Or maybe it has nothing to do with hate. Maybe it has to do with a genuine concern for the well-being of children .. even if you do not agree with what is best for children. Maybe it has to do with ideological integrity, with an unwillingness to compromise conviction in the face of public opinion.
Perhaps it would be better to be happy that we live in a country where there is still some freedom to refuse to participate when the state makes law what one believes is immoral.
In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
You know what badsede, you are actually ABANDONING traditional Catholic morality for a position that more resembles, in its moral idiocy, fundamentalist Islam or Protestantism.
Sure, you can say, if you really WANT to--and against all the evidence that's now in--that two homosexuals raising children will "warp" the children, making them "confused" about that all-so-sacred "complementariness" that the foolish, romantic and anti-scientific "Theology of the Body" of John Paul II has turned into a fetish in modern Catholicism--a SUBSTITUTE for the charity of the Gospels. But what you ABSOLUTELY CANNOT get around--just as those faithful Catholic objectors who resigned cannot get around it--is that leaving children cold, hungry, un-affirmed and un-adopted--literally, perhaps, out in the cold of a Boston winter--is a FAR MORE SERIOUS MORAL EVIL, consisting in a wholly unacceptable level of cruelty.
But there you are, defending it, trying to pretend that Jesus Christ would have defended it. Your "Catholic Christian morality" is an offense in the nostrils of God and His Son!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
you are actually ABANDONING traditional Catholic morality
When some of his disciples found his teaching, his moral teaching, too hard to accept, Jesus let them go rather than change it. I do not see how the refusal of a Catholic organization to participate in activities which Catholic teachings hold to be immoral can be a departure from this precedent.
and against all the evidence that's now in
Really? I haven't seen any such evidence, but I would be interested in seeing it. The only evidence that I have seen suggests the contrary .. does not prove, but only suggests, and that's the strongest I've seen.
romantic and anti-scientific "Theology of the Body" of John Paul II has turned into a fetish in modern Catholicism--a SUBSTITUTE for the charity of the Gospels.
Howso? You've made this claim many times, but I have never seen you explain it nor substantiate it. Have you read JPII's series of talks and books that make up the body of Theology of the Body?
As to the children, they are the true vicitms. The state has chosen the path of oppression, of stifling of religious freedom and personal conscience. It has decided to mandate morality, and in doing so has overstepped its bounds. It is shown itself incapable of providing for the parentless in its area, and is using the charitable drive of people as a means to force that morality upon them. The children are the vicitims, and the state is the perpetrator.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Would your stance change if this were a group of right-wing southern baptists refusing to allow catholics to adopt children based on similar religious objections?
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
No. I believe that they should have the right to act in accordance with their own morality and not be coerced into acceptance of a state-endorsed morality .. the fact that I may find that morality reprehensible does not matter. And I would still believe that the state should not be legislating morality.
Besides, it would be nothing new for Catholics in this country.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
The state legislates morality in many ways. Drug laws and prostitution laws are prime examples of legislating morality. Beyond that, even laws against rape and murder are based the moral standards that rape and murder are wrong. Non-discrimination laws may legislate morality, but in the same sense so does every other law.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
There's a difference between morality and justice. All unjust things are immoral, but not all immoral things are unjust. Laws against murder and rape safeguard a just society. They are an example of one of the primary roles of the state, to protect citizens from the aggression of other citizens.
What proof suggests that two homosexual men will raise warped children?
Religious affiliation should never be held a higher priority than the priorities of a secular state. understand you disagree with that. But this proof sounds suspicious.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
What proof suggests that two homosexual men will raise warped children?
Warped is quite the strong word. But the reality is that the studies that have been put forth to support the idea that there is no developmental impact on children of homosexual couples have been shown to be fundamentally flawed, suffering from methodology deficiencies that would not be tolerated in the rest of the scientific world. But they are being used as justification for revising the standards for appropriate situations in which to place adopted children. The state may be right, but it doesn't have the basis for the position besides politics.
Religious affiliation should never be held a higher priority than the priorities of a secular state.
You're right, I do disagree with that .. especially considering the war-mongering, civil rights denying, environment destroying priorities of the secular state in which I live.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
But the reality is that the studies that have been put forth to support the idea that there is no developmental impact on children of homosexual couples have been shown to be fundamentally flawed...
