Should homosexual people be allowed to visit their partners in hospital when it's 'family only'?

[pathia]

We ought not encourage same-sex couples to use legal loopholes to cobble together a Frankenstein version of what marriage is. There is no moral warrant to recognize a series of legal documents that, in the end, do nothing more than establish legitimacy to an intrinsically evil relationship.

One’s family is who wants it do be. The law has no place in fixing this statically, regardless of one’s opinion over same-sex relationships.

I’m intersex, would you wish them to make it illegal for a partner of EITHER sexes from visiting me? There is no ‘opposite’.

 

[Lethe]

We ought not encourage same-sex couples to use legal loopholes to cobble together a Frankenstein version of what marriage is. There is no moral warrant to recognize a series of legal documents that, in the end, do nothing more than establish legitimacy to an intrinsically evil relationship.

That what Jesus would say?

I don’t think there’s any need to be so vehement about it. There is nothing ‘Frankenstein’ or ‘evil’ about it any more than another sin. Having the same genitals doesn’t mean the couples are intrinsically different from straight couples - they still have the same capacity for thought and emotion.

But anyway, shrug England allows civil partnerships anyway, so I’m not too bothered.

 

[Other_Eric]

That what Jesus would say?

I don’t think there’s any need to be so vehement about it. There is nothing ‘Frankenstein’ or ‘evil’ about it any more than another sin. Having the same genitals doesn’t mean the couples are intrinsically different from straight couples - they still have the same capacity for thought and emotion.

But anyway, shrug England allows civil partnerships anyway, so I’m not too bothered.

Indeed, what might Jesus say to a same-sex couple who, by their behavior, obstinately refuse obedience to Him? I imagine that it might very well be something like: “Depart from me, you evildoers.” (1)

As far as vehemence or the attempt to draw equivalence between this and other sins, it is my belief that those who try such things suffer from ignorance as to exactly what same-sex attraction is. Ultimately, same-sex attraction is the individual’s repudiation of his own created identity and the subjugation of responsibility to self-centered, hedonistic pleasure. That such people may become emotionally attached to their sin is irrelevant. Also, it does not constitute thought that some people can rationalize away the inherent immorality involved in issues of same-sex attraction.

That England has willfully taken the first steps down the path of national suicide is unfortunate, but like you, “shrug” since I live in the United States, I’m not too bothered.

(1) Cf. New American Bible. Washington D.C.: United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2002. Matt 21:23. Available online at: usccb.org/nab/bible/matthew/matthew7.htm

 

[Other_Eric]

One’s family is who wants it do be. The law has no place in fixing this statically, regardless of one’s opinion over same-sex relationships.

I’m intersex, would you wish them to make it illegal for a partner of EITHER sexes from visiting me? There is no ‘opposite’.

That one’s family is whoever one wishes it to be is nothing more than a fashionable lie. It is, simply, the gross presumption that reality is, ultimately, subjective.

“Intersex” is not a valid identity. Everyone is either male or female. Even if science is unable to determine which one, nothing can change that bedrock truth. I cannot envision someone who is sexually ambiguous having a sexual partner of either gender while their own gender is undetermined. if this creates difficulty in their life, then they ought grow up and offer such difficulties to the Cross.

 

[pathia]

That one’s family is whoever one wishes it to be is nothing more than a fashionable lie. It is, simply, the gross presumption that reality is, ultimately, subjective.

So if one’s parents were abusive, you would be perfectly fine with them seizing control of someone’s medical care? Take ‘partner’ out of the question. Abusive family that the person left and all they have is a sexually disinterested friend. You’d still want the family to have superiority?

“Intersex” is not a valid identity. Everyone is either male or female. Even if science is unable to determine which one, nothing can change that bedrock truth. I cannot envision someone who is sexually ambiguous having a sexual partner of either gender while their own gender is undetermined. if this creates difficulty in their life, then they ought grow up and offer such difficulties to the Cross.

Both my partner and I are bisexual. There’s no confusion, we don’t care what gender either of us are, we just really enjoy each other’s company. We don’t even have a sexual relationship as I can’t engage in it, either direction. It doesn’t cause difficulty in my personal life. You presume way too much.

 

[Eris_Discordia]

So if one’s parents were abusive, you would be perfectly fine with them seizing control of someone’s medical care? Take ‘partner’ out of the question. Abusive family that the person left and all they have is a sexually disinterested friend. You’d still want the family to have superiority?

Both my partner and I are bisexual. There’s no confusion, we don’t care what gender either of us are, we just really enjoy each other’s company. We don’t even have a sexual relationship as I can’t engage in it, either direction. It doesn’t cause difficulty in my personal life. You presume way too much.

