Originally written as a response to http://www.catholic.org/politics/story.php?id=37702 - where, hilariously, the moderator only allows messages to be posted by people being obvious idiotic trolls, but denies posts that are thoughtful and reasoned. Which, of course, mine is. Don't worry, I never let good arguments go to waste.


Ezekiel said:

"I'm grateful for Deacon Fournier's ongoing coverage of this story. His commentary on the subject matter has consistently been among the most well-reasoned and articulate available in 'the press'. Judge Walker's Prop-8 ruling represents a huge victory of emotion over ontology in today's culture war, and a new threat to people's right to hold and express beliefs consistent with traditional Christian moral teaching. "

How does this in any way require you to recognize their marriage? They can't force anyone in a church to perform these marriages. You can go on believing as you'd like. So someone down the street wants the same civil (meaning it's a legal process, not a religious one) and legally-binding rights that any other married couple can have. These rights are completely non-religious in nature. You're basically saying that these people can make a contract. That is all civil marriage is at its core. Certainly, if you don't think these rights are important or part of a marriage, I welcome you to have your marriage performed at a church and not have your marriage certificate signed, as all that truly matters is having God witness and bless your marriage, correct?

If I remember correctly, any marriage performed on a Catholic outside of a Catholic church is not recognized by the church. So why worry about a few more marriages you consider shams?

As for people saying it's sanctified (it isn't, it's a contract) perversion, why would you encourage gay people who are going to be gay anyhow to decide on the opposite alternative - that is to say, instability, promiscuity, and so on? That is, unless, you want an excuse to point your finger at them and say "I'm better than you because I don't do this. You've faced a lifetime of getting treated like second-class citizens, and this is the best you can do after being treated badly your whole lives? This is why you don't deserve marriage."

For those crying out about democracy, let us not forget the lessons that history has taught us about mob rule and its effect on groups of people who are in the minority. Our founding fathers were wise to choose a representative democracy with a system of checks and balances to protect a capricious populace that changes its opinions often based on fashion, politics, and anecdotal evidence.

Those who are crying out wishing to die because they feel our society is morally bankrupt, remember suicide is a sin as well. Speaking of sin, the Old Testament focuses on a multitude of sins. Most of them we don't even consider sins today, but most of us are guilty of them all the same. Homosexuality was mentioned as one of them. So are laws against:

-Following the laws and procedures of infectious skin diseases (Leviticus 13)
-(For women) Basically isolated yourself for 7 days during the culmination of your monthly cycle, and following the proscribed rituals in case you accidentally contaminate someone? (Leviticus 15:19-30)
-Wearing clothing of mixed material (Leviticus 19:19)
-Divination and sorcery (Leviticus 19:26) - Have you read a horoscope lately?
-Cutting hair at the sides of your head or around the edge of your beard (Leviticus 19:27) - Do you remember this at the barber?
-Tattooing (Leviticus 19:28)
-Mistreating foreigners in your land - in fact, not treating them in a friendly, welcoming, and hospitable manner (Leviticus 19:33)

Notice that I didn't mention keeping the laws of kashrut as they apply to food. The reason I don't include these is because in the New Testament, there is some scriptural basis for saying that those who follow Christ's teachings do not have to follow them, specifically at Mark 7:14-23. In the rest of the Bible, there is nowhere that Christ says that some, but not all of the sins in the Bible are no longer sins.

He certainly doesn't say, "Well, now that I have come, you're free to pick and choose which sins are actually sins." Nowhere does Christ speak about homosexuality. In fact, he chose to hang out with prostitutes and thieves - the very people who needed him the most, and not to point out their sins and condemn them, but to spread the message of God's love. Keep in mind that these are the very people who would be condemned by the laws of Leviticus. He chose to spent time with them rather than the contemporary self-anointed guardians of morality, from religious personae to the first century equivalent of a soccer mom.

Paul, in Galatians 2:16 stated "Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justfied." This seems to me to be the statement of a man who agrees that the laws of the Old Testament had already been invalidated, yet in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 Paul mentioned the effeminate not inheriting the kingdom of God. First, why the sudden change of heart? Christ had no known law about cross-dressing or acting womanly. Why must the effeminate mean a homosexual? I have known plenty of masculine homosexual men and plenty of effeminate heterosexual men. The original word "Malakoi" that Paul used means exactly what effeminate means - soft, weak, and generally feminine. Paul was warning here against overly indulging in worldly pleasures, and women at the time were considered more prone to falling prey to them. I agree that moderation is important in all of life's pleasures. Paul also mentions that thieves, adulterers, drunkards, and fornicators (this includes prostitutes) are with the effeminate ones in not inheriting the kingdom of heaven. Curiously, many of those who Christ ministered to would fall in with those terms, and he never condemned them for their behavior. It seems to me that it's possible that Paul had lost some of Christ's message.

And what was Christ's message? If you consider that he was simply an addition to the Old Testament scriptures, then it's possible that only the Messianic Jews and similar groups have gotten it right. If not, what is the new convenant with the people of the world? Christ preached love. Christ preached acceptance that all of us are sinners. He didn't want us to count sins, and he certainly didn't want us getting involved pointing out the sins of everyone around us, which modern Christianity seems preoccupied with. He definitely did not say that certain things that God had said earlier were still sins and certain things no longer were - with the possible exception of the laws regarding food. Love God, love your neighbor, and have faith.