I would suspect that any study into solo parents, or parents that physically chastise or athiest parents would be found to be fundamentaly flawed. Since there does not seem to be any perfect way to raise a child. I have to admit, I am suspicious of these findings you speak of.
especially considering the war-mongering, civil rights denying, environment destroying priorities of the secular state in which I live.
If you are speaking about Umerika. Then I would question it as a secular state. On paper maybe. But I see no evidence of it being close to a secular state.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
I have to admit, I am suspicious of these findings you speak of.
The findings simply hold that the body of studies out there are, for the most part, methodologically flawed, suffering from small sample size, non-longitudinality, etc.
But I see no evidence of it being close to a secular state.
Then the question becomes even more pertinent as to why I should put it before my religious affiliation.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Are you suggesting that the state's anti-discrimination law is comparable to the conservative "war-mongering, civil rights denying, environment destroying" agenda?
The religious argument against homosexuality, rooted not in fact but in emotion, can only devolve into, and therefore always leads to, hyperbolic comparisons of this sort, meant ostensibly to show (since non-religious people "can't see for themselves") how 'destructive' homosexuality is...
I guess it's just hard for me to reconcile my experience of knowing many good and loving queer parents, with the kind of intolerance that would lead an organization to take its toys and go home like this.
John Paul II’s “Theology of the Body” may be “Gnostic and heretical,” according to this writer:
http://www.geocities.com/pharsea/SnakeOil.html
This is very interesting on Gary Wills’ criticisms of John Paul II. Please note the response of the Pole, who thinks it quite legitimate for a critic of th e late Pope to mention the role of his Polish ethnicity in describing his world-view:
This article presumes that “complementarity” is just “patriarchalism” and homophobia writ large, whereas I think it has mostly to do with anxiety to preserve the ecclesiastical power structure:
The pope upholds his particular view of the complementarity of the sexes (which he finds revealed in the Genesis creation narrative commanding procreation) and concludes that in the church there exists a female Marian principle (no ordination) that complements a male Petrine principle (ordination). Granted, John Paul II has made efforts to defend the goodness and sacredness of married heterosexuality in his prolific writings, but his insistence upon gender complementarity and the ban on contraception ensure that his teachings fail the needs of ordinary persons. The pope's romantic rhetoric is not received beyond a minority.
While Christian teachings and understanding of sexuality and gender have been evolving over the centuries, at this point we are caught in both an underestimation of the positive power of sexuality to engender love, unity and transformation in committed couples, and an overestimation of the moral, psychosocial and theological significance of gender identity (mostly female). [I personally attribute this to the late Pope’s exaggerated and unnecessarily anti-ecumenist cult of the VIRGIN Mary.] These inadequacies are systemically interrelated and thwart change. Authorities fear that if the ban on contraception and procreative gender complementarity is relaxed, then the way is opened to homosexual unions, which would further threaten gender complementarity, which in turn would threaten the ban on women's ordination, and so on.
I should hasten to add, though, that I believe that the late Pope is to be given a great deal of credit for BEGINNING this re-visiting of traditional Catholic sexual morality. Although I believe his teachings are “half-baked” regarding gender roles and identity (“complementarity” being too narrow an understanding of the impact of gender on affectivity and identity, and also too narrow an image of God’s or even Jesus’ nature), I also believe that, in the fullness of time, a more mature, charitable and civilized attitude toward same-sex and transgendered love WILL arise.
We could actually start with a more historically accurate understanding of the encounter between Jesus and a centurion who wanted his catamite-slave (as all in the crowd of 1st-century Roman subjects would have understood the nature of that relationship) to be cured and who reached the Saviour’s heart with his plea and his gentle, trusting "queer" faith.
(Reply to this) (Parent)
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Are you suggesting that the state's anti-discrimination law is comparable to the conservative "war-mongering, civil rights denying, environment destroying" agenda?
No, I am saying that this state has provided me with no basis to put it, nor its values, ahead of my religious affiliations. Any use of the state for the determination of "right" and "wrong" has to deal with the fundamentally flawed nature of our state.
