Catholic And Gay

[stevil]

[quote name='Papist' timestamp='1323261695' post='2346354']
Well said. Men and women compliment each other in a way same-sex couples can't.
[/quote]
Possibly a man-man or woman-woman relationship is in someways different to a woman-man relationship. So what?
Your preconceptions are not translating into verifiable issues with regards to a functional marriage.

[stevil]

[quote name='brianthephysicist' timestamp='1323238025' post='2346300']
We start off with the the traditional family unit: a husband, a wife, and children. This family unit serves to propagate society
[/quote]
The family unit is an interesting dynamic, but come in all shapes and sizes. Our government recognises defacto relationships as a family unit, so marriage is not the qualifying factor. A gay couple can't ever produce children, but then again there is no requirement for all families to consist of children. For non religious people marriage is not a prerequisite for sexual relationships.
I can't see how society is better off having gay people live single lives rather than married lives. But in actuality I am arguing for a functioning society, not a perfect society. If society can continue to function with some people belonging to gay marriage, then they ought to have that choice.
It is also interesting to note that the vocation of priesthood and nunhood is contrary to the family unit as these vocations put a restriction on these people not to form loving families.

[Socrates]

[quote name='Ale.SOLT' timestamp='1323274230' post='2346499']
Exactly!! Homosexuality is totally fine!
[/quote]
Wrong. Homosexual inclinations are objectively disordered.

The [url="http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc/p3s2c2a6.htm"]Catechism of the Catholic Church[/url] calls these inclinations "objectively disordered."



From the [url="http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19861001_homosexual-persons_en.html"]CONGREGATION FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITH [b][i]LETTER TO THE BISHOPS OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH[/i][/b] [b][i]ON THE PASTORAL CARE OF HOMOSEXUAL PERSONS[/i][/b][/url]

[quote]In the discussion which followed the publication of the Declaration, however, an overly benign interpretation was given to the homosexual condition itself, some going so far as to call it neutral, or even good. [b]Although the particular inclination of the homosexual person is not a sin, it is a more or less strong tendency ordered toward an intrinsic moral evil; and thus the inclination itself must be seen as an objective disorder.[/b][/quote]

Such disordered inclinations are not sinful if they are not deliberately willed, but something disordered is by definition not "totally fine." Just a little clarification.

[Basilisa Marie]

bowing out. I'm dizzy from all of this running in circles.

[Papist]

[quote name='stevil' timestamp='1323281683' post='2346595']
[b]Possibly a man-man or woman-woman relationship is in someways different to a woman-man relationship.[/b] So what?
Your preconceptions are not translating into verifiable issues with regards to a functional marriage.
[/quote]
You can say that again.

[Ice_nine]

haha God bless y'all for trying but, you're only beating a dead horse, bringing the horse back to life, killing it, and then beating it up again

[stevil]

"It would be nice that people are open to discussing differences of opinion, but you don't have to come out of discussion with everyone aligned."
[quote name='Nihil Obstat' timestamp='1323235854' post='2346283']
I don't know what you mean by this.
[/quote]
What I mean is, just because we discuss/debate a topic it doesn't mean that we need to have a goal of coming out of it in agreement.
We could listen to each others points, take them on board and still agree to disagree.

[stevil]

[quote name='Ice_nine' timestamp='1323283785' post='2346618']
haha God bless y'all for trying but, you're only beating a dead horse, bringing the horse back to life, killing it, and then beating it up again
[/quote]
I thought the point with the questioning was for people to understand how an Atheist comes to a position on things, such as making rules of society without using a objective moral as a point of reference.
I think I have clarified this well.
I am not sure what you are refering to when you say "God bless y'all for trying". What are people trying to do?

[Ice_nine]

They're trying to make you understand the glaring inconsistencies in your thought.

As far as I know you are not representative of atheists in general, and I doubt most atheists adhere to your logic. Ergo, it's not helping me, or probably anyone else, to understand how "an atheist comes to a position on things."

But hey you guys can continue the convo, I just don't think it's going anywhere

[brianthephysicist]

[quote name='stevil' timestamp='1323282205' post='2346601']
The family unit is an interesting dynamic, but come in all shapes and sizes. Our government recognises defacto relationships as a family unit, so marriage is not the qualifying factor. A gay couple can't ever produce children, but then again there is no requirement for all families to consist of children. For non religious people marriage is not a prerequisite for sexual relationships.
I can't see how society is better off having gay people live single lives rather than married lives. But in actuality I am arguing for a functioning society, not a perfect society. If society can continue to function with some people belonging to gay marriage, then they ought to have that choice.
It is also interesting to note that the vocation of priesthood and nunhood is contrary to the family unit as these vocations put a restriction on these people not to form loving families.
[/quote]

I'm sorry, maybe I'm coming at this from the wrong angle. In my first post, I wanted to get a sense of what your definition of a right is, that way I could appeal your sense of rights instead of my own.

