Why not tolerate non-sacramental, civil gay marriage?

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TheAdvocate said:
Since Catholics don’t consider civil marriage a sacrament anyway, then why not just let homosexuals marry each other civilly? So long as any laws passed passed do not force Catholic sacramental gay unions, why not just tolerate them? We don’t even allow two straight Catholics who are merely married civilly to receive Communion, because we don’t consider civil marriage to be an authentic marial union in the Christian sense.

To say otherwise would mean that we actually are giving civil unions a significant measure of validity.
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One thing is calling it a “marriage”, the other is tolerating “gay” people.

Homosexual unions should not be called “marriages” because they do not aim at or are capable of procreation. While real marriages treat having children a desirable thing and therefore are not egoistically focused on themselves, homosexuals aim at satisfying their own distorted sexual instincts.

Tolerance towards homosexuals is another thing. As Christians we are obliged to hate sin not a person. We should be sympathetic towards “gay” people as we are towards suffering from kleptomania. They have not chosen or ask for their condition so they are not to be blamed for their attractions. Being aware of spiritual, moral and social consequences of yielding to their tendencies however, they should be able to control themselves and refrain from distorted practices.

The problem is that the ones suffering from kleptomania do not try to impose on the rest of the society that it is right to steal a purse from an elderly lady in a street because “this is the way they are”. Homosexuals however, have an agenda of propagating not even their being “normal” but actually promoting their unnatural tendencies as something more fun and “trendy” than being heterosexual.

Fortunately, it does not seem to work at all times and most people are actually immune to this type of a primitive propaganda.
 
TheAdvocate said:
Since Catholics don’t consider civil marriage a sacrament anyway, then why not just let homosexuals marry each other civilly? So long as any laws passed passed do not force Catholic sacramental gay unions, why not just tolerate them? We don’t even allow two straight Catholics who are merely married civilly to receive Communion, because we don’t consider civil marriage to be an authentic marial union in the Christian sense.

To say otherwise would mean that we actually are giving civil unions a significant measure of validity.
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I agree. I think, at least to some degree, people have a right to self-determination, and marriage is an institution that crosses many cultures and has been defined differently in different cultures. When I read scripture I don’t see a message that we are to legislate for those not of our community - rather I see a message that we are to be the light on the hill that draws people to the radical love of our Lord, Jesus Christ.

That’s just my opinion though, and I respect that others do not share it.

God bless +
 
The_Bucket said:
I’m not arguing about the moral reality Jim. We really and truly are on the same page with it. As I said, I voted against gay marriage and specifically to have it constitutionally banned in Florida. I’d do it again. But I’m not going to get into a semantical game about what is or is not “real” the way fix is doing. Redefining civil marriage is not “redefining reality.” It’s simply redefining a civil contract and changing contract and property law. Civil marriage never made any moral judgment; except maybe when it banned interracial couples from marrying, which was also a grave evil. Otherwise, civil marriage is simply contract law. It is not an outward sign of an inward reality. That’s sacramental marriage.
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Yes, I understand that you oppose gay marriage. I wasn’t referring specifically to moral reality, but to physical reality—the physical reality of men and women, their physical design, their sexual complementarity.

It is this complementarity that since the dawn of history has resulted in men and women uniting in marriage and raising children who form the next generation of civilization. That’s a necessary function, and it’s why governments have taken an interest in it. No next generation, no nation.

It’s why governments have granted benefits to married couples. They do a valuable service in marrying, generating and raising the next generation. Marital intercourse is something that can only be done by a man and a woman. That’s what makes it marital. That’s what makes it marriage.

The state can define two men or two women as a marriage, but it certainly does not correspond to what society has considered as marriage for thousands of years. And in calling such couplings marriage, it really destroys the meaning of the word and does a disservice to real marriage by calling it by a term which has been eviscerated of its meaning. Not only that, it purports to give equal benefits to unequal institutions which do not provide similar societal benefits.
 
rossum said:
We disagree. Any truth you can express is always relative. At the very least is it relative to the language in which it is expressed and to a large number of further assumptions that lie behind the truth.