The religious argument against homosexuality, rooted not in fact but in emotion, can only devolve into, and therefore always leads to, hyperbolic comparisons of this sort, meant ostensibly to show (since non-religious people "can't see for themselves") how 'destructive' homosexuality is...
But you have missed the point that I was actually making...
I guess it's just hard for me to reconcile my experience of knowing many good and loving queer parents
I grew up in a broken home, but that did not change the fact that I grew up in a loving home with good parenting. But that fact doesn't change the detrimental developmental effect that it had on me either.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
The Catholic Church Hates Gays… Posted by DAN SAVAGE at 12:09 PM
…more than it loves babies. From the Chicago Sun-Times:
The Boston Archdiocese’s Catholic Charities said Friday it would stop providing adoption services because of a state law allowing gays and lesbians to adopt…
The state’s four Catholic bishops said earlier this month that the law threatens the church’s religious freedom by forcing it to do something it considers immoral.
Here’s the really telling part: Catholic Charities 42-member board voted unanimously in December to consider gay households for adoptions. So it wasn’t lay Catholics who had a problem with gay couples adopting children, but the bishops—all conservatives, all appointed by Rome, all out of touch. And all hurting children.
When it comes to adoption, religious conservatives want us to believe that straight couples are clamoring to adopt children who are being adopted by gay couples. That’s a lie—there are more children waiting to be adopted than there are couples (or singles) willing to adopt them. Often gay couples are willing to adopt children that straight couples are not—older children, handicapped children, children with HIV, mixed-race children. So the choice isn’t between gay parents and straight parents, but between parents and no parents.
Or to put in terms the bishops can understand: if you don’t also allow gay couples to adopt children, you’re leaving a lot of kids in limbo.
And, finally, the ultimate irony: This is the Catholic Church in freaking Boston, epicenter of the sex-abuse scandal. The same bishops who refused to protect children from rampaging pedophile priests are now “protecting” children from qualified, screened, and thoroughly vetted adoptive parents who happen to be gay.
The decision by Boston's Catholic Charities to give up all adoption services because of being required by the Vatican to break state law and refuse any and all gay adopters is one of the saddest things I've heard about in a long time. A reader comments from a particular perspective:
"I was raised Catholic, but, incidentally, I'm also adopted from South Korea through none other than Catholic Charities. I would have grown up in an orphanage in Korea, as that used to be the solution to children like me who were born out of wedlock, except that my biological mother decided to put me up for adoption. Her one specific request, and I feel it's an important and notable one, given the circumstances, was that I was to be raised Catholic. I'm not entirely sure why, but I'd like to think it was because of how they treated her and their reputation, both of which are sterling in terms of adoption.
My Mom's Irish and my Dad's Italian-Lithuanian and a career military doctor, so I would have to say that I feel as American as anyone else and, for all the trouble I've had with my faith, especially in recent times with all of the Church's misguided decisions, pronouncements, and corruption, I still long to actually and truly believe. But, to hear this, even though I have not grown up in a homosexual family, tells me that clearly the Church's priorities are so skewed, if not outright bankrupt, that I almost feel inclined to pursue a different branch of Christianity. It seems inconceivable that this is their excuse to dismantle such an important part of Catholic Charities, and, for a student currently studying abroad like me, it is just another push in the long chain of events that give me great misgivings about the Church, especially in America, and about our treatment of homosexuals."
…I've said it before, but I'll say it again: one day the Church will apologize to gay people for the wounds it has inflicted on their souls and psyches. Not in my lifetime, perhaps. But one day. And now, they're punishing children to maintain their doctrinal purity. May God forgive them.
http://time.blogs.com/daily_dish/
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Dan Savage and Andrew Sullivan. I asked for the proof that you claim exists and you give me politicos. All you have done is demonstrate that the state's policy is based on opinion.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
I rather agree with you on this aspect. I think this was done with a fair amount of class. Myself being a lesbian parent, I do believe the Catholic Church's stance to be rather uninformed. But rather than throw stones and cause an uproar, they made their decision, advised the affected parties of the timeframe involved, and are making an organized withdrawal from the sphere where their rules do not mesh with the legal requirements involved.
I could argue the evils of the Catholic Church (as opposed to ideal Christianity, which is a durned good thing) all day long. But this was handled by them as well as it could have been, I think. Kudos to them.
