Gay marriage and abortion
This is interesting--Gov Schwarzenegger vetoed the same-sex marriage bill on the very sound grounds that the people had approved Prop 22, which stated "Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California." Spin it as the media will, the veto has nothing to do with morality per se--after all, isn't Arnold for gay marriage?--but with the size of governmental power: If the people vote to approve or deny something, it is just plain not within the purview of the government to arbitrarily reverse it. That's not how a republic works. What if, it is asked, the people voted for something harmful (which the vote's outcome is usually said to be by the loudest voices)? Well, maybe they do, but again, that isn't how a republic works. This is the same reason Roe v Wade is unconstitutional: the federal government, in that case, overrode the decisions already reached by the various state legislatures. In actuality, neither the legality of gay marriage nor the legality of abortion have anything strictly to do with morality, even if morality
is the basis of the voters' choices.
Labels: gay marriage, legislation
Irritating article
Um . . .
this story has it all wrong.
Wrong assertion #1: ". . . a soon-to-be-released Vatican document that is expected to reinforce the teaching that gays are not welcome in the priesthood." There is no such teaching. The Church does
not ban gays from the priesthood. Gay men are eligible for ordination so long as they are chaste, and, one would hope, obedient to Church teaching. (However, you don't even have a good chance of that with a straight man.)
Wrong assertion #2: "In recent decades, Vatican officials have stated several times that gays should not become priests because their sexual orientation is 'intrinsically disordered' and makes them unsuitable for ministry." What officials say is not necessarily official teaching, and such is the case here. The Church does not teach this, even if many in the Church believe it. But more importantly, the way this is written implies the Church believes homosexuals are disordered. The actual teaching is that homosexuality is a disorder, not that the
person is disordered, and there
is a difference. And again
again, the Church does not teach that gays are unsuitable for ministry any more than it teaches that sobered-up alcoholics are unsuitable.
The whole article has an irritating tone implying some kind of Vatican witch hunt. In reality, the Vatican is asking that its seminaries actually (gasp) teach what the Church teaches. I mean, nobody said you had to agree with or abide by any of it, so if you don't,
don't go to seminary.
Labels: dogma
