The Poor, Persecuted Christian ... and Reality

Over at No Apologies, we find them desperately trying to spin things into a case of "persecuted christianity" because Washington, D.C. might pass a law legalizing SSM.

In Washington, D.C., the Catholic archdiocese has threatened to end its charitable work in the city – the work of Catholic Charities – if homosexual “marriage” rights are passed and the state tries to force Catholic Charities to extend employee benefits to homosexual “married” couples. If this happens, homosexualists will be to blame for terminating important charitable aid to the needy.

Then there is reality - The Catholic Church is the one threatening to shut down it's charitable works in D.C. if the bill is passed.

What soup kitchens for the poor have to do with SSM is a bit of a puzzle, isn't it?

But officials from the archdiocese said they feared the law might require them to extend employee benefits to same-sex married couples. As a result, they said, the archdiocese would have to abandon its contracts with the city if the law were passed.

Oh, now I see. The Church is afraid it might have to treat gay employees as actual equals with respect to subjects such as benefits plans.

The reality here is that the Church is offended that it might have to treat all of its employees as equals for subjects such as paid benefits plans. In other words, the Church is about to lose yet another area where it can discriminate and treat gay people as second class citizens.

It's important to note that the law in question does not impinge upon the Church's autonomy with respect to deciding who it will or will not marry:

Under the bill, which has the mayor's support and is expected to pass next month, religious organizations would not be required to perform same-sex weddings or make space available for them.

In order to get its way, the Church is effectively making the clients of its charitable operations the victims. The denizens of No Apologies, are, of course, trying to spin this hostage taking as being the fault of those who back gay marriage. In effect, they are saying that the Church's actions are the direct result of the law changing, instead of recognizing that the Church has choices it can make. It could choose to simply extend benefits to same sex couples that are legally married - and there would be no issue. Instead, they choose to try using their charitable operations as a political lever.

Hardly something that one can blame the backers of the gay marriage bill in D.C. for.

Arguing Against SGM: The Punch - FAIL

The Punch is an Australian current affairs magazine.

One of their columnists attempted to write a non-religious argument against gay marriage

It boils down to two basic lines of argument - neither of which hold even a drop of water when subjected to scrutiny.

The first argument is that same-gender couples can't possibly have children. This is a very nice truism, but if you restrict marriage solely along the lines of procreative potential there's some serious problems.

The simple fact is that while some marriages do not produce children, no gay relationships can produce children. Children may be involved but they haven’t been produced as a result of the sexual relationship between the couple.

Throughout its clouded history, marriage has been as much about the provision of a future for a society (through children) as it has been about the relationship between a man and a woman. A gay relationship is not the same as a marriage in this regard.

Again, if one uses such a criterion for marriage, then one must assume that marriages involving Intersex individuals or those who are for one reason or another sterile must also be seen as invalid.

A gay relationship that is raising children - whether by adoption, or past relationships of one of the partners - is just as much about the "future of society" as a heterosexual relationship raising children. Who gave birth to those children is immaterial - there are plenty of children raised by step parents.

Similarly, if one is talking about "the future of society", we must also recognize that not every heterosexual couple produces children - whether by choice or fate. Those couples are no more the majority than same-gender couples are. To suggest that either represent any kind of "threat" to the continuation of society is ludicrous at best.

Those who argue that allowing homosexual couples to marry will somehow be detrimental to society's integrity are invited to look to Canada, Norway, Spain and other countries which have had allowed such marriages for several years now. I have yet to see any credible research to suggest that the handful of same-gender marriages that take place each year have had any such consequences.

As I said earlier, there are many long-standing, committed and loving gay relationships and I have no objection to some form of recognition by the state for those that seek it but I do not think that marriage and a gay relationship are the same thing. A gay relationship needs to be called something else.

Oh? Really? Are you prepared to go through every piece of legislation that references marriage and make appropriate references to this "alternate"? I doubt it, and it would be much more expensive than simply allowing the same term to cover both heterosexual and homosexual partnerships. Second, as "separate-but-equal" experiments in both Canada and the United States have shown, separate-but-equal schemes are seldom, if ever, actually equal.

Our definition of marriage as between a man and a woman is part of our cultural heritage as well as recognition of the uniqueness of the relationship. There’s no reason to change that.

Besides the fact that the author has utterly failed to demonstrate that there is even a smidgen of evidence to demonstrate the "uniqueness" of the heterosexual marriage relationship that truly distinguishes it from a homosexual marriage relationship.

Lastly, he fails completely to address the systemic social and legal discrimination that same-gender couples experience on a routine basis where SGM is not fully recognized in law. Among other issues that are not adequately considered are topics such as inheritance rights, access to loved partners who are hospitalized, decision making powers that would normally devolve to a spouse are assigned to parents or other members of the biological family who may be quite overtly hostile to the same-gender partner; numerous taxation rules change for married couples ... and the list goes on.

Let me be explicit here - as I said repeatedly during the debate here in Canada, we are talking about the legal construct of marriage, not its spiritual or religious forms. Arguments that fail to address the very legitimate issues of discrimination and unequal treatment that same-gender couples face are fundamentally empty arguments.

The Wingnuts Howl

Apparently, the residents of Outer Wingnuttia that write for Lifesite are unhappy about the Court of Queens Bench ruling regarding Marriage Commissioner Orville Nichols.

As a public official, she said, Nichols is obliged to perform civil marriages according to the statutes in the Marriage Act, which allows same-sex "marriages." "I am sympathetic to the argument that a public official acting as government is at the same time an individual whose religious views demand respect," she wrote. "However, a public official has a far greater duty to ensure that s/he respects the law and the rule of law. A marriage commissioner is, to the public, a representative of the state. She or he is expected by the public to enforce, observe and honour the laws binding his or her actions. If a marriage commissioner cannot do that, she or he cannot hold that position."

This is pretty much what I have been saying since day one. The marriage commissioners are secular officials, not religious officials. This is an important distinction. I hate to think what some would experience if the concept of civil servant suddenly included the right to not serve someone in the public because you "disagreed" with some aspect of their life - real or perceived.

As for the Saskatechewan marriage commissioner story, it is just another of numerous confirmations that court decisions and legislative changes in favour of "equal rights" for homosexuals consistently result in denial of fundamental rights for those who oppose homosexuality (rather than homosexual persons themselves). This is dangerous stuff that cannot but lead to great harm to any society that allows it to continue.

Wait a second. Your "fundamental right" to oppose homosexuality? That's like my fundamental right to oppose religious stupidity. Religiosity is a personal right, and nobody has a right to project their beliefs onto others. Equal rights for homosexuals does not infringe upon religious freedoms - not unless there is a "right" somewhere to treat others as second class citizens based on that religion. Religious beliefs however, when enacted as public policy, do have a nasty tendency to abrogate equality rights - whether we are talking about women's equality, or GLBT rights.