"Myself being a lesbian parent, I do believe the Catholic Church's stance to be rather uninformed. But rather than throw stones and cause an uproar..."
Thanks for this.
I think a major problem with contextualizing disagreement as the other party being corrupt monsters is that it limits relations to the mutual opposition of force. Arguably, this has been the problem to begin with -- in almost any issue. When disagreement is contextualized as both parties having the capacity for sense and the desire for good, relations are not so limited, and communications of facts, ideas, arguments, and so on are possible.
With this in mind, it seems that, if people want others to change their position, they can either take the first route, become more powerful than the others, and force them to; or take the second route and not need to be more powerful or coercive. Of course, there are problems with the second route as well.
There is no evidence that queer parents are bad for children (as a matter of fact the American Academy of Pediatricians has concluded otherwise), so this is an action rooted not in "what is best for children," but in ideological narrowmindedness. Was this decision made after interviewing gay and lesbian parents and the children they have raised, or are raising? Somehow i doubt it... in fact i doubt that gay and lesbian voices matter at all to the Catholic Church.
So you define as hateful the act to refuse to participate in activity that one finds morally objectionable?
The article you reference is about the effect of the lack of stability caused by parents lacking official recognition, not about the children of homosexual parents in general. But the studies of the sort to which the AAP referred have come under heavy fire as of late. For example, a study out of USC specifically looked at the body of research that had been done and found that the studies generally asked questions of their data that would lead to a specific conclusion, rather than allowing the data to lead to conclusions. But when different questions were asked of the same data - for example, not just about sexual orientation - the image that emerged was much different. Further, it was found that many of the studies were commissioned specifically for political reasons, and in that way are no different than those commissioned by fundamentalist Christians trying to manipulate science to prove their side. It doesn't prove that the conclusion is wrong, but it does prove that the it has not been proven that the conclusion is right, as has been touted by people engaging in the issue as a political rather than a developmental one.
No, i define as hateful the decision to stop doing good and necessary work because of the organization's intolerance towards a small segment of society (and therefore a small segment of the families applying for adoption). The organization is taking its toys and going home, thereby punishing families heterosexual and homosexual alike, and forcing the state to find other ways to link children who need homes to eager adoptive parents... this is an intensely immature reaction.
Why the absolute unwillingness on the part of the church to investigate it's own position and consider that maybe on this they're wrong? After all, the church requests reflection and re-consideration on the part of those with whom it disagrees.
You can try to couch it as "refus[ing] to participate in activity that one finds morally objectionable" but in doing so you have to overlook the greater wrong that is being committed here.
Let me demonstrate my point from another angle. Suppose you are trying to toss food to sheep, but among the sheep there are a few goats who occasionally get the food instead. If you don't want the goats to get the food, are you going to stop tossing food out there altogether? Sure, you've succeeded in keeping goats from getting the food, but at the cost of starving the sheep too.
So I suppose you would say the same to a pacifist who refuses to file as conscientious objector to avoid a draft?
You disagree with Catholicism on this issue. That's fine. But their position has not been disproven, so I don't see how anyone could expect them to abandon it just in order to play the state's game. One of the core messages of Jesus was not to be a hypocrite, and participating in actions contrary to their morality is hypocricy.
The state has made doing this good contingent on being unfaithful to Catholic teaching. This is no different than the law that required that taking political office depend on denying transubstantiation. Considering that there is more need than Catholic Charities can fill, it has decided to focus instead on the good that it can do without compromising its Catholicism.
Your analogy shows how you are approaching the issue completely differently that Catholicism is. Your focus is on the goats, but in the analogy, the thing that would most closely align with what Catholicism is concerned for is the food. And you have just demonstrated my whole point. The state is acting based on political concern for the potential adopters and not for the children.
The state is acting based on political concern for the potential adopters and not for the children.
Let's stop pretending that this has anything to do with the welfare of the children. If the Catholic Church cared so much about the welfare of Children, why did they turn a blind eye pedophile priests for decades (and probably much longer), shifting them from parish to parish instead of actually dealing with their abuses of children. The Catholic Church's issue with gay and lesbian couples adopting children isn't about child welfare at all, it is simply about political agenda.
So I suppose you would say the same to a pacifist who refuses to file as conscientious objector to avoid a draft?
