"What Is Wrong With Homosexual Marriage?" A Catholic article

[goout]

goout:

At the same time, if you can’t recognize basic human nature, how can you have a just society?

Basic human nature is to love. That is what couples do. They love.

That’s a true but very general statement. I love my mom. And my brother. And Kate Winslet also. Although you could argue that none of those are a couple in the same way you probably intend. You will have to make a distinction there. I’m not sure you want to start doing that, but I think that you should.

Now, my wife I love also. And as human beings we are each a unified body and soul. And so the love that we express encompasses all of that. In marriage a man and woman express that love you speak about uniquely, like no other couple-type relationship does. That doesn’t detract from the goods present in any of those other relationships. It is simply unique.

So your statement is true and expresses a noble sentiment, but it’s also a generalization that does not recognize unique distinctions between various types of couples.

 

[Dakota111]

There are the rights of the child to consider, and the Catholic Church believes it is important for children to have both a mother and a father for developmental purposes.

You are begging the very topic in question so lets put the merely prudential views or doubtful extrapolated logic (from homosexual acts legitimately considered grave matter by Church doctrine) to one side as we review the morality of adoption into irregular families.

Yes it is an ideal that children should be brought up by both natural parents. But 50+% of the worlds children are already not in this situation and never can be so some irregularity from this ideal must be accepted as intrinsic when it comes to adoption. Significant irregularity is perfectly tolerable to the Church, despite its ideal teaching. That includes single parents and a step father even for daughters.

So this discussion is about determing moral principles re that toleration.

I personally cannot accept that simply the fact of familial irregularity always and everywhere must deny opportunity to adopt. It has never been taught by the Church in the past and in fact if anything it teaches the acceptability thereof in general.

What the Church is still grappling with, and what we are discussing here, is what more specific moral principles should apply in non perfect, real broken lives and families.

The actual parenting skills and likely best possible outcomes for a child in its own situation cannot be in principle ignored and a one size fits all filtering criteria imposed. That principle in itself would seem to be immoral.

 

[Beyond_Reason]

These are very good points.

 

[goout]

Beyond_Reason:

There are the rights of the child to consider, and the Catholic Church believes it is important for children to have both a mother and a father for developmental purposes.

You are begging the very topic in question so lets put the merely prudential views or doubtful extrapolated logic (from homosexual acts legitimately considered grave matter by Church doctrine) to one side as we review the morality of adoption into irregular families.

The larger point is that relativising intrinsic human attributes creates and perpetuates the very problems we need to address.
Of course we need the best solutions to all problems, We also need the most effective solutions, and putting bandaids on broken legs won’t work.

As long as our culture goes on with false ideas about human nature, chaos will reign, and we will need solutions to more and more brokenness.

 

[Beyond_Reason]

Chaos will reign? Things seem relatively organized in the context of history, imo.

 

[goout]

Chaos will reign? Things seem relatively organized in the context of history, imo.

The family chaos alluded to.

 

[Thorolfr]

Thorolfr:

goout:

And the point is, the union of two same sex people cannot participate in the creation of human life as a marriage uniquely does.
And the creation and flourishing of human life is something of value.

And for gay people, the rights and benefits they receive through civil marriage are also something of value for them.

At the same time, if you can’t recognize basic human nature, how can you have a just society?
Nazi Germany proposed many good things for the german people. Unfortunately they lost their sense of basic human nature, and what results is force. The loss of reason in favor of the bald assertion of rights.

In my opinion, an unjust society is the one envisioned by Bishop Paul Loverde who wanted to deny gay people with health insurance the right to extend that insurance to their same-sex partners who didn’t have any because he thought that giving even one right associated with marriage might appear to show some kind of approval for homosexuality. So, even though I at one time had no other way of getting private health insurance coverage except through my same-sex partner, I guess that my health and wellbeing and that of millions of other gay people like me was expendable in his view because of this overriding desire to make sure that society avoid any appearance whatsoever of condoning homosexuality. And this is despite the bishop himself writing that “the Catholic Church has always seen health care as a fundamental act of charity, intrinsically bound up with the Gospel itself…[and]… in 1993, in fact, the bishops of the United States stated clearly and directly, ‘Every person has a right to adequate health care.’”

