US bishops denounce court ruling on same-sex marriage [CWN]

[CWN_News]

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops denounced an August 4 ruling in which a federal court struck down a California law defining marriage as the union of a man and a …

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[curlycool89]

Even Cardinal Mahony is getting in on the condemning (and I know that he’s not real popular around here).

 

[larkin31]

Here is some reasoning in the Bishop’s letter:

There is only one issue before each of us Californians: Is Marriage of Divine or of Human Origin?

Judge Walker pays no attention to this fundamental issue, and relies solely upon how Prop 8 made certain members of society “feel” about themselves.

Those of us who supported Prop 8 and worked for its passage did so for one reason: We truly believe that Marriage was instituted by God for the specific purpose of carrying out God’s plan for the world and human society. Period.

Every single religious faith community in our known history has held this belief since recorded history began. Every indigenous group discovered down through history also understood this belief about marriage, and carried out cultural and religious practices to sustain that belief. Marriage is of divine origin, and that belief is embedded deeply into the heart and spirit of human beings–also described as the natural law for the human family.

Judge Walker assumes that the institution of marriage is of human and civil origin, and therefore, that “marriage” can mean anything any person wishes to ascribe to the institution. Wrong.

The union of a man and of a woman in a life-long loving and caring relationship is of divine origin. No human nor civil power can decree or declare otherwise.

That’s not an entirely fair summary of the judge’s ruling. But the bishop sounds a little mad, and sometimes mistakes are made in anger.

We’ll see what happens as this makes its way through the legal system…

 

[PatrickSebast]

I don’t really understand why the bishops are criticizing this decision from a religious standpoint. Judges have to make their choices based on legal standpoints, it isn’t their job to write the law, but to apply it to individual cases. Judge Walker can easily claim that he just did his job to the best of his ability since he wrote a 100+ page explanation of his legal justification with references to the laws he was using to make his decision. If the Bishops feel his decision was bad from a legal perspective that is what they should be criticizing him for. If it isn’t bad from a legal perspective then why criticize the judge at all? He has a job to do, and anything outside of a decision based on law would be an abuse of his power.

The blame for this should not be rooted in the judge, but in what the legal system has allowed marriage to become over the course of decades. This wasn’t a sudden jump from good and sacred marriage to unsanctified pagan marriages. If this issue gets to the supreme court and the decision is upheld (which seems likely at this point) causing gay marriages to be allowed around the country it won’t equate with a sudden fall from grace in our countries marriage system. Marriage has been broken in our country for a long time. Couples who are remarried are equatable to homosexual couples in God’s eyes(both invalid relationships) and yet our legal system is more than open to such things.

Maybe I am missing something, but it really doesn’t seem like focusing attention on individual judges and their lack of consideration for Catholic morality in their decisions is terribly beneficial. If we keep trying to catch that last straw before it hits the camels back, but don’t bother to unload the camel, sooner or later we will miss the straw and its back is going to break.

 

[KJK80]

I don’t really understand why the bishops are criticizing this decision from a religious standpoint. Judges have to make their choices based on legal standpoints, it isn’t their job to write the law, but to apply it to individual cases. Judge Walker can easily claim that he just did his job to the best of his ability since he wrote a 100+ page explanation of his legal justification with references to the laws he was using to make his decision. If the Bishops feel his decision was bad from a legal perspective that is what they should be criticizing him for. If it isn’t bad from a legal perspective then why criticize the judge at all? He has a job to do, and anything outside of a decision based on law would be an abuse of his power.

The blame for this should not be rooted in the judge, but in what the legal system has allowed marriage to become over the course of decades. This wasn’t a sudden jump from good and sacred marriage to unsanctified pagan marriages. If this issue gets to the supreme court and the decision is upheld (which seems likely at this point) causing gay marriages to be allowed around the country it won’t equate with a sudden fall from grace in our countries marriage system. Marriage has been broken in our country for a long time. Couples who are remarried are equatable to homosexual couples in God’s eyes(both invalid relationships) and yet our legal system is more than open to such things.

Maybe I am missing something, but it really doesn’t seem like focusing attention on individual judges and their lack of consideration for Catholic morality in their decisions is terribly beneficial. If we keep trying to catch that last straw before it hits the camels back, but don’t bother to unload the camel, sooner or later we will miss the straw and its back is going to break.