Apples and oranges. Catholic Charities of Boston is not being conscripted to kill people.
Considering that there is more need than Catholic Charities can fill, it has decided to focus instead on the good that it can do without compromising its Catholicism.
That speaks to my point precisely. You say their concern is for the children, but is it not "compromising their Catholicism" to stop doing this work altogether? Children are going to suffer because of this, and i submit that this is a significantly greater evil than adopting a few of them to (thoroughly checked out) couples who happen to be gay.
Since the research on this topic is at worst inconclusive, meaning that there is no positive evidence of detrimental effect, the CCB's refusal to compromise or to at least engage in dialogue, demonstrates bald-faced bigotry.
In a statement, the seven board members said they were "deeply troubled" by the bishops' request, and said it "undermines our moral priority of helping vulnerable children find loving homes.
"We also cannot participate in an effort to pursue legal permission to discriminate against Massachusetts citizens who want to play a part in building strong families," the statement read.
"The course the Bishops have charted threatens the very essence of our Christian mission. For the sake of the poor we serve, we pray they will reconsider." [emphasis added]
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sophiaserpentia) wrote2006-03-11 01:24 pm
no subject
Perhaps it would be better to be happy that we live in a country where there is still some freedom to refuse to participate when the state makes law what one believes is immoral.
In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Sure, you can say, if you really WANT to--and against all the evidence that's now in--that two homosexuals raising children will "warp" the children, making them "confused" about that all-so-sacred "complementariness" that the foolish, romantic and anti-scientific "Theology of the Body" of John Paul II has turned into a fetish in modern Catholicism--a SUBSTITUTE for the charity of the Gospels. But what you ABSOLUTELY CANNOT get around--just as those faithful Catholic objectors who resigned cannot get around it--is that leaving children cold, hungry, un-affirmed and un-adopted--literally, perhaps, out in the cold of a Boston winter--is a FAR MORE SERIOUS MORAL EVIL, consisting in a wholly unacceptable level of cruelty.
But there you are, defending it, trying to pretend that Jesus Christ would have defended it. Your "Catholic Christian morality" is an offense in the nostrils of God and His Son!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
When some of his disciples found his teaching, his moral teaching, too hard to accept, Jesus let them go rather than change it. I do not see how the refusal of a Catholic organization to participate in activities which Catholic teachings hold to be immoral can be a departure from this precedent.
and against all the evidence that's now in
Really? I haven't seen any such evidence, but I would be interested in seeing it. The only evidence that I have seen suggests the contrary .. does not prove, but only suggests, and that's the strongest I've seen.
romantic and anti-scientific "Theology of the Body" of John Paul II has turned into a fetish in modern Catholicism--a SUBSTITUTE for the charity of the Gospels.
Howso? You've made this claim many times, but I have never seen you explain it nor substantiate it. Have you read JPII's series of talks and books that make up the body of Theology of the Body?
As to the children, they are the true vicitms. The state has chosen the path of oppression, of stifling of religious freedom and personal conscience. It has decided to mandate morality, and in doing so has overstepped its bounds. It is shown itself incapable of providing for the parentless in its area, and is using the charitable drive of people as a means to force that morality upon them. The children are the vicitims, and the state is the perpetrator.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Besides, it would be nothing new for Catholics in this country.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Religious affiliation should never be held a higher priority than the priorities of a secular state. understand you disagree with that. But this proof sounds suspicious.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Warped is quite the strong word. But the reality is that the studies that have been put forth to support the idea that there is no developmental impact on children of homosexual couples have been shown to be fundamentally flawed, suffering from methodology deficiencies that would not be tolerated in the rest of the scientific world. But they are being used as justification for revising the standards for appropriate situations in which to place adopted children. The state may be right, but it doesn't have the basis for the position besides politics.
Religious affiliation should never be held a higher priority than the priorities of a secular state.
You're right, I do disagree with that .. especially considering the war-mongering, civil rights denying, environment destroying priorities of the secular state in which I live.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
I would suspect that any study into solo parents, or parents that physically chastise or athiest parents would be found to be fundamentaly flawed. Since there does not seem to be any perfect way to raise a child. I have to admit, I am suspicious of these findings you speak of.
especially considering the war-mongering, civil rights denying, environment destroying priorities of the secular state in which I live.