I have already given the example of “1 + 1 = 2” being a relative truth. There is at least one unstated assumption in there. The presence of that unstated assumption makes it impossible for the statement to be absolute – there are circumstances in which that statement is not true. It is true if, and only if, the unstated assumption holds.

rossum
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okay you are not being logical. That is not an insult. I’m not all mad when I say this. This is a fact. I have posted the definition of truth as defined by Webster. You may have heard of him he makes dictionaries. Truth is compared to fact and standards to measure it. Truth does not if fact change. What are suggesting above literally destroys any possibility of a logical argument. Not only that you have stated it arbitrarily. 1+ 1 = 2 is in fact true. So long as 1 is what we know to be one then the answer is 2. If you are saying that 1 does not mean 1 then you are not saying 1 + 1 = 2 you are saying something completely different calling it 1 when you never meant 1 to begin with. Here you are abrogating logical thought. You are saying because someone somewhere might try to add without first understanding basic integer principles then we have to question everything we know about math. This is false.

More to the point you don’t even believe this. You cannot exist in this society and believe this. do you only look before you cross sometimes? Someone told you its always dangerous to cross the street without looking. Is that true? Did you argue with teachers about your grades telling them there standard is irrelevant because its based on assumptions. Gravity pulls you down. There is an assumption in that maybe today is the day we go skydiving without parachutes. You don’t believe this. You don’t believe anything of the kind or you would be dead or a non functional member of society. “My bank account has millions of dollars in it” is demonstrably false precisely because it does not square up with the known standard. Namely how much money is actually in my bank account.

In fact if you really believed this you would not make a logical argument because all I have to say to defeat you is “That’s not true.” and you loose the argument every time based on your own philosophy. If you abrogate truth sir there is no possible argument you can make to me for anything because every argument you will make will invariably depend on absolute truth which you just discarded the very notion of. Why are you posting here if you don’t believe in truth? If it is all relative then by what right do you try to argue your position over mine as yours also has nothing solid to stand on, and truth is different for me?
If there is no such thing as truth sir then your posting and battling to have your way is a contradiction. I say your wrong about everything. According to this idea that you espouse I'm right and there is nothing you can logically say about it unless you abrogate this idea that truth is not true, or are you saying you are not logical?
 
The_Bucket said:
I know it does. I’m saying that pushing an anti-gay marriage message is going to get drowned out in a sea of condemnation. Few people would condemn a positive pro-sacramental marriage message. It would get through to more people and still constitutes a firm defense of Church teaching. Isn’t that what we want in the end? The conversion of more souls to Christ?
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Words mean things. There is no such thing as “gay marriage,” therefore the Catholic Church is not anti-gay marriage. If all Catholics knew and defended Catholic teaching it would never “get drowned out in a sea of condemnation.” It gets drowned out due to ignorance and fear. I think Christ predicted this.
 
JimG said:
The state can define two men or two women as a marriage, but it certainly does not correspond to what society has considered as marriage for thousands of years. And in calling such couplings marriage, it really destroys the meaning of the word and does a disservice to real marriage by calling it by a term which has been eviscerated of its meaning. Not only that, it purports to give equal benefits to unequal institutions which do not provide similar societal benefits.
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Well then we agree in several large respects. And honestly, the main reason that this change took place is because we separated children from marriage. And that happened when we separated sex from children.

Certainly people engaged in fornication for millenia. This is nothing new. There was, however, always the risk of a child being conceived. Or at least some kind of a risk given that contraception before the modern era was not exactly reliable. Technology has changed that dramatically.

