Gay "marriage" Rights

[jen.esis]

Now, firstly, I know it is not recognized by the church as a marriage for obvious reasons so I shall call it a union. Secondly, I know the church believes engaging in homosexual actitivty is sinful but I have something that has been troubling my mind and heart lately.

Okay I understand the Church not allowing Gay unions under her supreme being but what I don't get is when Catholic/Christian politicians, and for that matter, most of America now trying to restrict them getting unions. Now obviously we believe its sinful but what right do we have in our religiously free country to try and stop them from getting this union? The gay couple trying to get a union is probably not Catholic and as defined in our countries law they have a right to any religious practices and freedoms. Now as JP2 said in his writings (i think familiris consortios) gay marriage does not provide a stable structure which I understand but whats so bad about two gay people trying to adopt some kids? It provides these kids a sense of family which they may have never had. Can't we all just try and worry about our own sins, love others, and try to take the plank out of our eyes before the speck in theirs?

There is so many more problems that our politicians could deal with before this. The gays aren't out there killing anyone. Yeah sure you and I may define it as a sin but who are we to judge? Can't we look past their sinfulness and live together as one? If they want to sin, they can take it up with God.

Please correct me if I am wrong in anything. I have tried talking to my religion teachers and youth ministers about this with no good answers. Peace and GOD BLESS!

[cappie]

[quote name='jen.esis' timestamp='1336791979' post='2429963']
Now, firstly, I know it is not recognized by the church as a marriage for obvious reasons so I shall call it a union. Secondly, I know the church believes engaging in homosexual actitivty is sinful but I have something that has been troubling my mind and heart lately.

Okay I understand the Church not allowing Gay unions under her supreme being but what I don't get is when Catholic/Christian politicians, and for that matter, most of America now trying to restrict them getting unions. Now obviously we believe its sinful but what right do we have in our religiously free country to try and stop them from getting this union? The gay couple trying to get a union is probably not Catholic and as defined in our countries law they have a right to any religious practices and freedoms. Now as JP2 said in his writings (i think familiris consortios) gay marriage does not provide a stable structure which I understand but whats so bad about two gay people trying to adopt some kids? It provides these kids a sense of family which they may have never had. Can't we all just try and worry about our own sins, love others, and try to take the plank out of our eyes before the speck in theirs?

There is so many more problems that our politicians could deal with before this. The gays aren't out there killing anyone. Yeah sure you and I may define it as a sin but who are we to judge? Can't we look past their sinfulness and live together as one? If they want to sin, they can take it up with God.

Please correct me if I am wrong in anything. I have tried talking to my religion teachers and youth ministers about this with no good answers. Peace and GOD BLESS!
[/quote]

This is as great a conversation in Australia as in the USA, so I will direct remarks using Australia.

The Bible shows marriage to be foundational to a healthy society. Over many generations Christians have reflected on the teaching of Scripture in relation to marriage and have developed a distinctive view. Although marriage exists in all human cultures, the Christian tradition has particular insights into its nature and purpose. Our confidence in the view we advocate stems from our faith in a God who created all things and designed our sexuality as men and women for the relationship of marriage.

Not all Australians share all elements of a Christian understanding of marriage, but we hold much in common. The majority of Australians have a moral framework informed by their Christian heritage, and all humankind possesses a sense of the natural law given by God in Creation. Sin affects sensibilities in relation to natural law, but it shows through at many points in personal conscience and in human culture. Thus Christians present a distinctive view of marriage, yet one which resonates with the broader community.

A central message of Christianity, expressed most fully in Christ on the Cross, is that human beings find fulfilment in being a gift to others. Marriage is the paradigm of human love in being a complete, permanent, exclusive, mutual gift of self that goes beyond the spouses in outreach to others through its fruitfulness and commitment to nurturing children. The universal vocation to give oneself in love takes many forms, including committed celibacy as a witness to the Kingdom of Heaven (Matthew 19:12) and the many other ways in which we express love for one another and for our Creator.

The vocation to give oneself in love is shared by people of same sex orientation, and finds expression in the many ways in which we give of ourselves in ways other than in marriage, including friendship and contribution to our community. There is a distinguished and much loved history of creative contribution to our culture by people known to be of homosexual orientation, whereby they give themselves in love to others and in that way live in accordance with the universal likeness to God. However, marriage is a particular type of giving that reflects God’s plan for sexuality including the complementarity of man and woman, their openness to the divine gift of procreativity, and the nurturing of children.