I’m going to agree. I’m Pansexual, and gender-neutral(Not hermaphroditic. I was born female, and do not consider myself either gender). My partner is a straight man. Sorry, but if I were in the hospital, if he wasn’t allowed to see me, I would flip, and I would tell my family to lie and say he’s my brother. I should be able to have whoever I please visit me in ICU, especially if I were about to die. My friends are just as important to me as my family. So pathia, I completely agree.

 

[Other_Eric]

So if one’s parents were abusive, you would be perfectly fine with them seizing control of someone’s medical care? Take ‘partner’ out of the question. Abusive family that the person left and all they have is a sexually disinterested friend. You’d still want the family to have superiority?

Both my partner and I are bisexual. There’s no confusion, we don’t care what gender either of us are, we just really enjoy each other’s company. We don’t even have a sexual relationship as I can’t engage in it, either direction. It doesn’t cause difficulty in my personal life. You presume way too much.

If a person has reason to believe that his or her family would cause harm then that person ought to take out a restraining order so that there are criminal consequences for such interference. Unmooring the concept of “family” from its traditional meaning and substituting instead some subjective determination that could vary with the wind is not an acceptable substitute.

That there is no sexual activity between an unmarried couple, while commendable, cannot serve as a just cause for anyone to redefine familial relationships. Who it is that is one’s family ought not be a subjective whim.

 

[PatriceA]

Barring that someone isn’t trying to enforce power of attorney and is just visiting, I think the hospital is the last place someone should discriminate based on sexual orientation. Every human being should be able to see their loved ones, be it family or friend, straight or other. There are are more approrpiate battlefields to pick this fight.

 

[Zoe_Brain]

“Intersex” is not a valid identity. Everyone is either male or female. Even if science is unable to determine which one, nothing can change that bedrock truth.

Not even Scripture?
Isaiah 56:4-5

4 For thus saith the LORD
 unto the eunuchs that keep my sabbaths,
 and choose the things that please me,
 and take hold of my covenant;

 5 Even unto them will I give in mine house
 and within my walls
 a place and a name 
**better than of sons and of daughters**:
 I will give them an everlasting name, 
that shall not be cut off.

I cannot envision someone who is sexually ambiguous having a sexual partner of either gender while their own gender is undetermined.

Your views go directly against those of arch-conservative Peter Cantor in his De vitio sodomitico — or On Sodomy (1192 AD). Here’s the excerpt on hermaphrodites (or as we’d call them now, intersexuals) were viewed historically.​

*The Lord formed man from the slime of the earth on the plan of Damascus, later fashioning woman from his rib in Eden. Thus in considering the formation of woman, lest any should believe they would be hermaphrodites, he stated, “Male and female created he them,” as if to say, “There will not be intercourse of men with men or women with women, but only of men with women and vice versa.” For this reason the church allows a hermaphrodite — that is, someone with the organs of both sexes, capable of either active or passive functions — to use the organ by which (s)he is most aroused or the one which (s)he is more susceptible.

If (s)he is more active [literally, “lustful], (s)he may wed as a man, but if (s)he is more passive, (s)he may marry as a woman. If; however, (s)he should fail with one organ, the use of the other can never be permitted, but (s)he must be perpetually celibate to avoid any similarity to the role inversion of sodomy, which is detested by God.*

Your views are novel, highly non-traditional, even activist. The reform you propose, abandoning scripture and a thousand years of traditional belief on the matter is most revolutionary.

 

[Other_Eric]

Not even Scripture?
Isaiah 56:4-5

4 For thus saith the LORD
 unto the eunuchs that keep my sabbaths,
 and choose the things that please me,
 and take hold of my covenant;

 5 Even unto them will I give in mine house
 and within my walls
 a place and a name 
**better than of sons and of daughters**:
 I will give them an everlasting name, 
that shall not be cut off.

Your views go directly against those of arch-conservative Peter Cantor in his De vitio sodomitico — or On Sodomy (1192 AD). Here’s the excerpt on hermaphrodites (or as we’d call them now, intersexuals) were viewed historically.​

*The Lord formed man from the slime of the earth on the plan of Damascus, later fashioning woman from his rib in Eden. Thus in considering the formation of woman, lest any should believe they would be hermaphrodites, he stated, “Male and female created he them,” as if to say, “There will not be intercourse of men with men or women with women, but only of men with women and vice versa.” For this reason the church allows a hermaphrodite — that is, someone with the organs of both sexes, capable of either active or passive functions — to use the organ by which (s)he is most aroused or the one which (s)he is more susceptible.

If (s)he is more active [literally, “lustful], (s)he may wed as a man, but if (s)he is more passive, (s)he may marry as a woman. If; however, (s)he should fail with one organ, the use of the other can never be permitted, but (s)he must be perpetually celibate to avoid any similarity to the role inversion of sodomy, which is detested by God.*

Your views are novel, highly non-traditional, even activist. The reform you propose, abandoning scripture and a thousand years of traditional belief on the matter is most revolutionary.

