Pope Benedict said Monday that gay marriage was one of several threats to the traditional family that undermined "the future of humanity itself."
The pope made some of his strongest comments against gay marriage in a new year address to the diplomatic corps accredited to the Vatican in which he touched on some economic and social issues facing the world today.
He told diplomats from nearly 180 countries that the education of children needed proper "settings" and that "pride of place goes to the family, based on the marriage of a man and a woman."
"This is not a simple social convention, but rather the fundamental cell of every society. Consequently, policies which undermine the family threaten human dignity and the future of humanity itself," he said.
21 Comments
The Pope is right, - Indeed SCOTUS precedent is on his side and always has been.
“Marriage is one of the "basic civil rights of man," fundamental to our very existence and survival.”
Supreme Court precedent of Skinner v. Oklahoma.
Unlike the cultural left - traditionalists understand that children come from mothers & fathers and that the preservation of the intact family is a precondition to a healthy society.
If you attack the family you attack society. That is exemplified by the social breakdown in the blck underclass. Once the family unit breaks down you cannot address any social problems succesfully without addressing the family unit first.
The Pope, as usual, has it wrong. He and everyone else should be supportive of marriage both gay and straight as both build sound family foundations that benefit society, children and even the Church of one's choice. "Pride of place goes to the family, based on the marriage of two loving committed adults, gay or straight."
Thank you Pope Benedict: Your message is indeed urgent and welcome in this day of age. How ironic that the next blog discusses the importance of fathers which the somomite activists dismiss as unimportant.
You do not have to be Catholic which I am not to understand the grave importance of his message.
Rich,marriage exists to unite males to females,because the existence of opposite-sex relationships helps society and that of same-sex sexual relationships harms society.Claiming to be "gay" is no excuse for a same-sex relationship!
Louis E,
Can you list any of the ways that "traditional" marriage benefits society ... but that SSM does not?
Or any of the "harms" to society of SSM?
So, the head of a worldwide organization engaged in systematically shielding child molesters from justice is a credible source on what's best for society?
Im not a Catholic, I am a Russian Orthodox Christian living in Texas but I commend the pope on his courage to speak out on behalf of all decent Christians, Muslims and Jews against the gay agenda and its evils
In point of fact, the Pope does NOT speak for all Christians, Jews, and Muslims. He doesn't speak for me (an Epsicopalian). On the issue of SSM he may not even speak for a majority of Catholics (at least according to post Prop-8 election analysis). My traditional marriage to my wife has not been affected by the legalization of SSM in our state on iota.
SearchCz,
simply by being opposite-sex,an opposite-sex marriage sets an example of critical importance that any same-sex couple monstrously,obscenely fails to meet.The species having two sexes obligates all of us to acknowledge the exclusively normative status of opposite-sex relationships,especially with regard to those attempting to evade that fact.All failures to adhere to that norm are deplorable.
Sorry, can you state this in simple terms please? Are you saying that opposite-sex relationships are the only ones that conform to social norm?
SearchCz,I am saying that the species evolving two sexes creates a biological norm that social norms should always conform to.
Rich: the term 'family' is strictly for genetically related relatives. To use it loosely is okay, like talking about Santa Claus, but as long as we keep in mind adoptive kids are not really 'family'. Once the terms is used for whatever friendship adopted a dog (and some people do call their dog - part of their 'family'), it can be used for anything, but does not stand for the same thing. That is not to say that sometimes friends are not more beneficial or caring than blood-related 'family'. Love can define relationships for us, ourselves, but that is not something that anyone can prove to anyone else. Get real.
Well SearchCz (
Here's another way to say it.
"Marriage is neither a conservative nor a liberal issue; it is a universal human institution, guaranteeing children fathers, and pointing men and women toward a special kind of socially as well as personally fruitful sexual relationship. Gay marriage is the final step down a long road America has already traveled toward deinstitutionalizing, denuding and privatizing marriage. It would set in legal stone some of the most destructive ideas of the sexual revolution: There are no differences between men and women that matter, marriage has nothing to do with procreation, children do not really need mothers and fathers, the diverse family forms adults choose are all equally good for children. What happens in my heart is that I know the difference. Don't confuse my people, who have been the victims of deliberate family destruction, by giving them another definition of marriage."
Walter Fauntroy-Former DC Delegate to CongressFounding member of the Congressional Black CaucusCoordinator for Martin Luther King, Jr.'s march on DC
Fitz,
Nice quote from a former Baptist pastor. I disagree with premise that granting equal marriage rights is confusing or destructive to families. Thanks for sharing it though!
SearchCz,I disagree with the premise that allowing relationships that are not opposite-sex to qualify as marriages should ever be characterized as "granting equal marriage rights".
The SSMer Is at a loss when it comes to supplying a substantive counter argument to the moral argument that same-sex sexual behavior is immoral.
