USCCB on Supreme Court Decision: "Tragic Day for Marriage and Our Nation"

James Martin, S.J.June 26, 2013

From the US Conference of Catholic Bishops.

SUPREME COURT DECISIONS ON MARRIAGE: ‘TRAGIC DAY FOR MARRIAGE AND OUR NATION,’ STATE U.S. BISHOPS

WASHINGTON—The U.S. Supreme Court decisions June 26 striking down part of the Defense of Marriage Act and refusing to rule on the merits of a challenge to California’s Proposition 8 mark a “tragic day for marriage and our nation,” said Cardinal Timothy Dolan of New York, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco, chair of the U.S. bishops’ Subcommittee for the Promotion and Defense of Marriage.

The statement follows.

“Today is a tragic day for marriage and our nation. The Supreme Court has dealt a profound injustice to the American people by striking down in part the federal Defense of Marriage Act. The Court got it wrong. The federal government ought to respect the truth that marriage is the union of one man and one woman, even where states fail to do so. The preservation of liberty and justice requires that all laws, federal and state, respect the truth, including the truth about marriage. It is also unfortunate that the Court did not take the opportunity to uphold California’s Proposition 8 but instead decided not to rule on the matter. The common good of all, especially our children, depends upon a society that strives to uphold the truth of marriage. Now is the time to redouble our efforts in witness to this truth.

These decisions are part of a public debate of great consequence. The future of marriage and the well-being of our society hang in the balance.

“Marriage is the only institution that brings together a man and a woman for life, providing any child who comes from their union with the secure foundation of a mother and a father.

“Our culture has taken for granted for far too long what human nature, experience, common sense, and God’s wise design all confirm: the difference between a man and a woman matters, and the difference between a mom and a dad matters. While the culture has failed in many ways to be marriage-strengthening, this is no reason to give up. Now is the time to strengthen marriage, not redefine it.

“When Jesus taught about the meaning of marriage – the lifelong, exclusive union of husband and wife – he pointed back to “the beginning” of God’s creation of the human person as male and female (see Matthew 19). In the face of the customs and laws of his time, Jesus taught an unpopular truth that everyone could understand. The truth of marriage endures, and we will continue to boldly proclaim it with confidence and charity.

“Now that the Supreme Court has issued its decisions, with renewed purpose we call upon all of our leaders and the people of this good nation to stand steadfastly together in promoting and defending the unique meaning of marriage: one man, one woman, for life. We also ask for prayers as the Court’s decisions are reviewed and their implications further clarified.”

Editors: Background information can be found at http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/marriage-and-family/marriage/promotion-and-defense-of-marriage/backgrounder-on-proposition-8-and-doma.cfm

Comments are automatically closed two weeks after an article's initial publication. See our comments policy for more.

Chris NUNEZ

11 years 4 months ago

Sadly, Cardinal Dolan's human anthropology is wrong. Surely there must be cultural anthropologists among the many theologians in the Church. The cardinal and as many bishops as desire to can repeat this opinion which lacks substance all they want, it still doesn't make it truth.

Kevin Mallon

11 years 4 months ago

A question for Cardinal Dolan: Why is it that "The federal government ought to respect the truth that marriage is the union of one man and one woman" when David and Solomon both had dozens of wives/concubines, and we know that God loved and favored them deeply and they held true to all his laws?

Vincent Gaitley

11 years 4 months ago

David and Solomon, God bless them, weren't Catholics. And under these rulings today the limit on the number of spouses has no rational basis either. We're all Gay Mormons now.

G Miller

11 years 4 months ago

Mr Gaitley, I resent you using the term "gay" in the context you are using it in. It smacks of someone using the "N" word. Clean up your bigoted language and educate yourself on the realities that gay and straight biologies are different. You are allegedly Christian but you don't speak like Jesus, you speak like a redneck.