Abandon Scripture? Me? Which Scripture? Not that psalm you recklessly quote where it describes the *inheritance and station *of those please the Lord as better than that of sons or daughters; nor could it be the "eunuchs" described earlier, since no one has ever understood the state of eunuchism to be anything other than artificial. Certainly you’re not suggesting that the writings of Peter Cantor, laudable as they may be, are or ought to be part of the canon of Sacred Scripture?

Further, it’s not clear that this passage of Peter Cantor’s that you quote suggests what it is that you think it does. It is instructive that Cantor argues that the so-called hermaphrodite take only one sexual role. That is, he recognizes that the underlying truth of such a person’s identity is either male or female. He explicitly forbids functioning as some combination of the two. In this he preserves the concept of exactly what I am saying: there is no valid “intersex” identity. There is only one gender or the other masked by deformity.

In order to determine which gender identity the person actually is, he offers an approach commensurate with the person’s own experience of arousal. It is imperfect, but in the absence of objective criteria like we have today, not entirely unreasonable. He then goes on to forbid that such an individual attempt to live as the opposite gender once the choice has been made. Even here, he once again seeks to preserve the dual nature of sexuality.

You describe that my view “novel, highly non-traditional, even activist,” yet I can point you to several orthodox contemporaries who make the exact same point as well as a great many Doctors and Fathers of the Church going back towards Christ in an unbroken line. For now, suffice it to say that, since man has been made by God “male and female,” in order to claim human identity, one must be one or the other. There is no “intersex.”

 

[Zoe_Brain]

I cannot envision someone who is sexually ambiguous having a sexual partner of either gender while their own gender is undetermined.

I showed how this view is not valid scripturally.

For now, suffice it to say that, since man has been made by God “male and female,” in order to claim human identity, one must be one or the other. There is no “intersex.”

But can one be born one, then change to the other?

edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/12/17/gaza.gender.id/

usrf.org/news/010308-guevedoces.html - contains some medical nudity.

What criteria do you use?

Are you saying that there are people who are not human?

How do you reconcile this with Galatians 3:28?

There is neither Jew nor Greek, 
there is neither bond nor free, 
**there is neither male nor female: **
for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.

 

[markomalley]

Voiced quite well in this : youtube.com/watch?v=GoWNnt4Fdh4

(Hear it through, if it offends you it’ll be over soon enough anyway… The point that hits home with me is that someone could be refused to see their partner of years and years because theyre not married, though they would happily be married if they could)

Sorry for taking so long to reply to this. Had to think about it a bit.

I really don’t see this as a homosexual or heterosexual or transsexual or intersexual or any other kind of sexual preference issue.

A person should be able to designate who he wants to visit or who he doesn’t want to visit him in the hospital. Period. A person should be able to give a legally binding medical power of attorney to any person he chooses. Period. Once a person has made those designations, that should be the final word. Period.

Let me give you an example:
A Catholic man is married to a Catholic woman. The woman commits adultery repeatedly against him. Not just once but several times. He separates from her in accordance with Canon Law:

Can. 1152 §1. Although it is earnestly recommended that a spouse, moved by Christian charity and concerned for the good of the family, not refuse forgiveness to an adulterous partner and not disrupt conjugal life, nevertheless, if the spouse did not condone the fault of the other expressly or tacitly, the spouse has the right to sever conjugal living unless the spouse consented to the adultery, gave cause for it, or also committed adultery.

§3. If the innocent spouse has severed conjugal living voluntarily, the spouse is to introduce a cause for separation within six months to the competent ecclesiastical authority which, after having investigated all the circumstances, is to consider carefully whether the innocent spouse can be moved to forgive the fault and not to prolong the separation permanently.
​

However, the husband (the innocent spouse) never grants the adulterous wife a divorce in the government courts nor does he consent to an ecclesiastic annulment.

If I was that husband, I probably wouldn’t want that estranged wife to be allowed to visit following a major surgery…it might not be a very healthy thing to do. In fact, I might want to grant a trusted friend a medical power of attorney and grant that friend full visiting rights (even in ICU)…if for no other reason than to keep the estranged, adulterous wife away.
​

The point is that the ability to grant visitation rights and to grant decision-making authority should be the right of anybody, regardless of any other issue involving one’s relationships.

I have absolutely no sympathy for homosexual relationships that mimic natural ones. I do not think that any spousal rights or state sanction or acknowledgment should be granted them. But in the case of medical decision-making and hospital visitation, the sexuality of the people involved is irrelevant.

 

[Other_Eric]

Other Eric;6385855:

I cannot envision someone who is sexually ambiguous having a sexual partner of either gender while their own gender is undetermined.

I showed how this view is not valid scripturally.