There are three important implications for Christians in Australia today. First, we need to recognise that the Christian view of sexuality and marriage is not universally shared by Australians. Most agree with parts of the Christian view, including that marriage is for a man and a woman, but many do not feel compelled to live out the full Christian meaning of marriage. The Christian view is counter-cultural.
Second, we need to commit ourselves to living by God’s revealed pattern, in the light of our redemption in Christ. Churches should be communities in which marriage is honoured (Hebrews 13:4) and in which everyone is supported to live a life of sexual self-control, leaving behind the old ways of immorality and license. In this we rely on God’s grace, recognising the long and difficult task many Christians face in living faithfully for God in a society which has little sympathy for the Christian sexual ethic. As we live this way, we bear witness to God’s creation order and redemptive project. Third, we should seek to promote patterns of sexual life and marriage which reflect God’s ways, and seek opportunities to advocate the Christian sexual ethic in community and public life. We do not expect to see a reversal in the pattern of casual sexual relationships so common in our society. Nor are we under the illusion that returning to patterns of marriage which are closer to the Biblical pattern makes people Christians or makes Australia a Christian nation. However, living according to God’s design is good for all people, so we promote the Biblical patterns out of love for our neighbour. Every Christian and church should consider how this is best done in their particular circumstances.

Christians should encourage governments to follow these principles to the extent that they can in a secular society. Same sex marriage should not be legalised since God’s order of marriage is a social good which protects the identity, security and flourishing of children.

Marriage is shaped by the needs of our common humanity. Despite varying cultural expressions, it has come to be seen as the union of a man and a woman who make a permanent and exclusive commitment to each other, of the type that is fulfilled by bearing and rearing children together. This concept of marriage is consistently found across cultures throughout history. Marriage involves a comprehensive union of spouses, and norms of permanence and exclusivity. These combine to create a special link to children, for their sake, that protects their identity and nurture by a mother and father. These elements taken together reflect the current understanding of marriage, and demonstrate the inadequacy of the revisionist understanding.

With one exception a person is complete within themselves as to bodily organs and their functions: heart, lungs, stomach and so on. In other words, to fulfil any of these functions a person does not require a contribution from anyone else. The one biological function for which individual adults are naturally incomplete is sexual reproduction. In sexual intercourse, but not in any other form of sexual contact, a man’s and a woman’s bodies coordinate by way of their sexual organs for the common biological purpose of reproduction. In this way they perform the first step of the complex reproductive process. Their bodies become one by coordinating for the biological good of the whole, thereby securing future generations at the same time as they are giving unique expression to their love for each other. This way of viewing marriage has become less persuasive only because widespread contraception has masked the link between marital sexual activity and the rearing of children. That in turn conveys the impression that all modes of sexual expression seem equivalent. But marriage remains deeply and uniquely oriented to bearing and rearing children. By contrast, two men or two women cannot achieve the same kind of union, since there is no child-oriented outcome or function toward which their bodies may coordinate. Same sex partnerships lack essential and natural orientation to children: they cannot be sealed by the generative act.

A child’s relationship to both mother and father is inherent to marriage. Children conceived by other means may find themselves with people in parental roles who are in a same sex relationship, but such relationships are not the origin of the child. It is possible for children to be nurtured in such a household, but however good that nurturing, it will not provide the biological link and security of identity and relationship that marriage naturally demands and confirms.

Marriage also provides children with a role model of the human love of their parents relating as man and woman. Its complementarity ensures the unilateral love of each parent to the child and the necessary differences between motherly and fatherly love. In contrast, the revisionist case incorrectly asserts that there is no necessity for a child to experience both fathering and mothering within the family.

Neither marriage breakdown, the early death of a parent, the adoption of children, de facto relationships, nor the practice of step-parenting negates these arguments. The complications and tragedies of an imperfect world do not justify the redefinition of marriage.

Given the natural orientation of the marital relationship to children, it is not surprising that the best available sociological evidence indicates that children fare best on virtually every indicator of wellbeing when reared by their wedded biological parents.

The current debate is about the function and purpose of the law in relation to marriage, and not a discussion regarding personal motivation and attitudes. We ought to deal fairly with persons of homosexual orientation and their needs. In the same spirit we should not accept ad hominem attacks on defenders of traditional marriage spiced by the use of pejoratives such as “homophobe” and “bigot”.

At the heart of the argument for same sex marriage lie revisionist propositions that same sex marriage harms no-one, and that to deny homosexual couples marriage is a denial of “natural justice”. But under the current reform proposals, marriage would be totally changed. Marriage would not be about securing the rights of children, but rather meeting the needs of adults. It would place adult sexual choice and emotional commitment at its centre. Under these (rarely articulated) conditions, there is no valid reason why marriage rights should not be granted to polyamorous or any other type of sexual relationship. Indeed, it is unclear why sexual activity should be the focal point of legislation – why should long term housemates or inseparable golfing partners not likewise seek recognition at law for their relationships?

The revisionist case reduces marriage to a matter of choice and love between adults. For the most part, advocates have avoided discussion of the deeper meaning of marriage, insisting instead that the change will result in minimal impact. But if the definition of marriage is changed, that will affect all people(children in particular), because “marriage” will primarily serve the interests of adults.

Marriage is a public matter, not a private matter. Those by advocating so strongly for change, tacitly acknowledge this. It is not therefore simply a matter of allowing a freedom for ourselves. It is a matter of determining what best promotes human flourishing.