Vincent Gaitley

11 years 4 months ago

Mr/Ms Miller: I didn't notice your nasty remarks until now. And you didn't notice my remarks above in other places. I don't care a wit about gay marriage, but I do care about the law and the behavior of the Supreme Court. My language was not bigoted just for using "Gay Mormons" as a pun (that you missed) on the matter of polygamy among some happy Mormons. Gay is not the exclusive word of the homosexual community, and I have something you evidently lack, a devilish sense of humor. By the way, I am not morally obligated to be a cheerleader for gays, and failing so doesn't make me a bigot, thank you. As for your other allegations, well, when I use the 'N' word, I say be Nice.

Jim McCrea

11 years 4 months ago

Vincent: I'll let you in on a little secret ... but don't tell anyone else. When David and Solomon were around, there were NO Catholics anywhere. Things have gone downhill ever since, though.

Katherine S

11 years 4 months ago

"The preservation of liberty and justice requires that all laws, federal and state, respect the truth, including the truth about marriage." When there is a truth that is recognized by the Catholic Church but not recognized by society in general, the State must conform its laws to Catholic truth in order to preseve liberty?

Jerry Reiter

11 years 4 months ago

Praise God that I can now marry the person I love in my own home church and have it legal in our own state of California. We tell naysayers we are just people planning our wedding. Wish us well, not ill. We are happy. And we will be able to have the federal rights and benefits now that every other citizen already has. We just want to spend the rest of our lives loving the Lord and one another. Some don't agree. So what? We don't comment on your marriage, so please stop with all the vicious attacks. Cruelty is not Christ's way. May God bless us all.

Vincent Gaitley

11 years 4 months ago

You were always free to marry. You had to marry a woman, and gay women had the freedom to marry men. Your rights were not injured at all. Nobody has unfettered "rights" in marriage in any state, now or ever. One man can not marry his sister at any age (removing the state interest in healthy childbearing--a hoax anyway). No brother can marry brother; Mom and Dad are off limits, as are the Gramps. Cousins? Some are marriage material, others not--unless you're royal--no worries there. And are the mentally deficient marriage eligible? And what of polygamy and its ilk. If like can marry like, what court dares limit by number? None of these matters has been addressed in this rush to the marriage clerk. If I were a state legislator, I'd likely vote for gay marriage, but I'd want a statute that makes clear that marriage is a contractual state, not a "right", and therefore can be regulated. The above instances of taboo incest are the last taboos. Fifty years ago gayness was equally repugnant, so before you snicker at these unmentioned limits on marriage...

Tom Wilson

11 years 4 months ago

For what it's worth, the Court did not redefine marriage, it only confirmed that states can define marriage however they wish and that to the extent that a state has redefined marriage to include homosexual couples (and, presumably, any number of persons and any close relatives), then the federal government must provide the same benefits it provides to all married persons. Does anyone believe that a male-male couple or a female-female couple is the same as a male-female couple? That the fact that only a man and a woman can create new life, that only a man and a woman can provide a child a mother and a father is unworthy of special distinction in our society? Because if you believe that, then you believe that there is no difference between men and women. And if you do believe that, then you have to ask the question why God created two sexes and didn't just allow all of us to reproduce in any pairing or even individually. Look, if two people want federal benefits like social security and inheritance rights for convenience, I understand that. But to go from that to saying that all such pairs of people should be called "married" ignores the reality of the differences between man and woman and the value that male-female unions provide to children and to society that other couplings (or more) cannot provide. It's the creation of a false equality at the expense of society's perception of marriage. The notion that same-sex couples are the same a male-female couples is a joke.

Thomas Rooney OFS

11 years 4 months ago

Greetings, Tom! You understand that "if 2 people want federal benefits like social security and inheritance rights for convenience, they should have it." I have a question to follow that; What federal benefits should married people enjoy, from which commited homosexual life partners specifically should be excluded? Everyone knows a man is a man and a woman is a woman, and only a male-female couple can create life. Naturally. LEGALLY what ought the difference be, person to person...or couple to couple for that matter?

