because you feel you are at war! I find though that sometimes if I feel like I am arguing with someone, if I keep the mindset that we are having a civil conversation even if we are not, it disarms them and we are able to dialog and have often very productive conversations. I see in this disagreement though that I have to be especially careful of differences in language and culture, the inability of this media to convey my thoughts well, and the danger of the reader imposing false expectations upon me because of his past experience.
I think my charge of small-mindedness is entirely appropriate (the more I think about it). Legalizing SSM does not require Catholics to change “their” definition of marriage, since the SSM debate isn’t about the Catholic definition marriage. Catholics who are intent on insisting otherwise are, in my view, being small-minded precisely because they are unable to see the rest of the world through non-Catholic lenses. It is an undeniable fact that “civil marriage” exists in America, separate and distinct from various forms of religious marriages (including Catholic), and Catholics (or any other group) don’t get to claim to be exclusive authorities on the meaning of "marriage. Again, to insist otherwise (as many on here have done), is pretty much the definition of small-mindedness.
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My point is that whether the charge of small-mindedness is appropriate or not is a completely irrelevant discussion with regard to how to better convey your argument to people. Indeed, I would argue that if you treat people like they are small-minded you will surely set them against you and your cause.

I think that most people don’t consider other people’s view points because they are either too lazy, too busy, or unexposed, not because they are incapable of doing so. I would go so far as to argue that if you have failed to convey your position to someone then the deficiency might not be in them, but rather in your ability to communicate.

Let me put this another way. You saying that someone is immature, small-minded, or just spouting nonsense becomes an ad-hominem attack. This is incredibly ineffective because you utterly fail to understand the argument and position of the other person. When someone has begun ad-hominem attacks, that person has already lost the argument (and their dignity!) and will be able to accomplish nothing.
"Catholics (or any other group) don’t get to claim to be exclusive authorities on the meaning of "marriage.
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Exactly my point. You don’t get to claim to be an exclusive authority on the meaning of words. We all define our language by our culture and experiences.
In other words, SSM advocates have to change “civil marriage” to “civil unions” in order to satisfy the desire of Catholics to keep the term “marriage” exclusively in the realm of religious domain.
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First, I should mention that it’s not just Catholics, but Christians as well that you disagree with. Yes there are some who support gay marriage, but Catholics are certainly not alone. Indeed, I know some atheists and I have heard of homosexuals who hold the same opinions. What I am trying to say is that what we are talking about has applications far beyond Catholics and indeed includes a great deal of Americans.

Let me put this into an analogy. When fighting, an inexperienced man would try to confront his opponent with brute strength. A wise man would know to never directly oppose his opponent’s strength and would even know how to use his opponents strength to his own advantage. In this way a really good fighter can take down a man of twice his strength. Now, I assume that your objective is not to be ‘married’ but to gain equal rights. You fighting for ‘gay marriage’ is like a small man trying to fight a sumo wrestler head on. You probably won’t win. But there are other ways to confront the discussion without even confronting the rather sensitive word ‘marriage’.

The topic of whether it is right or just aside, I think that the only way that you CAN succeed with many people is to not discuss gay marriage at all.
 
This thread has been closed. Thank you to all who contributed. Please take the time to review the CAF rules on charity and its place in these discussions.
 
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