Originally written as a response to http://www.catholic.org/politics/story.php?id=37702 - where, hilariously, the moderator only allows messages to be posted by people being obvious idiotic trolls, but denies posts that are thoughtful and reasoned. Which, of course, mine is. Don't worry, I never let good arguments go to waste.


Ezekiel said:

"I'm grateful for Deacon Fournier's ongoing coverage of this story. His commentary on the subject matter has consistently been among the most well-reasoned and articulate available in 'the press'. Judge Walker's Prop-8 ruling represents a huge victory of emotion over ontology in today's culture war, and a new threat to people's right to hold and express beliefs consistent with traditional Christian moral teaching. "

How does this in any way require you to recognize their marriage? They can't force anyone in a church to perform these marriages. You can go on believing as you'd like. So someone down the street wants the same civil (meaning it's a legal process, not a religious one) and legally-binding rights that any other married couple can have. These rights are completely non-religious in nature. You're basically saying that these people can make a contract. That is all civil marriage is at its core. Certainly, if you don't think these rights are important or part of a marriage, I welcome you to have your marriage performed at a church and not have your marriage certificate signed, as all that truly matters is having God witness and bless your marriage, correct?

If I remember correctly, any marriage performed on a Catholic outside of a Catholic church is not recognized by the church. So why worry about a few more marriages you consider shams?

As for people saying it's sanctified (it isn't, it's a contract) perversion, why would you encourage gay people who are going to be gay anyhow to decide on the opposite alternative - that is to say, instability, promiscuity, and so on? That is, unless, you want an excuse to point your finger at them and say "I'm better than you because I don't do this. You've faced a lifetime of getting treated like second-class citizens, and this is the best you can do after being treated badly your whole lives? This is why you don't deserve marriage."

For those crying out about democracy, let us not forget the lessons that history has taught us about mob rule and its effect on groups of people who are in the minority. Our founding fathers were wise to choose a representative democracy with a system of checks and balances to protect a capricious populace that changes its opinions often based on fashion, politics, and anecdotal evidence.

Those who are crying out wishing to die because they feel our society is morally bankrupt, remember suicide is a sin as well. Speaking of sin, the Old Testament focuses on a multitude of sins. Most of them we don't even consider sins today, but most of us are guilty of them all the same. Homosexuality was mentioned as one of them. So are laws against:

-Following the laws and procedures of infectious skin diseases (Leviticus 13)
-(For women) Basically isolated yourself for 7 days during the culmination of your monthly cycle, and following the proscribed rituals in case you accidentally contaminate someone? (Leviticus 15:19-30)
-Wearing clothing of mixed material (Leviticus 19:19)
-Divination and sorcery (Leviticus 19:26) - Have you read a horoscope lately?
-Cutting hair at the sides of your head or around the edge of your beard (Leviticus 19:27) - Do you remember this at the barber?
-Tattooing (Leviticus 19:28)
-Mistreating foreigners in your land - in fact, not treating them in a friendly, welcoming, and hospitable manner (Leviticus 19:33)

Notice that I didn't mention keeping the laws of kashrut as they apply to food. The reason I don't include these is because in the New Testament, there is some scriptural basis for saying that those who follow Christ's teachings do not have to follow them, specifically at Mark 7:14-23. In the rest of the Bible, there is nowhere that Christ says that some, but not all of the sins in the Bible are no longer sins.

He certainly doesn't say, "Well, now that I have come, you're free to pick and choose which sins are actually sins." Nowhere does Christ speak about homosexuality. In fact, he chose to hang out with prostitutes and thieves - the very people who needed him the most, and not to point out their sins and condemn them, but to spread the message of God's love. Keep in mind that these are the very people who would be condemned by the laws of Leviticus. He chose to spent time with them rather than the contemporary self-anointed guardians of morality, from religious personae to the first century equivalent of a soccer mom.

Paul, in Galatians 2:16 stated "Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justfied." This seems to me to be the statement of a man who agrees that the laws of the Old Testament had already been invalidated, yet in 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 Paul mentioned the effeminate not inheriting the kingdom of God. First, why the sudden change of heart? Christ had no known law about cross-dressing or acting womanly. Why must the effeminate mean a homosexual? I have known plenty of masculine homosexual men and plenty of effeminate heterosexual men. The original word "Malakoi" that Paul used means exactly what effeminate means - soft, weak, and generally feminine. Paul was warning here against overly indulging in worldly pleasures, and women at the time were considered more prone to falling prey to them. I agree that moderation is important in all of life's pleasures. Paul also mentions that thieves, adulterers, drunkards, and fornicators (this includes prostitutes) are with the effeminate ones in not inheriting the kingdom of heaven. Curiously, many of those who Christ ministered to would fall in with those terms, and he never condemned them for their behavior. It seems to me that it's possible that Paul had lost some of Christ's message.

And what was Christ's message? If you consider that he was simply an addition to the Old Testament scriptures, then it's possible that only the Messianic Jews and similar groups have gotten it right. If not, what is the new convenant with the people of the world? Christ preached love. Christ preached acceptance that all of us are sinners. He didn't want us to count sins, and he certainly didn't want us getting involved pointing out the sins of everyone around us, which modern Christianity seems preoccupied with. He definitely did not say that certain things that God had said earlier were still sins and certain things no longer were - with the possible exception of the laws regarding food. Love God, love your neighbor, and have faith.