Tom Wilson

11 years 4 months ago

Hello Thomas - What are the legal differences between men and women? And if the answer is "none," which arguably, it should be, then should not a woman be able to sue for the right to be called a man? Federal benefits are but one aspect of the institution of marriage and its impact on society. We call women "women" because society recognizes that women are different from men in many aspects other than their rights in the workplace, their rights to equal pay, their right to vote, etc... Likewise, when we speak of marriage, we recognize that the parties of two different sexes are potential creators of new life (with some infertile exceptions to that rule). And that's a big deal for society, because marriage assigns responsibility for raising those children to the spouses, the only two people who can give that child a mother and a father. And we not only believe that the raising of children by their moms and dads is a worthy ideal, there is scientific literature that proves as much. So, taking that word "marriage" and assigning it to couples who inherently can never procreate says to society, "You know how people used to believe that men and women should form a lifelong union before having kids? Well, that's not the case anymore and the law affirmed as much when it held that homosexual unions are marriages too." And there's even evidence in countries where homosexual "marriage" exists that shows a drop in marriage rates and more children born out of wedlock. Our law has bent a lot to assimilate homosexuals into a heterosexual world, even allowing adoptions by homosexual couples in imitation of heterosexual couples. But at a certain point, a society has to stop and say, "Wait. We've gone so far in trying to promote acceptance of homosexuals that we're ignoring important distinctions that hold value to our society, e.g., that encouraging moms and dads to raise their kids in a lifelong union is something special that homosexual couples can never do." We have a big illegitimacy problem in this country, and toying with what has been ostensibly a union for procreation and codifying it as a non-procreative union is a big gamble. The better thing for society would have been for the Court to conclude that marriage is a procreative institution that promotes responsible parenting and unified families, and that liberal notions of such things as unregulated sex and no-fault divorce have chipped away at society's perception of marriage in a way that has led to countless children growing up without moms and dads and high poverty rates for single moms and their children. Homosexual "marriage" would further denigrate marriage and thwart the ideal of unifying moms and dads and their offspring.

Thomas Rooney OFS

11 years 4 months ago

Thanks for the reply - Some points - "And if the answer is "none," which arguably, it should be, then should not a woman be able to sue for the right to be called a man?" Since we agree there is no legal difference between a woman and a man as a person, I think it would be pretty silly to sue for rights to be called one or the other. My marriage of 17 years to my wife is not denigrated...not one iota...by my cousins' decision to get married to her girlfriend of 5+ years. My marriage is far more denigrated by heterosexual couples who take vows before Church and/or state and throw it on the garbage heap when it doesn't suit them any longer...children or no children. Allowing people who are TRULY committed to each other, able to provide for unwanted children we so vigorously and rightly defend in the womb (yes I am ALL for homosexual adoption rights as well), the legal, familial, and financial rights of marriage, is moral and equitable. You say marriage has been a union for procreation, primarily. I agree. It has also been a union for settling family disputes, protecting family assets, and as political salves over the centuries. Things change. In Gaudum et Spes, for the first time. our Church acknowledged there was a UNITIVE aspect to marriage as well as a procreative aspect. Were it only meant as procreative, we all ought to be up in arms against allowing infertile couples to "hi-jack" the term "marriage". They are physical unable to have children. What is left? Unitive love. Tom...I appreciate the back and forth on this. Passions are high on this issue and it does my soul good to be able to discuss this calmly with someone who does not agree.

