This link is from the former head of the Dominican order, who is, I believe, widely regarded as "liberal" in his theology. Frankly, I was (pleasantly) surprised to see what he says.
IMO the highlight is at the beginning:
The Catholic Church does not oppose gay marriage. It considers it to be impossible. If it were possible, then we would have to support it since the Church tells that we must oppose all discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. The issue is not gay rights but a wonderful truth of our humanity which is that we are animals: rational animals according to the Medievals, spiritual animals open to sharing the life of God. In the sacraments, the fundamental dramas of our bodily life are blessed and become open to God's grace: birth and death, eating and drinking, sex and illness. St Thomas Aquinas says that grace perfects nature and does not destroy it.
Marriage is founded on the glorious fact of sexual difference and its potential fertility. Without this there would be no life on this planet, no evolution, no human beings, no future. Marriage is a plastic institution and takes all sorts of forms, from the alliance of clans through bride exchange to modern romantic love. We have come to see that it implies the equal love and dignity of man and woman. But everywhere and always it remains founded on the union in difference of male and female.There is more, including:
This is not to denigrate committed love of people of the same sex. This too should be cherished and supportedSo why not give the whole thing a read?
4 comments:
What is it about it that you find pleasantly surprising? That you've found an article full of nicey-nice that still manages to assert that the LGBT community is not deserving of marriage equality? Oh, sure, the author claims to support civil unions, but separate-but-equal is a pernicious fiction.
Fr. Radcliffe opines that "The State" "[does] not have an exclusive right to determine who can marry." For the purpose of civil marriage, yes, "The State" does have that right. Just as The State has the right to determine who may drive a car and who may carry a concealed weapon.
Fr. Radcliffe's position, whether he cares to admit it or not, is that The Church should have a say in who can enter a civil marriage. In other words, his position, despite his claim to the contrary, is that civil marriage is the provenance of The Church.
Thanks for reading and commenting, Lightning Baltimore.
I note that you offered no rebuttal to Fr. Radcliffe's basic argument. And I think you are mistaken when you claim that his position is that the Church should have a say. He is laying out an argument in an attempt to explain the reasoning behind the Church's teaching, in the hope of persuading people, not to exercise some non-existent veto on state action.
What I found pleasantly surprising was that he defended the Church's position on the matter. I had expected him to give reasons for the Church to accept gay marriage, at least as a civil institution. (Again, not that the Church can control what the State does, but that the Church can try to persuade.)
I am both mystified and saddened by this ongoing conflict because I see it quite simply as one of semantics and cannot understand why it is not recognized as such.
Marriage to the State is different from marriage in the eyes of the church (all faiths), and they only come together where the state authorizes clergy to perform the marriage ceremony and recognizes its legality.
I acknowledge the right of any church to say that certain unions accepted by the state are not 'marriages' at all in the sense that the church views marriage.
But, for all legal purposes {in the United States, at least) I believe the church MUST recognize all marriages deemed such by the state.
If I could be Emperor for a day I would take away the authority of clergy to perform legal marriages, and let those who chose to have their unions blessed by their church do so in purely religious ceremonies.
Thanks for the comment, Mister Ed. Maybe I can shed some light on why some people can't just say, it's just semantics so it's not important.
For one thing, semantics don't matter when we are just saying the same thing in different words. But I don't think that is the case here. I think it is a question of whether there is an objective reality which we should try to express with our words, and, if so, what that reality is. And I thought Fr. Radcliffe did a pretty good job of expressing that there is an objective reality with regard to the natural institution of marriage.
Beyond the concern that our words and our laws be grounded in the reality of human nature, however, there is also an element of practical concern. If you look at the words of some of the courts which have found a basic right to gay marriage, they express it as a matter of simple human equality, no different from racial equality. Some of the more vociferous advocates add that opposition to gay marriage can only come from hatred and bigotry. If such sentiments become the basis of law establishing a right to gay marriage, then any institution which does not go along with it is morally and legally indistinguishable from one that is segregationist. So despite all the sincerely meant words assuring us that no church will be forced to perform gay marriages, it is inevitable that such churches will come to be seen as evil. How long can their First Amendment protections survive, to say nothing of their tax-exempt status? The churches that don't perform gay marriages will become the Bob Jones University of the 21st Century.
Perhaps it would be a good thing for the Catholic Church to lose exempt status. It could be very freeing. But I'd rather not have us considered hatemongers as a matter of law.
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