I think that most Americans sense the injustice and unfairness involved in denying certain rights to same-sex couples and that is why a majority of them now support extending those rights to gay people. And this, in my opinion, has made our society more just. As Martin Luther King liked to say in quoting the 19th century abolitionist, Theodore Parker, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

 

[Dakota111]

See my last post.

 

[Beyond_Reason]

I think the greater evil here is a system that would force you to get healthcare through a spouse in the first place. Imagine if you didn’t have a partner? If it’s an evil to make it difficult or impossible to get healthcare coverage for someone who has a same sex partner, surely it would also be an evil to make it so for someone who does not have a partner of any sex.

 

[Thorolfr]

I think the greater evil here is a system that would force you to get healthcare through a spouse in the first place. Imagine if you didn’t have a partner? If it’s an evil to make it difficult or impossible to get healthcare coverage for someone who has a same sex partner, surely it would also be an evil to make it so for someone who does not have a partner of any sex.

I don’t disagree with this. But since this isn’t something that could easily and quickly have been fixed, it makes no sense that the Bishop would nevertheless oppose some gay people being able to get health insurance coverage through their partners when it had already been made possible for them if they were in legal domestic partnerships. If he had gotten his way and this right to health insurance coverage had been taken away, then the health of some of these people would have been compromised. I can’t imagine any good reason for someone to push to take health insurance coverage away from people who can’t in the existing circumstances get it in any other way.

 

[QwertyGirl]

In marriage a man and woman express that love you speak about uniquely, like no other couple-type relationship does.

The same same could be said about two men who share a sexual relationship in marriage.

 

[Thorolfr]

goout:

In marriage a man and woman express that love you speak about uniquely, like no other couple-type relationship does.

The same same could be said about two men who share a sexual relationship in marriage.

This reminds of some discussions I’ve seen about Leviticus 18:22 which opponents of gay sex often bring up: “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.” To which some gay men have said that they don’t lie with a male as with a woman but as a male with another man.

 

[edwest]

Well said.

 

[edwest]

The point to remember is when the State tried to force Catholic adoption agencies to add same-sex couples, they closed their doors.

 

[edwest]

This is very true. Rearranging the social furniture is the current campaign.

 

[Pattylt]

Just to clarify this…the Catholic adoption agency was operating under a government contract for the city or state it was in and as such needed to either follow governmental law or withdraw from the contract. They chose to withdraw from the contract which also left them incapable of continuing to operate. They had to close their operation.

This is often a dilemma for religious organizations that take government contracts. They must follow governmental law which can conflict with their religious beliefs. It’s their choice.

 

[edwest]

A little historical background:

http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-act...nation-against-catholic-adoption-services.cfm

 

[Pattylt]

That article confirms what I said. Is Catholic charities going after a legal decision on this? If they can get a legal exemption for religious reasons then they could reopen their doors. For now, the law is viewed as Catholic charities being in violation of state law whether you agree or not so the law needs to be clarified to allow exemptions.

I’m not promoting what happened. I’m merely pointing out that it is a legal decision based on the current law and I understand what you think of it. It’s still the law.

 

[Thorolfr]

The point to remember is when the State tried to force Catholic adoption agencies to add same-sex couples, they closed their doors.

There’s a case in South Carolina where an adoption agency called Miracle Hill had a policy of not adopting any children to any families who were not Christians from a Protestant denomination. Apparently a Jewish family had tried to adopt there and were turned down, so they complained. The adoption agency was told that this violated both federal and state laws against religious discrimination. But now the governor of South Carolina is seeking an exemption for this adoption agency from the Trump administration and the South Carolina state legislature changed state law to allow an exemption to state law. And yet Miracle Hill is getting hundreds of thousands of dollars from the state and federal government. Do you think that Miracle Hill should be allowed to refuse to let Catholic couples adopt there even though they receive money from the government?

 

[Pattylt]

Correct me if I’m wrong, but can’t adoption take place privately between the adopting family, the mother and a lawyer? I know that in the past many adoptions took place this way. This type of adoption doesn’t need to meet any state or federal legal non discrimination requirements. To operate as a charitable organization, you do.