Tom Wilson

11 years 4 months ago

The argument that it does not affect you personally ignores the broader public policy issues at stake here. We don't legalize murder because we think we'd be personally affected by it; we make it illegal because it creates a social environment that enhances our existence, makes us and our children safe. Maybe your marriage would be unaffected, but what about the children who are born out of wedlock because marriage is not about procreation any more? Do we not as a society have the right to create a legal framework that helps to assure that kids have both a mom and dad? Should we not encourage fathers to take responsibility for their offspring by entering into a lifelong union with a woman? Some things change, but over the course of 5K+ years of civilization, man and woman continues to be the only way that our species reproduces. Marriage exists because of that very fact; it's why marriage is a couples' institution. No family asset was ever protected via a union of a man and a man; why is that? Is there anything as tragic as the infertile married couple? This is the exception to the rule of fertility of man and woman. We don't make laws based on exceptions; we make laws based on ideals. Nice engaging with you as well, Thomas.

Jim McCrea

11 years 4 months ago

" ... there's even evidence in countries where homosexual "marriage" exists that shows a drop in marriage rates and more children born out of wedlock. " Are you going to sit there with a straight face and tell me that heterosexuals are so weak in their committment to matrimony and responsible parenthood that same-sex marriage shattered their willingness to perpetuate what was the norm? Do you think it rained more heavily in those countries since the advent of same-sex marriage? How about corn crop failures? Any advent of the birth of two-headed gazelles?

Tom Wilson

11 years 4 months ago

Hi Jim - I don't think that it's a simple as drawing a straight line from legalization of same-sex marriage to a "shattered willingness to perpetuate the norm." It think the link of causation is much more complex than that, affected by such things as media messaging about same-sex marriage, what is being taught to children in the schools after legalization, what is being offered in institutes of higher education on the subject, as well as the experiences of those who have attended same-sex weddings, viewed same-sex wedding announcements, advertisements for same-sex wedding services, etc... If we learned anything about homosexuals in the last 20 years or so, it's that they are not shy about whatever they're doing and demanding. If marriage was implicitly a procreative union because it was man-woman, it certainly is not one after legalization of same-sex marriage; indeed, it is expressly NOT procreative and society becomes well aware of that and probably very quickly. And what a relief that must be to men, notoriously reluctant to take on the responsibility of marriage. Sex without commitment? Check, thanks to feminism. Fatherhood without fear of marital commitment? Check.

Joseph O'Leary

11 years 4 months ago

Marriage equality is not marriage identity -- it does not mean that a male-male couple is the SAME as a male-female couple or that a man is the SAME as a woman -- it does mean that they are all entitled to the same Moral and Legal respect (just as we respect the sterile marriage of the aged or the Josephite marriage of two religious people equally with the fertile marriage of the young).

G Miller

11 years 4 months ago

Mr Wilson, If you are going to crow on about the biology of marriage then let's enjoy the full context of that biological discussion. First, not all straight marriages result in children for lots of biological reasons. Marriage is not about procreation. Procreation happens outside of marriage all the time, just ask all the descendants of Ghengis Khan and Roman invaders. Procreation is part of marriage but again to contend that it is the sole and overarching purpose is silly. A marriage is valid with or without kids. Would the Church annul a marriage because it did not result in children? Second if biology is to be considered in the discussion, then please educate yourself to the biological differences between your straight male brain and my gay male brain. When exposed the same images our brains would light up in different ways. Clearly there is more at work in our neural organization than choice. Third, your straight marriage would probably not have survived all that my gay relationship has survived. We are constantly attacked in our relationship by the same societal organizations that support your marriage. My partner is harassed each time he visits the US by the TSA. The last time the TSA agent even bullied me on the phone threatening me with his immediate return to his home country if I did not answer his questions to his satisfaction. Silly me, I thought the Gestapo had been disappeared with VE Day back in 1945. So if you want your marriage to exist in a moral universe start supporting gay marriages. Such an act would give your marriage more credibility and make for a more just society. As for the biology, if you don't like the existence of gays, pray to God that He stops His biodiversity program. Til God answers your prayer, get used to it.