Instead of offering a moral argument the SSMer retreats to a plea for moral neutrality. But where is the middle ground much less neutrality when there is no counter argument and no justification for balancing opposing arguments? Does not exist.
The best that the SSMer can do is demand that sexual morality be sidelined arbitrarily by force of governmental authority so as to neutrality ... politically ... the moral argument for which the SSMer has no substantive challenge.
The argument in favor of the core meaning of marriage does not rely on the moral argument that same-sex sexual behavior is immoral, however the SSMer's argumentation depends on the false equivalence between the nonmarriage of a brideless or groomless relationship and the union of husband and wife. So the SSMer emphasizes homosexed feelings and behavior ... and the gay identity group ... so as to bait marriage defenders to respond to those nonmarriage subjects.
When confronted forthrightly on those subjects the SSMer will cry foul. The game is to claim offense for even discussing the very thing upon which the SSM idea has been promoted by the SSM campaign. The homosexual emphasis is they want to talk about but they do not want marriage defenders to do so forthrightly. Do so and they feign hurt feelings and proceed to make ad hom attacks ... o at least excuse and encourage such personalized attacks.
Meanwhile the social institution of marriage has a core meaning that the SSMer rejects as unjustly discriminatory. That core: integration of the sexes, provision for responsible procreation, and these combined as a coherent whole. This is foundational to civil society.
The SSM idea is none of these things. It lacks coherency. Within a relationship that lacks one sex there is no sex equality much less unity of man and woman. There can be no bond of motherhood with fatherhood. No procreation without going outside the relationship. No sexual basis for a presumption of paternity nor of a default commitment to coparent. Instead SSM segregates by sex.
The supposedly big advantage of the SSM idea is that it integrates by sexual attraction but that is objectively false. The homosexual emphasis of the SSMer does NOT produce a law for SSM that would require same-sex sexual attraction. But what is the point of the emphasis on same-sex sexual attraction if that is not definitive of the type of relationship the SSMer advocates? The promotion of the false equivalence I mentioned earlier.
Well sex segregative types of relationships are not the moral nor the lawful nor the logical equivalent of the integrative relationship of husband and wife. It is also segregative by sexual attraction. The SSMer complains that the man woman criterion of marriage law is code to for discrimination based on sexual attraction. The SSMer will depend on the profoundly flawed racist analogy and yet it is the SSMer who promotes the segregative priority. Not only does SSM not integrate the sexes but it also segregates by attraction to the male sex and by attraction to the female sex. Marriage integrates man and woman and integrates sexual attraction to the male sex with sexual attraction to the female sex. The SSMers admits this whenever the complaint is made that the husband wife relationship is de facto heterosexual and the prototypical "same sex couple" is a homosexed relationship.
The affront to human dignity should be obvious when the reader examines the flaws in the rhetoric and argumentation of the SSMer. Even SSM argumentation turns on itself and destroys the homosexual emphasis that the SSMer cannot do without.
Pope Benedict could remove his papal cap and garments and his observation would still be authoritative correct because it is left uncountered by the SSMer.
The best the SSMer will do is to continue to recite yet more false equivalencies and ask questions that are premised on those false equivalencies.
An observation is correct because it is uncountered? That doesn't make any sense.
Gay people are humans, Chairm. Their dignity IS human dignity.
The Pope is correct in his assessment! Marriage and the family are God-ordained sacred institutions that is the foundation and fabric of society. No other union, no matter how much the claim that people are equal, can meet the criterion for marriage but heterosexual men and women. It is time that we put the nonsense of SSM to rest as at best, SSM unions are an abberation and worst perverted.
Chairm,
Excellent (and new to me) thoughts on the subject.
As everyone here probably knows---thanks to NOM---it's show time again in NJ, where my US Congressman recently joined the Democratic (majority) leadership of both the NJ Senate & Assembly at a press conference where SSM was established as priority #1 (i.e. bill S1 and A1, respectively)---my own district's openly 'gay' State Assemblyman being a Primary Sponsor.
In the last legislative session the same bill did not reach the Assembly, being defeated in the Senate, but now, prior Senate NO votes cast are no longer reliable, especially among scandal-ridden legislators. And this time, maybe the Assembly will vote first so as to place sufficient pressure on the Senate in order to exact an extremely thin victory-margin as occurred in New York State.
Gov. Cuomo proved that it doesn't take a 'gay' lapsed Catholic governor to join a hundred or so paranoid egomaniacs to undo thousands of years of common law and moral sense (or is that common sense and moral law?). We're expecting a veto by GOP Gov. Christie---I thank He Who Reigns for Christie's victory over scandal-ridden Corzine in 2011.
In the meantime, I'll keep praying that you'll keep philosophizing.
Praying for the Lord Jesus Christ to come back soon!! This world is sooooo screwed up! But, the Lord also tells us, " when you see all these things happening, Do not be discouraged, for I am with you"! GOD is in control as we know. For we are in the world, but NOT OF this world! Thank you Jesus!!!