If you are speaking about Umerika. Then I would question it as a secular state. On paper maybe. But I see no evidence of it being close to a secular state.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
The findings simply hold that the body of studies out there are, for the most part, methodologically flawed, suffering from small sample size, non-longitudinality, etc.
But I see no evidence of it being close to a secular state.
Then the question becomes even more pertinent as to why I should put it before my religious affiliation.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
The religious argument against homosexuality, rooted not in fact but in emotion, can only devolve into, and therefore always leads to, hyperbolic comparisons of this sort, meant ostensibly to show (since non-religious people "can't see for themselves") how 'destructive' homosexuality is...
I guess it's just hard for me to reconcile my experience of knowing many good and loving queer parents, with the kind of intolerance that would lead an organization to take its toys and go home like this.
For Your Greater Edification...
The legacy of John Paul II’s “Theology of the Body,” which this writer sees as a “stunted teaching”:
http://ncronline.org/NCR_Online/archives/032103/032103q.htm
John Paul II’s “Theology of the Body” may be “Gnostic and heretical,” according to this writer:
http://www.geocities.com/pharsea/SnakeOil.html
This is very interesting on Gary Wills’ criticisms of John Paul II. Please note the response of the Pole, who thinks it quite legitimate for a critic of th e late Pope to mention the role of his Polish ethnicity in describing his world-view:
http://www.therevealer.org/archives/daily_000267.php
This article presumes that “complementarity” is just “patriarchalism” and homophobia writ large, whereas I think it has mostly to do with anxiety to preserve the ecclesiastical power structure:
The pope upholds his particular view of the complementarity of the sexes (which he finds revealed in the Genesis creation narrative commanding procreation) and concludes that in the church there exists a female Marian principle (no ordination) that complements a male Petrine principle (ordination). Granted, John Paul II has made efforts to defend the goodness and sacredness of married heterosexuality in his prolific writings, but his insistence upon gender complementarity and the ban on contraception ensure that his teachings fail the needs of ordinary persons. The pope's romantic rhetoric is not received beyond a minority.
While Christian teachings and understanding of sexuality and gender have been evolving over the centuries, at this point we are caught in both an underestimation of the positive power of sexuality to engender love, unity and transformation in committed couples, and an overestimation of the moral, psychosocial and theological significance of gender identity (mostly female). [I personally attribute this to the late Pope’s exaggerated and unnecessarily anti-ecumenist cult of the VIRGIN Mary.] These inadequacies are systemically interrelated and thwart change. Authorities fear that if the ban on contraception and procreative gender complementarity is relaxed, then the way is opened to homosexual unions, which would further threaten gender complementarity, which in turn would threaten the ban on women's ordination, and so on.
http://www.bishop-accountability.org/news2003_01_06/2003_03_21_Callahan_StuntedTeaching.htm
Luke Timothy Johnson on American Catholicism and on the “Theology of the Body”:
http://www.catholicsinpublicsquare.org/papers/fall2001commonweal/johnsonpaper/johnsonpaper.htm
http://www.commonwealmagazine.org/article.php?id_article=200
I should hasten to add, though, that I believe that the late Pope is to be given a great deal of credit for BEGINNING this re-visiting of traditional Catholic sexual morality. Although I believe his teachings are “half-baked” regarding gender roles and identity (“complementarity” being too narrow an understanding of the impact of gender on affectivity and identity, and also too narrow an image of God’s or even Jesus’ nature), I also believe that, in the fullness of time, a more mature, charitable and civilized attitude toward same-sex and transgendered love WILL arise.
We could actually start with a more historically accurate understanding of the encounter between Jesus and a centurion who wanted his catamite-slave (as all in the crowd of 1st-century Roman subjects would have understood the nature of that relationship) to be cured and who reached the Saviour’s heart with his plea and his gentle, trusting "queer" faith.
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Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
No, I am saying that this state has provided me with no basis to put it, nor its values, ahead of my religious affiliations. Any use of the state for the determination of "right" and "wrong" has to deal with the fundamentally flawed nature of our state.
The religious argument against homosexuality, rooted not in fact but in emotion, can only devolve into, and therefore always leads to, hyperbolic comparisons of this sort, meant ostensibly to show (since non-religious people "can't see for themselves") how 'destructive' homosexuality is...