Finally, There are many variations of households that nurture children, including those that can only have occurred through the use of technology. In all circumstances in which children are nurtured the State has a parens patriae interest in the welfare of children. The State therefore has an interest in relationships that cause children to come to be. It has an interest also in reproductive technology to protect the rights of children to have an identity and to know, have access to and be nurtured by their mother and father as far as that is practicable. Marriage offers the best security for those rights and should therefore be protected and given its full meaning, including its capacity to procreate and to provide both mother and father to the child. For the sake of children, the State therefore has an interest in promoting marriage as a relationship between a man and a woman entered into for life and to the exclusion of all others, and for using that relationship as the paradigm when circumstances fail children.

[cappie]

One question that arises again and again:

Doesn’t the traditional concept of marriage sacrifice some people’s fulfilment for others?

This objection is best considered by disclosing its hidden assumptions:
(a) Fulfilment is impossible without regular outlets for sexual release.
(b) Meaningful intimacy is impossible without sex.
(c) Fulfilling relationships require legal recognition.
(d) Homosexual orientation is such that any State which does not actively accommodate it equally in every sense necessarily harms or disregards a class of human beings.

In respect of the first assumption that fulfilment is impossible without regular outlets for sexual release, the days are long since past when the State will prevent any likeminded people from making their own private arrangements.

However, the State cannot give same sex unions what is truly distinctive of marriage. That is, it cannot make them actually comprehensive, oriented by nature to children, or bound by the moral norms specific to marriage. At most the State can call such unions marital, but such designation would not – because, in moral truth, it cannot – make them so; and it would, to society’s detriment, obscure people’s understanding about what truly marital unions do involve. In this sense, it is not the State that keeps marriage from certain people, but their circumstances that unfortunately keep certain people from marriage.

This is so, not only for those with exclusively homosexual attractions, but also for people who cannot marry because of, for example, prior and pressing family obligations incompatible with marriage’s comprehensiveness and orientation to children, inability to find a mate, or any other cause. Those who face such difficulties should in no way be marginalised or otherwise discriminated against, and they deserve our support in the face of what are often considerable burdens. But none of this establishes the first mistaken assumption, that fulfilment is impossible without regular outlets for sexual release – an idea that devalues many people’s way of life.

In contradiction to the second assertion that meaningful intimacy is impossible without sex, what we wish for people unable to marry because of a lack of any attraction to a member of the opposite sex is the same as what we wish for people who cannot marry for any other reason: rich and fulfilling lives. In the splendour of human variety, these can take infinitely many forms. In any of them, energy that would otherwise go into marriage is channelled toward ennobling endeavours: deeper devotion to family or nation, service, adventure, art, or a thousand other things. But most relevantly, this energy could be harnessed for deep friendship, and we must not nor are entitled to conflate depth of friendship with the presence of sex.

The third assumption, that fulfilling relationships are impossible without legal recognition, is baffling (but not rare) to find in this context. Even granting the second point, legal recognition has nothing to do with whether homosexual acts should be banned or anyone should be prevented from living with anyone else. This debate is not about private behaviour. Instead, public recognition of certain relationships and the social effects of such recognition are at stake. Some have described the push for same sex marriage as an effort to legalise or even to decriminalise such unions. But one can only decriminalise or legalise what has been banned, and these unions are not banned. Rather, same sex unions are simply not recognised as marriages.

The fourth assumption, that homosexual orientation is such that any State which does not actively accommodate it equally in every sense necessarily harms or disregards a class of human beings, draws an arbitrary distinction between homosexual and other sexual desires that the State may not sanction. It often leads people to suppose that traditional morality unfairly singles out people who experience same sex attractions. It does not. Traditional morality sees in every person, a person of dignity whose welfare makes demands on every other being that can hear and answer them. In some it sees desires, for a range of reasons not limited to same sex orientation that cannot be integrated within the comprehensive union of marriage.

[CatherineM]

I can't image adding anything after such a wonderful response, but I wanted to touch on a couple of things that come up in the American debate. The first is rights. We Americans are all about not being denied our rights. People who have same sex attraction are not being denied any rights by not being allowed to marry their gay lovers. I have the right as a woman to marry a man. A lesbian has that same right, she can legally marry a man. Allowing her to marry a woman has never been a right, so we are not denying her rights, we are just not allowing a new right to be created.

Second, when we say that gay marriage doesn't harm anyone, that's untrue. Primarily it harms the two individuals. Things are sins for a reason. I had over a hundred gay clients, and can truthfully say that I didn't know of a couple in one of these unions who was truly healthy and happy and whole. They might have been together for decades but still just weren't complete. They were living a shadow life in comparison to the lives I see in our parish experienced by sacramentally married couples who have been together for the same number of years.

Why would we want to tear society apart legalizing something that will hurt the individuals involved?