No, my friend, I’m afraid you did nothing of the sort. It is no wonder you chose to ignore my response to your “demonstration.” Read my statement one more time. There is no warrant in anything you have cited to leave gender undetermined, nor warrant to act in an androgynous fashion. As long as the gender of anyone remains undetermined, through either the inability of science to definitively answer the question or the wanton disinterest of the individual concerned, such an individual can have sexual partner. Absent an understanding of one’s own sexuality and gender, one cannot possibly engage the sexuality of another.

Other Eric;6392466:

For now, suffice it to say that, since man has been made by God “male and female,” in order to claim human identity, one must be one or the other. There is no “intersex.”

But can one be born one, then change to the other?

edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/meast/12/17/gaza.gender.id/

usrf.org/news/010308-guevedoces.html - contains some medical nudity.

What criteria do you use?

Are you saying that there are people who are not human?

How do you reconcile this with Galatians 3:28?

There is neither Jew nor Greek, 
there is neither bond nor free, 
**there is neither male nor female: **
for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.

Gender is not a mutable characteristic. One is either one or the other. There may be any number of deformities that mask the appearance of one’s gender, yet, the underlying reality will always be one or the other. The links you have provided do nothing to even blur this fundamental truth, since everyone involved eventually comes to realize what the true gender of the individual is.

In establishing criteria for the disce3rnment of gender, I defer to biologists who have the training to recognize such things. I do not accept the idea that cosmetic surgery meant to recreate the appearance of one gender or the other is sufficient to be able to call gender a mutable characteristic.

As far as your appeal to Scripture, I reconcile Galatians 3:28 with my position by also reading Galatians 3:26 and 27. In God’s donation of His grace through the Sacraments, everyone has equal access regardless of identity. This is not meant to be read to suggest that identity does not ultimately exist.

 

[peary]

Of course; that is an act of mercy and also is reflective of the corporal works of mercy - to visit the sick. God is not mocked, and human beings deserve their dignity.

 

[Other_Eric]

Of course; that is an act of mercy and also is reflective of the corporal works of mercy - to visit the sick. God is not mocked, and human beings deserve their dignity.

When, under the excuse of a Corporal Work of Mercy, one wishes that the near occasion of sin represented by a same-sex sexual partner be spun so that it appears normal, God is mocked doubly: both by lending implicit support to a relationship that offends Him and by using the form of mercy to assist in sin.

Human dignity begins at the individual’s core identity as male or female. It is preserved when God-fearing Christians seek to prohibit the access of those who degrade this identity through depraved lust and parody the Sacrament of Marriage through their psychotic codependency.

 

[Doc_Keele]

Of course; that is an act of mercy and also is reflective of the corporal works of mercy - to visit the sick. God is not mocked, and human beings deserve their dignity.

Great answer!

 

[Christopher68]

To answer the original question - yes, of course they should be allowed to visit.

I won’t name them, but there are two posters on this thread whose comments are mean-spirited at best. They really need to examine what is in their heart.

 

[jdnation]

I think anyone who is well aquainted and truly concerned about someone in the hospital should be able to visit them in times of need.

That said I would not equate homosexual couples as ‘family’ or ‘married spouses.’

It is hospitals who ought to adjust their rules with concern to visiting rights within reason.

It is not the definition of what constitutes marriage or family that must be changed in order to meet the requirements of hospital visits or any other convenience.

 

[Other_Eric]

It is not the definition of what constitutes marriage or family that must be changed in order to meet the requirements of hospital visits or any other convenience.

No, merely the definition of what sorts of relationships are moral and ought to be encouraged or accommodated.

 

[Zoe_Brain]

Sharon, a psychotherapist, and JoAnn, a City of Seattle housing administrator, had been life-partners for 17 years, when JoAnn’s chronic illness worsened and she was hospitalized at the University of Washington Medical Center. On September 3, 2005, JoAnn was moved to the ICU and came under the care of a contract nurse, Karen Hulley, for the night. And on that night, their lives changed forever. Despite the fact that the University and JoAnn’s doctor permitted Sharon to be by her beside constantly, Nurse Hulley, repeatedly refused Sharon access to JoAnn’s room and bedside, continually evicting her from the room. By the time Sharon regained access to her partner the next morning, JoAnn’s condition had deteriorated, and she was heavily drugged. She died within a matter of hours.

Video at insiderexclusive.com/component/content/article/1-shows/118-qsame-sex-couple-discrimination-sharon-reed

Sharon and JoAnn had copies of their power of attorney and health care proxy with them, and copies were attached to JoAnn’s chart. And they had the cooperation and backing of JoAnn’s doctor. But after hours, after the doctor had gone home and the night nurse was in charge, all respect for the law and contracts went out the window. Whenever Sharon tried to be in the room with JoAnn to comfort her as she lay dying, the nurse screamed at her “You don’t belong here!”, and kicked her out.

As I think Other Eric would have done, right?