[quote name='stevil' timestamp='1323226831' post='2346096']
But when law imposes restrictions on our actions, it then is imposing on the actions that we can perform. Some of these impositions are desired and essential inorder to create a functioning society. In my opinion these are the rules government should impose. Some impositions are not with regards to creating a functioning society, such as anti gay laws, in my opinion the government should not impose and the society members each should be allowed to choose what actions they want to take, be that having gay sex or not having gay sex, it should be a personal choice.
When i am refering to "rights" I am refering to the actions that people are physically able to perform, this is the only possible stance I can take given that I do not believe in an objective right/moral.
I hope this is now clear to you.
[/quote]

From this paragraph, I saw that you wanted laws to preserve a functioning society. I was under the assumption that by the word "functioning", you didn't simply want something that "works well enough" or "gets the job done", but something that more efficiently creates and preserves a harmonious and self-propagating society. Earlier you even made a comment remarking on how far we have matured as a society. If all you are after is something that "works well enough" or "gets the job done", then this whole discussion is moot, because our current society is functions in this sense of the word.

If you are looking to build up a more efficient society (or by your own words maybe even a more "mature" society), then let's see where this takes us. Traditional marriage has served for (at least) the last few thousand years as the "standard" family unit (at least in western civilization, I'm not familiar enough with my world history to say for sure about every culture). The reason I use the word standard, is two-fold. I use it as 1) the most common unit and 2) as the one to which all others are compared (standard as in a measure).

You are correct in saying that "The family unit is an interesting dynamic, but come in all shapes and sizes"; alongside traditional marriage have often (if not always) been other "nonstandard" family units. Over time, these have come in various forms, such as polygamist marriages or a more commonly seen one today would be single parenthood. None of these other forms have been able to stand the test of time as traditional marriage has.

Let's try to examine why that might be. In taking the case of single parenting, we can easily see how this negatively affects our society today. In no way am I saying that single parents [i]cannot[/i] raise a healthy, happy, contributing member of society, but that it is significantly more difficult than raising a child within the confines of traditional marriage. I'm not saying that traditional marriage has it all perfect either, I mean it's pretty easy to look around and see there are plenty of cases of traditional marriages producing children that do not properly function within the social norms of society either.

The main point is that one can easily see that the [i]preferred[/i] option is traditional marriage. If someone becomes a single parent (which can happen for any number of reasons outside of the parent's control), they are not condemned for it, but people are generally advised to try to avoid single parenting. It has somewhat of a taboo on it. Why does this have a taboo on it? Society certainly manages to get by with this as an option alongside traditional marriage. But as we we said earlier, it's not about simply "getting by".

Similarly, we can look at the issue of same-sex marriage and see how it measures up against the standard of traditional marriage. In my last post, I gave a rough explanation of how the love found in a same-sex marriage is different than that of the love found in a traditional marriage. Again, not saying that love doesn't exist in a same-sex relationship, just that it is a different dynamic. It is not the dynamic [i]best[/i] suited to raising children. I mean, sure, we can "get by" with it, but I want to give children the best. And nothing but the best.

If we make same-sex marriage legal, we are affirming to society that it is equally as able to propagate society as traditional marriage. But it's [i]not[/i]. It isn't on equal footing as traditional marriage, similar to how single parenting or polygamy aren't on equal footing. This is why polygamy is outlawed. Because single parenting can occur from any number of circumstances outside of the parent's control, this cannot be outlawed, but it does receive somewhat of a taboo. This is why we are arguing for the outlaw of same-sex marriage. Not to be bigoted, but because we want to foster not simply a functioning society, but a more mature, harmonious, and self-propagating society.





I hope that was a better explanation this time. There were some other points you mentioned in your post that I would also like to address.


[quote name='stevil' timestamp='1323282205' post='2346601']
The family unit is an interesting dynamic, but come in all shapes and sizes. Our government recognises defacto relationships as a family unit, so marriage is not the qualifying factor. A gay couple can't ever produce children, but then again there is no requirement for all families to consist of children. [b]For non religious people marriage is not a prerequisite for sexual relationships.[/b]
I can't see how society is better off having gay people live single lives rather than married lives. But in actuality I am arguing for a functioning society, not a perfect society. If society can continue to function with some people belonging to gay marriage, then they ought to have that choice.
It is also interesting to note that the vocation of priesthood and nunhood is contrary to the family unit as these vocations put a restriction on these people not to form loving families.
[/quote]

Yes, unfortunately that is true. But as I said before, sex outside of marriage is an attack on traditional marriage. Often, people are able to convince themselves that they live life in a bubble and that their actions in the bedroom only affect the people in that bedroom. But this is simply not true. Engaging in sex outside of marriage teaches people that human dignity is not important. I don't know how you feel about your dignity, but I kinda like mine. That's why I speak up against sex outside of marriage, to preserve my dignity.





