It is amazing how the Roman Catholic Church will portray itself as
being David to the Goliath of the LGBT Community, and even claim that
they were outspent and dismiss where the LGBT Community is coming from
by calling it “glitterati” and claiming that the money that passed New
York’s marriage equality act came from “entertainment circles, political
powerbrokers, and the media.”
Of course, it should be pointed out that
David won against Goliath, not lost.
Bishop Timothy Dolan of New York has decided that he is upset over
what occurred in New York, but he does not grasp or understand the why
it is occurring or even the fact that many Catholics support LGBT
Rights- including marriage equality.
This is in spite of the fact that
the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church has continued to vilify and
demonize lesbians and gays.
Dolan recently wrote “You will
understand my special word of gratitude to people of faith —
evangelicals, Mennonites, Jews, Moslem, Catholics, Amish, and so many
more, led often by African-American and Latino believers — who simply
believe that marriage is a given, at the very foundation of
civilization, which the state has the duty to defend and protect, not to
mutate.”
And yet, we live in a secular society that did not allow two people
of different skin colors to marry as long ago as 44 years ago. In fact,
our President’s parents could not get married or have their marriage
recognized as being legitimate.
In fact, beginning in 1948, the
Catholic Church waged a war to redefine marriage, according to Blaise Zerega of the Huffington Post.
He wrote “According to Reverend Scotty McLennan of Stanford
University, author of Finding Your Religion, it was the Catholic Church
that stepped forward to successfully challenge California’s
anti-miscegenation law on behalf of a black-white couple in Los Angeles.
At the time, 40 states had such laws in force. It wasn’t until 1967
that the Supreme Court struck down remaining restrictions on interracial
marriage then being enforced by some twenty states.”
If that seems rather surprising, it is. After all, the Catholic
Church has been said to be, according to the likes of Dolan, the
stouthearted defenders of traditional marriage as it has been defined
for centuries, and yet, under its watch, interracial and interfaith
marriages began to occur, and the Catholic Church even fought for those.
Dolan continues by saying “the Church neither has nor wants political
‘clout.’ As Cardinal John O’Connor commented, ‘The only “clout” the
Church really has is God’s Truth, the assurance of His grace, and the
simple yet sincere conviction of our people.’ Blessed John Paul II
again reminds us that ‘The Church never imposes, she only proposes.’
And as our current Holy Father has often observed, all the Church wants
is its freedom to serve humanity by bringing the light of the gospel to
the world.”
If this was true, why would the Catholic Church spend thousands of
dollars going after marriage equality in Maine and California, among
other places? Why would the Catholic Church help to fund groups like
the National Organization for Marriage and have their own bishops
lobbying for or against legislation in Congress? The reality is that
the Church imposes all the time.
They have threatened excommunication
for anyone opposing their belief system- a practice that, incidentally,
goes back to Henry II when Saint Thomas a Beckett, the Archbishop of
Canterbury, interfered in the politics of England repeatedly.
It is the
height of self delusion to say that the Catholic Church only proposes
and does not try to impose. That is like saying that a person stabbing
you in the back is not stabbing you in the back because you can’t see
it.
The next two things that Dolan takes up belong together:
But, three, we do worry indeed about this freedom of religion. Editorials already call for the removal of guarantees of religious liberty, with crusaders calling for people of faith to be coerced to acceptance of this redefinition. If the experience of those few other states and countries where this is already law is any indication, the churches, and believers, will soon be harassed, threatened, and hauled into court for their conviction that marriage is between one man, one woman, forever, bringing children into the world.
“Four, the real forces of “intolerance” were unmasked here. The caricature, of course, is that those defending traditional marriage were the right-wing bigots and bullies. However, as one out-of-state journalist, who was following the debate closely, commented to me, “From my read of the columns, blogs, and rhetoric, it’s not your side that’s lobbing the grenades.”
A Catholic who wrote to criticize me for my defense of marriage still conceded, “But I must confess that I am sickened by the amount of anti-Catholic venom that has surfaced in this debate.” As one respected columnist has observed, the problem is not homophobia but theophobia — a hatred by some of God, faith, religion, and the Church.
And, it should be pointed out, that the Catholic Church and those who
oppose same-sex marriage have often equated homosexuals with those who
will prey upon the weakest and most vulnerable in society- children.
While Dolan can whine about being demonized, at least what he is being
portrayed as is accurate.
Dolan and his cohorts have claimed to love
lesbians and gays, but say that homosexuality is sinful despite a
reading of the Bible that may not be accurate.
Of course, those who
believe that homosexuals are bad people who lie around all day and have
sex just because it feels good, or go around creating gorgeous males
with half a brain in order to have sex, and then toss them aside for the
next fling, yes, what they are saying won’t seem bad even though it is.
As for religious liberty, no one is forcing the Catholic Church’s
priests to do anything. Instead, they are doing it to themselves. It
is ironic that Dolan states that in the other states and countries where
same-sex marriage is legal, those opposed have been harassed and
dragged into court because of their beliefs, when he cannot come up with
more than a handful of examples.
Certainly this is not happening in
Vermont, where same-sex marriages and civil unions have been legal for
ten years now. There have been a few cases in Canada and Great Britain,
but usually those involve people who have a legal obligation to perform
duties that they are saying they will not do because of their religious
beliefs. If they cannot perform their duties under the law, they
should find another job.
Dolan then tries to apologize for hurting anyone. Of course, “love
the sinner and hate the sin” is just as hypocritical and damaging as
calling lesbians and gays nasty things. It accomplishes the same thing
without looking mean. He wrote
Five, though, if we did hurt anybody in our defense of marriage, I apologize. We tried our best to insist from the start that our goal was pro-marriage, never anti-gay. But, I’m afraid some within the gay community were offended.
As I replied recently to a reporter who asked if I had any message to the gay community, “Yes: I love you. Each morning I pray with and for you and your true happiness and well-being. I am honored that so many of you are at home within our Catholic family, where, like the rest of us, we try, with the help of God’s grace and mercy, to conform our lives to Jesus and His message. If I have offended any of you in my strenuous defense of marriage, I apologize, and assure you it was unintentional.
Actually, Dolan, it was intentional.
Your defense of post 1967
marriage, and your constant attempts to portray marriage as if it is
static and universally one man/one woman are damaging.
Of course, you
cannot see that because you cling to this antiquated and erroneous
belief that marriage is only between one man and one woman like a lipid
clings to a rock in a storm.
Get over yourself, learn that marriage
being between one man and one woman is not Biblical at all, and was
imported from Greece, where it was the norm.
Stop acting as if your
beliefs were universal, or that they have Biblical support since the
reality is that they are not universal, and even the prohibitions on
homosexuality in the Bible seem directed towards a particular sexual act
and not to all forms of homosexuality.
There is even a passage in the
Bible which indicates that Christ has no issues with same-sex couples.
The rest of what Dolan says is the usual crap about how the Roman
Catholic Church will be unbowed in this whole thing.
The reality is
that the Roman Catholic Church lost five centuries ago, and has been
desperately trying to cling to a 14th Century view of the world and
their power.
Where once, the Catholic Church could order kings and
emperors to go to war on its behalf, today, it struggles for relevance
in a world where their beliefs are being challenged piece by piece
through science and through greater understanding of human life.
Finally, I am a Goddess worshiper, and my religious beliefs include
that homosexuality is part of the natural order of things.
Female and
Male energies find their own balances without regards for the sex of the
individuals involved in a relationship.
What Dolan proposes is to put
his religion above mine legally, something that is in violation of the
Constitution.