Tom Wilson

11 years 4 months ago

Mr. Miller - I disagree. Marriage's civil purposes, it's value to society, are 1) that it helps assure that a child will have both its mother and father, 2) it assures that fathers take responsibility for the children that they conceive, and 3) it helps assure that fathers do not conceive children with multiple women (creating conflicts of interest). Society has no interest in whether people are in love, per se, except to the extent that it leads to marriage and serves the protection/responsibility purposes previously mentioned. No, not all marriages result in children, but with very few exceptions every one has the potential to result in children and/or keep a fertile male away from fathering children with multiple women, and that is where the marriage has value to society.

Jim McCrea

11 years 4 months ago

What is a joke is the insistence on linking the term “marriage” to the terms “man” and “woman.” Civil marriage (not the same as matrimony) is open to definition and re-definition as necessary. Same-sex marriage is legally recognized in several jurisdictions within the United States and by the federal government. As of July 2013, thirteen states (California, Connecticut, Delaware, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington), the District of Columbia, and five Native American tribes have legalized same-sex marriage. Has opposite-sex marriage/matrimony collapsed in any of these jurisdictions since the recognition of same-sex marriage? I submit that any collapse of opposite-sex marriage/matrimony has been happening for quite some time now and there is no direct link to the advent of civil same-sex marriage to any of the weaknesses that participants in opposite-sex marriage/matrimony exhibit. There is one inherent weakness in opposite-sex marriage/matrimony that you should be worried about: only practitioners thereof give birth to homosexuals! There must be a weakness in heterosexuality that allows this to happen.

David Harvie

11 years 4 months ago

The USCCB is often so quick to point out how marriage equality for all is a danger to society. I can only wish that they were as quick to "root out every sign of unjust discrimination" In our society. Here in New Jersey, study after study has shown that civil unions have failed to prevent discrimination against LGBT folk. When will the bishops speak out against this unjust discrimination? Today, my civil union partner and I celebrate our 30th anniversary. I am grateful to SCOTUS for this anniversay present. Maybe by our 50th, we will see some action from our church. One must always have hope.

Roberto Blum

11 years 4 months ago

John Boswell's research on adelphopoiesis suggests that the Church allowed for same sex unions in the past and had a specific sacramental to bless these unions. Whether these unions included the sexual aspects of marriage or just the social and economic aspects of the consorcium could be rightly argued. If marriage had the sole purpose of biological reproduction, opponents of "same sex marriage" would be right but biological reproduction is not the only purpose of marriage. The Church recognizes that partners in marriage have the purpose of helping each other in their lives, promoting their friendship and love, raising their children and educating them, and sanctifying each other. Today is a great day for Americans and should be a day of rejoicing for Catholics also because the Court made justice to a minority of our fellow human beings.

Vince Killoran

11 years 4 months ago

A wonderful day to be an American. Liberty and justice were exactly what the Court delivered today. Of course the shape and character of marriage has changed over the centuries. . . even now it's clear, however, that "gay marriage" conforms to Anglo-American law and is unremarkable in the most fundamental ways.

Bill Mazzella

11 years 4 months ago

Another tragic day when the bishops said nary a word about the demolition of the voting rights act. Just keep building 200 million dollar cathedrals and inviting Roberts, Scalia, Alito and Thomas to their sites while the captives remain bound and the anointing of Jesus is made a mockery. Keep the robes streaming and the money and the Knights of Malta going to keep the Empire intact.

Gabriel Speciale

11 years 4 months ago

Nice comments, Bill. What about the Voting Rights Act indeed. It seems the Bishops push a lot of CST to the wayside and prefer to focus on narrow and politically division issues that don't effect the Church at all (i.e. the government will not force the Church to marry homosexuals). How much money is allocated to fighting losing battles? Aren't there better ways for us to serve the greater good? AMDG.