[quote name='stevil' timestamp='1323282205' post='2346601']
The family unit is an interesting dynamic, but come in all shapes and sizes. Our government recognises defacto relationships as a family unit, so marriage is not the qualifying factor. A gay couple can't ever produce children, but then again there is no requirement for all families to consist of children. For non religious people marriage is not a prerequisite for sexual relationships.
[b]I can't see how society is better off having gay people live single lives rather than married lives[/b]. But in actuality I am arguing for a functioning society, not a perfect society. If society can continue to function with some people belonging to gay marriage, then they ought to have that choice.
[b]It is also interesting to note that the vocation of priesthood and nunhood is contrary to the family unit as these vocations put a restriction on these people not to form loving families.[/b]
[/quote]

It's actually not contrary. Maybe I'm not the [i]most[/i] qualified to speak on this particular point, but they do go hand in hand because they are designed for different things. Traditional marriage serves to propagate society in giving birth to and raising new members of society. I don't know if you have any children or not, but if you do, you know that it is a full-time job. A parent can't go half-way. They need to give it all to their child. That's why there needs to be members of society that have the freedom to do some of the more hands-on fixes that society needs. I guess some people might look at it as not being "tied down". That's one way to look at it. Another way to think of it is by the old quote: "it takes a village to raise a child". Priests, nuns, and brothers devote their lives to service of others. Part of this comes in the form of prayers and other spiritual favors, but from a more pragmatic standpoint, they also serve the physical and emotional needs of the surrounding community in a different way than a husband or wife might be able to serve the community. Single lay people also serve to propagate society, in yet another fashion that a husband or wife could not do, but that people "tied down" by the stricter rules of living within a religious community are unable to do.

[Nihil Obstat]

Welp, I'm out.

[stevil]

[quote name='brianthephysicist' timestamp='1323297135' post='2346842']From this paragraph, I saw that you wanted laws to preserve a functioning society. I was under the assumption that by the word "functioning", you didn't simply want something that "works well enough" or "gets the job done", but something that more efficiently creates and preserves a harmonious and self-propagating society. Earlier you even made a comment remarking on how far we have matured as a society. If all you are after is something that "works well enough" or "gets the job done", then this whole discussion is moot[/quote]
I want government to be minimalistic. Only enforcing rules essential for a functioning society. I feel as an adult, I do not need a parent figure over looking me and telling me how I should live my life.
In this way I feel that society is maturing as it is starting to treat its members with more respect and allowing them to take control of their own lives and make their own decisions (for better or for worse).

[brianthephysicist]

[quote name='brianthephysicist' timestamp='1323297135' post='2346842']
From this paragraph, I saw that you wanted laws to preserve a functioning society. I was under the assumption that by the word "functioning", you didn't simply want something that "works well enough" or "gets the job done", but something that more efficiently creates and preserves a harmonious and self-propagating society. Earlier you even made a comment remarking on how far we have matured as a society. [b] If all you are after is something that "works well enough" or "gets the job done", then this whole discussion is moot, because our current society is functions in this sense of the word.[/b]
[/quote]


[quote name='stevil' timestamp='1323314156' post='2347129']
I want government to be minimalistic. [b]Only enforcing rules essential for a functioning society[/b]. I feel as an adult, I do not need a parent figure over looking me and telling me how I should live my life.
In this way I feel that society is maturing as it is starting to treat its members with more respect and allowing them to take control of their own lives and make their own decisions (for better or for worse).
[/quote]

This tells me all that I needed to know. Good day and God bless.

[stevil]

[quote name='Ice_nine' timestamp='1323294865' post='2346811']
They're trying to make you understand the glaring inconsistencies in your thought.

As far as I know you are not representative of atheists in general, and I doubt most atheists adhere to your logic. Ergo, it's not helping me, or probably anyone else, to understand how "an atheist comes to a position on things."

But hey you guys can continue the convo, I just don't think it's going anywhere
[/quote]
So far noone has pointed out any inconsistencies.
All Atheists think like me on this matter. None of us believe there are any objective morals.

[Vincent Vega]

[quote name='stevil' timestamp='1323318175' post='2347181']
So far noone has pointed out any inconsistencies.
All Atheists think like me on this matter. None of us believe there are any objective morals.
[/quote]
I did (or you might have missed it, I guess):


[quote name='USAirwaysIHS' timestamp='1323236907' post='2346286']
So in this case it is just (or at the very least, is not objectively unjust) to keep two same sex individuals from marrying. Am I incorrect?
[/quote]