The separation of sex from procreation is what enabled society to easily do away with separating marriage from children. And with marriage now firmly all about “two people being in love” there is no reason for the state to use marriage as a way to foster procreation.
 
fix said:
Just like owning a slave was once legal or abortion is legal. All an abuse.
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We agree that the legal definition of something and the Catholic moral definition of something are different.
All definitions authentic of marriage start with man and woman. Sure, there are deviations but those are deviations not the rule.
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You are back to your “one true marriage” argument. There is no such thing. There is “one true Catholic marriage”, but that is not the only form of marriage. This thread concerns civil marriage, not Catholic marriage.
No errors. A “married” homosexual couple cannot produce children.
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Again with the shifting goalposts. You started off saying that only heterosexuals could produce children. You were wrong, and you have been shifting goalposts in a failed attempt to avoid your error. Here is what you posted, again:
fix said:
Only heterosexuals can produce children.
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Only heterosexuals can do such things.
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And you persist in your error. Bisexuals can produce children. Gay men can visit a sperm bank. Lesbians may be raped. You appear to have very fixed ideas and to be unable to change them even if they are shown to be wrong. Bisexuals can have children. Do you disagree?

rossum
 
Stephen168 said:
Words mean things. There is no such thing as “gay marriage,” therefore the Catholic Church is not anti-gay marriage. If all Catholics knew and defended Catholic teaching it would never “get drowned out in a sea of condemnation.” It gets drowned out due to ignorance and fear. I think Christ predicted this.
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No Stephen, it’s semantics. There is such a thing as gay marriage in the eyes of certain states and countries. Just like there is such a thing as no-fault civil divorce. Just like there is such a thing as gay adoptive parents. Denying civil and temporal realities does our side no good. Re-asserting, however, what are the moral realities is indeed a good thing.
 
down_under said:
Not only that you have stated it arbitrarily. 1+ 1 = 2 is in fact true.
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It is true given a certain assumption. In the absence of that assumption it is not true. Hence it is not absolutely true because it is not true in all circumstances.

Here is a hint: “There are 10 kinds of people, those who understand binary and those who don’t.”

Any attempt to state a truth inevitably has certain assumptions built in. Hence any statement can only ever be relatively true because it depends on those underlying assumptions.

rossum
 
rossum said:
We agree that the legal definition of something and the Catholic moral definition of something are different.

You are back to your “one true marriage” argument. There is no such thing. There is “one true Catholic marriage”, but that is not the only form of marriage. This thread concerns civil marriage, not Catholic marriage.

rossum
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This from a guy that does not believe in truth. That great I’m going to laugh at the insanity of this all day long. The humor hear is truly of high quality. He first proves that he does believe in truth and then tries to run back to there being no truth but his. all in one post.

There is no truth by your own admission therefor you wrong about everything all the time. (this is good this is. You have brought true humor into my life. You have really lightened my day.
 
The_Bucket said:
No Stephen, it’s semantics.
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That’s what I said, Words mean things. Marriage is a human condition where children are created and raised. Anything else is a legal fiction and like I said before legal fictions may or may not be bad but, they are not real.

What is the problematic situation that calling same-sex unions marriage designed to solve?
 
The_Bucket said:
The separation of sex from procreation is what enabled society to easily do away with separating marriage from children. And with marriage now firmly all about “two people being in love” there is no reason for the state to use marriage as a way to foster procreation.
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Is sex separated from procreation, and marriage separated from children in your mind?
 
Stephen168 said:
That’s what I said, Words mean things. Marriage is a human condition where children are created and raised. Anything else is a legal fiction and like I said before legal fictions may or may not be bad but, they are not real.
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Legal fictions are not fictions. They are real. Slavery was real even though it was an abhorrent thing. The moral fact that all human beings are equal in the eyes of God did not make slavery less real. Your point about words meaning things is salient but then it sort of becomes a logical disconnect.

Adoptive parents are real parents and yes, specifically because the government says so. Blasphemy laws in Islamic countries are real as are the punishments, despite the fact that Islam does not contain the fullness of the Truth. Legal realities are actual realities, albeit ones that exist only in this temporal world. Denying them is counter-productive.
What is the problematic situation that calling same-sex unions marriage designed to solve?
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The way supporters of SSM see it, the problem is that heterosexual married couples are entitled to certain rights that homosexual couples do not receive. These are all related to property and contract law which could be easily amended while leaving out the term “marriage.” But the reason SSM supporters want the term “marriage” to be used is so that every relationship can be deemed equal in the eyes of the state and society as a whole. I imagine that I would see the problem a little better if I myself were homosexual, but I’m not.