Charlie Noel

11 years 4 months ago

The lack of knowledge of, respect for and faith in the Word of God revealed in most of these comments is genuinely stunning, especially as many of the authors may profess to be practicing Roman Catholics. The authority and content of Divine Revelation in matters of human sexual and marital anthropology is abundantly clear. 2000 years of theological development, magisterial catechesis and the united witness of all canonized saints East and West who have taught or commented on human sexuality is a thoroughly unified witness. Thinking otherwise is really some sort of mad wishful thinking on the part of those unable to detect the difference between the most outrageous heresy and the Christian faith. I hold a Ph.D. in theology from a leading American Jesuit university and am quite surprised that such readers imagine themselves having very much in common at all with Sts. Ignatius Loyola and Francis Xavier. AMDG!

Tom Wilson

11 years 4 months ago

Didn't you read the comments, Charles? The Church has recognized same-sex marriage in the past; or, "things change," or thousands of years of theologians have all been wrong and it took modern psychology to figure that out. I think nowadays people allow their emotions to overcome their sense of right and wrong. They look to the Gospels and interpret them based on how they feel. So they conveniently overlook things like Hell and sin, as these things make them uncomfortable and acknowledge the fact that some behaviors are wrong. So, they tout that Jesus forgave the adulteress, but the ignore that He told her to sin no more. They acknowledge that Jesus spoke about man joining woman (in Matthew), but they claim that He spoke about it in the after-the-fact context of divorce. It's all rationalization of feelings and conflict aversion. I think this all derives from the 1960s anti-establishment movement that has morphed into the public school system. It's an adolescent mentality that rejects any institution that restricts behavior. Because, you know, since we're all good people at heart, our society should have no restrictions, religious or otherwise, on what we do, as long as we don't ostensibly hurt anybody. "Gay marriage doesn't harm my marriage," the mentality goes, so it must be good.

Anne Grady

11 years 4 months ago

Hell is the absence of God... a lost and lonely place indeed if it exists. Not that one can't be lost and lonely, but that doesn't mean God is absent.

Roberto Blum

11 years 4 months ago

Has revelation stopped? Has the Spirit abandoned God's People? If so, the Church is a dead body, a fossil that has nothing to offer and should be discarded, but the Spirit blows wherever He/She/It wishes and I believe revelation is still present in the Church, which is the whole People of God, not only the ecclesiastical hierarchy.

Anne Grady

11 years 4 months ago

Beautiful!

Vincent Gaitley

11 years 4 months ago

Well, golly. Haven't you heard? Nobody cares about the authority. Even "good" Catholics have sex before, during, and outside marriage--sometimes with their spouses. Shh, sometimes with priests. The world is upside down, careless, crude, bored with the missing God, and not really minding the witness of the icy and sterile canonized saints (most of whom were celibate and unmarried and childless). The gig's up. The Church doesn't call the shots on sex anymore.

Tom Wilson

11 years 4 months ago

Nobody cares about the Church anymore, and yet at Easter and Christmas, you can't get a seat. And look at all the youngsters lined up for baptisms, communion, and confirmation. And when they're old and sickly, where do they turn; we see them at mass every Sunday. Yes, many Catholics are lapsed, struggling with the temptations of the world, yet realizing where the truth lies.

Jim McCrea

11 years 4 months ago

Are you not, in many cases, confusing culturalism with knowledge of the truth?

Anne Grady

11 years 4 months ago

Hear, Hear!

Anne Grady

11 years 4 months ago

You are confusing Divine revelation with Church revelation. You are confusing Truth with Dogma. You are confusing the bishops love with God's Love.

G Miller

11 years 4 months ago

One thing is clear, with all that verbosity, it must have been easy to earn a PhD. It seems to me that you are educated and exasperated but you didn't do anything to move the discussion along.

Gabriel Speciale

11 years 4 months ago

The repeal of DOMA doesn't allow gay people to be married in the Church so what exactly is the problem? The Church is free to have her laws and Caesar is free to have his.

Tom Wilson

11 years 4 months ago

The problem is the official designation of marriage as a non-procreative institution and the ramifications thereof for children and society, all to make homosexual couples feel like they are the same as heterosexual couples.