But you have missed the point that I was actually making...
I guess it's just hard for me to reconcile my experience of knowing many good and loving queer parents
I grew up in a broken home, but that did not change the fact that I grew up in a loving home with good parenting. But that fact doesn't change the detrimental developmental effect that it had on me either.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Posted by DAN SAVAGE at 12:09 PM
…more than it loves babies. From the Chicago Sun-Times:
The Boston Archdiocese’s Catholic Charities said Friday it would stop providing adoption services because of a state law allowing gays and lesbians to adopt…
The state’s four Catholic bishops said earlier this month that the law threatens the church’s religious freedom by forcing it to do something it considers immoral.
Here’s the really telling part: Catholic Charities 42-member board voted unanimously in December to consider gay households for adoptions. So it wasn’t lay Catholics who had a problem with gay couples adopting children, but the bishops—all conservatives, all appointed by Rome, all out of touch.
And all hurting children.
When it comes to adoption, religious conservatives want us to believe that straight couples are clamoring to adopt children who are being adopted by gay couples. That’s a lie—there are more children waiting to be adopted than there are couples (or singles) willing to adopt them. Often gay couples are willing to adopt children that straight couples are not—older children, handicapped children, children with HIV, mixed-race children. So the choice isn’t between gay parents and straight parents, but between parents and no parents.
Or to put in terms the bishops can understand: if you don’t also allow gay couples to adopt children, you’re leaving a lot of kids in limbo.
And, finally, the ultimate irony: This is the Catholic Church in freaking Boston, epicenter of the sex-abuse scandal. The same bishops who refused to protect children from rampaging pedophile priests are now “protecting” children from qualified, screened, and thoroughly vetted adoptive parents who happen to be gay.
http://www.thestranger.com/blog/archives/2006/03/05-11.php#a004755
And so is Andrew Sullivan:
The decision by Boston's Catholic Charities to give up all adoption services because of being required by the Vatican to break state law and refuse any and all gay adopters is one of the saddest things I've heard about in a long time. A reader comments from a particular perspective:
"I was raised Catholic, but, incidentally, I'm also adopted from South Korea through none other than Catholic Charities. I would have grown up in an orphanage in Korea, as that used to be the solution to children like me who were born out of wedlock, except that my biological mother decided to put me up for adoption. Her one specific request, and I feel it's an important and notable one, given the circumstances, was that I was to be raised Catholic. I'm not entirely sure why, but I'd like to think it was because of how they treated her and their reputation, both of which are sterling in terms of adoption.
My Mom's Irish and my Dad's Italian-Lithuanian and a career military doctor, so I would have to say that I feel as American as anyone else and, for all the trouble I've had with my faith, especially in recent times with all of the Church's misguided decisions, pronouncements, and corruption, I still long to actually and truly believe. But, to hear this, even though I have not grown up in a homosexual family, tells me that clearly the Church's priorities are so skewed, if not outright bankrupt, that I almost feel inclined to pursue a different branch of Christianity. It seems inconceivable that this is their excuse to dismantle such an important part of Catholic Charities, and, for a student currently studying abroad like me, it is just another push in the long chain of events that give me great misgivings about the Church, especially in America, and about our treatment of homosexuals."
…I've said it before, but I'll say it again: one day the Church will apologize to gay people for the wounds it has inflicted on their souls and psyches. Not in my lifetime, perhaps. But one day. And now, they're punishing children to maintain their doctrinal purity. May God forgive them.
http://time.blogs.com/daily_dish/
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
I never claimed to give you "proof" that the Church's policy was immoral and unnecessarily cruel. That's self-evident, to any but moral idiots.
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
Re: In Your Defensiveness, You're Becoming a Proponent of OBVIOUSLY "Un-Christian" Cruelty!
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I could argue the evils of the Catholic Church (as opposed to ideal Christianity, which is a durned good thing) all day long. But this was handled by them as well as it could have been, I think. Kudos to them.
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Thanks for this.
I think a major problem with contextualizing disagreement as the other party being corrupt monsters is that it limits relations to the mutual opposition of force. Arguably, this has been the problem to begin with -- in almost any issue. When disagreement is contextualized as both parties having the capacity for sense and the desire for good, relations are not so limited, and communications of facts, ideas, arguments, and so on are possible.