Truthfully, I can see their point. Civil marriage is not about children anymore. We as a society threw that away many decades ago. Why should heterosexual relationships be deemed “special” if they are not about the natural creation of children? The bottom line is, and I say this with sincerity, they shouldn’t.

And if you’ll notice, the Church’s teaching about marriage never really ever coincided with civil marriage. Civil marriage was about property and the raising of the next generation. Sacramental marriage is by definition open to children but children are not a requirement for a marriage to be sacramental.

Marriage in the eyes of the Church is, literally, about sex.It is not, strictly speaking, about children. That’s why people who cannot engage in marital relations are barred from marrying in the Church. Marriage in the Church is about the joining of two as one flesh. Children are a gift from God but not a right. Most married people who engage in relations end up with children, but not all. If marriage were really just about the raising of children, the Church would bar infertile couples or the elderly from marrying. It does not because marriage is not about children. It is about sex.
 
The_Bucket said:
Legal fictions are not fictions. They are real. Slavery was real even though it was an abhorrent thing. The moral fact that all human beings are equal in the eyes of God did not make slavery less real. Your point about words meaning things is salient but then it sort of becomes a logical disconnect.

Adoptive parents are real parents and yes, specifically because the government says so. Blasphemy laws in Islamic countries are real as are the punishments, despite the fact that Islam does not contain the fullness of the Truth. Legal realities are actual realities, albeit ones that exist only in this temporal world. Denying them is counter-productive.

The way supporters of SSM see it, the problem is that heterosexual married couples are entitled to certain rights that homosexual couples do not receive. These are all related to property and contract law which could be easily amended while leaving out the term “marriage.” But the reason SSM supporters want the term “marriage” to be used is so that every relationship can be deemed equal in the eyes of the state and society as a whole. I imagine that I would see the problem a little better if I myself were homosexual, but I’m not.

Truthfully, I can see their point. Civil marriage is not about children anymore. We as a society threw that away many decades ago. Why should heterosexual relationships be deemed “special” if they are not about the natural creation of children? The bottom line is, and I say this with sincerity, they shouldn’t.

And if you’ll notice, the Church’s teaching about marriage never really ever coincided with civil marriage. Civil marriage was about property and the raising of the next generation. Sacramental marriage is by definition open to children but children are not a requirement for a marriage to be sacramental.

Marriage in the eyes of the Church is, literally, about sex.It is not, strictly speaking, about children. That’s why people who cannot engage in marital relations are barred from marrying in the Church. Marriage in the Church is about the joining of two as one flesh. Children are a gift from God but not a right. Most married people who engage in relations end up with children, but not all. If marriage were really just about the raising of children, the Church would bar infertile couples or the elderly from marrying. It does not because marriage is not about children. It is about sex.
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It is now clear that you don’t know what a legal fiction is, and you don’t understand the Churches teaching on marriage.
 
rossum said:
That is true for Catholic marriage. It is not true for civil marriage. A post menopausal woman, who has no chance of getting pregnant, can get a civil marriage. IIRC she can also get a Catholic marriage. I am not sure if she would be allowed to have sexual relations with her husband; doesn’t the Catholic Church require consummation of the marriage? That would imply that she is allowed to have sexual relations with her husband, despite zero chance of getting pregnant.

Sin is a religious issue and is not relevant to civil marriage. This thread is about civil marriage.

rossum
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The only valid marriage in the Catholic church is between a Man and a Women who can consummate the marriage. Intercourse. Marriage is communal and procreative.

Civil Union is just another argument for SSM, it doesn’t benefit society and you know it. You are not here to learn things you don’t understand, but to undermine the truth. Your arguments are false teaching of the Catholic Church and you are promoting heresies in this forum. the Question of Civil Union was asked and answered several times and obviously you want to push a homosexual agenda which has no place on this forum. The truth is there are absolute truths and you don’t want to learn them. The only one that has them is the Catholic church and no one is forcing you to be a Catholic. God doesn’t force people to love him, and when you don’t love him, then you love yourself and he can’t help you. Civil Union is wrong period. It does nothing but promote immorality.
God help us.
 
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