Gabriel Speciale

11 years 4 months ago

But it isn't our definition of "marriage" and it never is. It is civil. Additionally, your point about marriage being a "non-procreative" institution is not compeling. The government doesn't get involved in procreation. If it did - older couples wouldn't be allowed to marry. People who don't want children couldn't marry. They do and they always have. Also, heterosexual couples who are not Catholics are not like us. What do we say about that?

Matthew Pettigrew

11 years 4 months ago

Is my marriage any less real or any less valid than yours because my wife and I decided from the time of our first date that neither of us wanted to have children? Your comment compels me to ask you explain exactly what ramifications our decision had for children and society.

Vincent Gaitley

11 years 4 months ago

My share value in Gerber Foods dropped. Otherwise, didn't you vow to accept children as they came from God? I don't really care, for the record, but you asked.

Anne Grady

11 years 4 months ago

They know they are not the same, they've been outsiders their whole life, they will still be outsiders to you, but now they are recognized by the law of the land as real.

Jim McCrea

11 years 4 months ago

Quite frankly, many of us think that our relationships are BETTER than those of many heterosexual couples.

Tim Reidy

11 years 4 months ago

Full names, please Gabriel, as per our policy.

Roberto Blum

11 years 4 months ago

Marriage as a sacrament is efficacious, meaning it is a "real" channel for God's grace in order to help individuals attain salvation through their actions in this life. In marriage the "ministers" of the sacrament are the individuals commiting themselves to each other and the priest representing the christian community is only witnessing the vows exchanged by the partners. Canon law may declare illicit and invalid "same sex marriage" but canon law cannot be an obstacle to "God's grace raining" on those same sex individuals declaring their commitment to each other before God and the community.

Anne Grady

11 years 4 months ago

Thank you. Grace in all its mysterious forms happens for all not just heterosexual Roman Catholics.

Jim McCrea

11 years 4 months ago

That is matrimony, not civil marriage. Stop confusing the two.

Bill Mazzella

11 years 4 months ago

Charles Noel wrote: "The authority and content of Divine Revelation in matters of human sexual and marital anthropology is abundantly clear. 2000 years of theological development, magisterial catechesis and the united witness of all canonized saints East and West who have taught or commented on human sexuality is a thoroughly unified witness." The truth that Jesus promised is in the Beatitudes. Not in an infallible truth. If you think the RCC has been right about sex then I have a bridge I want to sell you. The truth that sets us free is not absurd adherence to dogma but the command (mandatum) to serve one another. This is why Holy Thursday is called Mandatum. A new command I give to you that you love one another and wash (we must. not a suggestion) the feet of one another. Damasus was no saint. ( St. Damasus I: October 1, 366 - December 11, 384 (18 years) He, more than most, built the Bishop of Rome into a head of Empire. Augustine is the one who should be demythologized above all. Because he did some real damage. He held that it was proper to use force to compel Christians to become Catholics. He was very wrong on sex and women. There is a lot to be garnered from our tradition, Charles. But people no longer get imprisoned for disagreeing with people who promote domination instead of service. We have another chance with Francis who is more gospel than empire. We are allowed to think even tho we are Catholic.

Victor Ortiz-Menjivar

11 years 4 months ago

Indeed a very tragic day for marriage in our nation. I hope the reading from the link below will make some sense. I know it does. The Three "NO"s to the LGBT West http://mat-rodina.blogspot.com/

Joseph O'Leary

11 years 4 months ago

Russian homophobia, red in tooth and claw. I weep for the country of Pushkin and Gogol, Lermontov and Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy and Chekhov, Tchaikovsky (one of your hated "sodomites") and Stravinsky. You had a brief glimpse of freedom between Stalin and Tsar Putin; now you are consigning yourself to the vilest forms of hatred and murder, or what the Prophets call "the sin of Sodom"!

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