With this in mind, it seems that, if people want others to change their position, they can either take the first route, become more powerful than the others, and force them to; or take the second route and not need to be more powerful or coercive. Of course, there are problems with the second route as well.
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There is no evidence that queer parents are bad for children (as a matter of fact the American Academy of Pediatricians has concluded otherwise), so this is an action rooted not in "what is best for children," but in ideological narrowmindedness. Was this decision made after interviewing gay and lesbian parents and the children they have raised, or are raising? Somehow i doubt it... in fact i doubt that gay and lesbian voices matter at all to the Catholic Church.
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The article you reference is about the effect of the lack of stability caused by parents lacking official recognition, not about the children of homosexual parents in general. But the studies of the sort to which the AAP referred have come under heavy fire as of late. For example, a study out of USC specifically looked at the body of research that had been done and found that the studies generally asked questions of their data that would lead to a specific conclusion, rather than allowing the data to lead to conclusions. But when different questions were asked of the same data - for example, not just about sexual orientation - the image that emerged was much different. Further, it was found that many of the studies were commissioned specifically for political reasons, and in that way are no different than those commissioned by fundamentalist Christians trying to manipulate science to prove their side. It doesn't prove that the conclusion is wrong, but it does prove that the it has not been proven that the conclusion is right, as has been touted by people engaging in the issue as a political rather than a developmental one.
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Why the absolute unwillingness on the part of the church to investigate it's own position and consider that maybe on this they're wrong? After all, the church requests reflection and re-consideration on the part of those with whom it disagrees.
You can try to couch it as "refus[ing] to participate in activity that one finds morally objectionable" but in doing so you have to overlook the greater wrong that is being committed here.
Let me demonstrate my point from another angle. Suppose you are trying to toss food to sheep, but among the sheep there are a few goats who occasionally get the food instead. If you don't want the goats to get the food, are you going to stop tossing food out there altogether? Sure, you've succeeded in keeping goats from getting the food, but at the cost of starving the sheep too.
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So I suppose you would say the same to a pacifist who refuses to file as conscientious objector to avoid a draft?
You disagree with Catholicism on this issue. That's fine. But their position has not been disproven, so I don't see how anyone could expect them to abandon it just in order to play the state's game. One of the core messages of Jesus was not to be a hypocrite, and participating in actions contrary to their morality is hypocricy.
The state has made doing this good contingent on being unfaithful to Catholic teaching. This is no different than the law that required that taking political office depend on denying transubstantiation. Considering that there is more need than Catholic Charities can fill, it has decided to focus instead on the good that it can do without compromising its Catholicism.
Your analogy shows how you are approaching the issue completely differently that Catholicism is. Your focus is on the goats, but in the analogy, the thing that would most closely align with what Catholicism is concerned for is the food. And you have just demonstrated my whole point. The state is acting based on political concern for the potential adopters and not for the children.
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Let's stop pretending that this has anything to do with the welfare of the children. If the Catholic Church cared so much about the welfare of Children, why did they turn a blind eye pedophile priests for decades (and probably much longer), shifting them from parish to parish instead of actually dealing with their abuses of children. The Catholic Church's issue with gay and lesbian couples adopting children isn't about child welfare at all, it is simply about political agenda.
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Bait and Switch, Bait and Switch...
Re: Bait and Switch, Bait and Switch...
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Apples and oranges. Catholic Charities of Boston is not being conscripted to kill people.
Considering that there is more need than Catholic Charities can fill, it has decided to focus instead on the good that it can do without compromising its Catholicism.
That speaks to my point precisely. You say their concern is for the children, but is it not "compromising their Catholicism" to stop doing this work altogether? Children are going to suffer because of this, and i submit that this is a significantly greater evil than adopting a few of them to (thoroughly checked out) couples who happen to be gay.
Since the research on this topic is at worst inconclusive, meaning that there is no positive evidence of detrimental effect, the CCB's refusal to compromise or to at least engage in dialogue, demonstrates bald-faced bigotry.
Seven members of CCB's board disagree with this decision and resigned in protest, stating pretty much what i have:
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Amen, Sister!