I was just reading an article over at BBC News entitled Italians clash on gay ‘marriage’. I found the following quote from the pope typical of his outdated and outmoded thinking:
The pope said of gay marriage that it was a “serious mistake to obfuscate the value and functions of the legitimate family based on marriage by attributing legal recognition to other forms of legal union for which there is no real social demand”.
There’s plenty of social demand for gay marriage and it’s only right that we welcome and accept people of all orientations into modern society, including into our insitutions of marriage. Nobody is saying that the Catholic church should be obligated to marry these people, but it is only fair to allow gay people to express their love for one another through a legal marriage if they so choose to do. I really fail to understand how it’s any religion’s right to tell people not associated with that religion what is right or wrong for them to do.
This is one more reason that I dislike organised religion and chose to discontinue any involvement with it myself. I believe that, so long as one doesn’t break just laws and doesn’t actively engage in religious (or other) persecution of others that people should just be allowed to get on with their lives. We live in a time where governments want to tell us what to do, when to breathe, how to raise our families (thanks, Tony) and where the pope still hasn’t understood that many of us are quite happy for him to sit in the vatican so long as he doesn’t stick his oar into affairs that don’t concern him.
Hopefully, the Italians will see some sense and allow gay Italians to have rights that others have in more enlightened countries around the world. The Canadians are already fairly enlightened, the US less so, and then for once the UK is doing pretty well. I find these things interesting because by studying how society treats the minorities amongst it, we can come to understand just how “free” and enlightened we really are.
Jon.
Well said bro!
One thing many religions have in common is the belief that their faith is universal; as such, I think, the opinion that gay marriage is a universally bad thing (and expressing said opinion) is quite justified within the framework those religions.
Additionally, I think the pope is very much aware that not everyone agrees with the Catholic church’s idea of morality; instead it is more likely precisely because not everyone agrees with it, that he feels the need to stress those points, not least because as a religious leader it is his job to spread the faith.
Furthermore, his thinking is neither outdated nor outmoded; unlike a scientific theory where more evidence can be found, the evidence is (more or less) fixed for most religions, and only the interpretation of it can change (and, as history show, frequently does). Trends and current popular opinion does not really enter into it.
In summary, I think the pope follows his convictions, stands by them and tries to convince others of the correctness of his thinking in a non-violent fashion; that, in itself, is to be commended, as much as one might disagree with the opinions expressed. As such, blaming the pope for stating that gay marriage is bad is tackling the issue from the wrong angle; the real question is why a secular government should pay attention to it.