Catholicvote Endorses Rick Santorum

[qfnol31]

[quote name='XIX' timestamp='1332220043' post='2404355']
I've always understood the bishops' stance to be to support marriage as a matter of "traditional marriage vs homosexual marriage." I could be wrong.

I actually think your adoption example is your best explanation now. I don't necessarily disagree with you tbh, it's more a matter of not being able to wrap my head around your arguments. Are you essentially saying that some necessary government functions rely on a set definition of marriage? Like adoptions? And divorces?
[/quote]If you go to http://www.marriageuniqueforareason.org/ the bishops outline their stance on marriage. It's true that they are defending traditional marriage against the new push for homosexual marriage, but part of the bishops' stance says that there is no such thing as homosexual marriage.

My argument has three main points, since the push for a national defense of traditional marriage has seen three different attacks:
1) Traditional marriage and the traditional understanding of family as a man and a woman coming together to raise a family is necessary for a good society and for society to thrive. This particular response is directed at those people who don't think that gay marriage is a big deal. First of all, I don't think that gay marriage exists. Secondly, I think that gay marriage is a perversion of marriage and its legalization has the ability to destroy society almost to the point of how the loss of freedom of religion would destroy society. Sure a society can survive in such a situation, but it is no longer a real society. This particular argument also includes the defense of a child's right to have a father and a mother (also harmed by divorce, etc.).

[quote][b]5. Isn’t marriage a private relationship? What does it have to do with the common good?[/b]
Marriage is a personal relationship, but not a private one. In fact, marriages play a crucial role in society. By publicly joining hands in marriage, husband and wife enter into a unique communion and sharing of their whole lives that not only joins their distinct families into one, fostering greater connections between people, but also provides the essential context for welcoming new human life. By being open to children, each marriage is the foundation of a new family, rightly called the “key cell” of society (CCC, nos. 2207). In fact, because of its procreative aspect, marriage can be said to be the very source of society (see CSDC, no. 214), the “cradle of life and love” (CL, no. 40). Furthermore, both the irrevocable bond that unites husband and wife in marriage, as well as the sacrificial love that fathers and mothers show their children, create a “dynamic of love” that makes the family the “first and irreplaceable school of social life” (CSDC, no. 221; FC, no. 43). By practicing loving interdependence, husband and wife teach society to reject individualism and seek the common good for all. In modeling love and communion by welcoming and raising new human life and by taking care of the weak, sick and old, marriages and families provide social stability and thus foster the principles of solidarity and subsidiarity.[/quote]

To sum up this particular argument: traditional marriage is at the core of society. Its demise (and we've seen some already) will irreparably harm society in so many ways (I'm willing to list all the possible ways if you're interested). This argument has been attacked by liberals who think that it's a private matter or discrimination, as well as conservatives/libertarians who don't think the government should be involved in such matters. My abortion example is a practical example of how society is protected by laws defending traditional marriage.

2) Marriage is a Natural Law issue. To say that the government shouldn't get involved in defending marriage is to deny implicitly the place of marriage in the natural law. Marriage has two forms: Natural and Sacramental. Natural Marriage is a gift of God to human nature itself and is offered in the sexual differences between men and women. THe government has the right (and now the responsibility) to defend marriage in its natural form. This is a matter of justice: changing the definition of marriage to fit whatever people want is unjust because it is a lie. This argument goes alone with the first argument that marriage is for the good of society as a whole. Natural Marriage falls directly within the question of Natural Law and so it is completely valid to legislate it correctly. (Sacramental Marriage is limited to baptized couples and as such does not fall under the law, except that a valid marriage must take place for the sacramental marriage to be valid.)

Now there are two arguments against this use of Natural Law. The first argument is that the government doesn't have the authority to create laws about marriage. This argument is true insofar as the government cannot legitimately create a law saying that marriage is something other than it is. However, if the government decides to create laws to ensure that traditional marriage is in place, then the government is perfectly within its rights. My argument about licensing with Wincester is that these licenses in fact are a good way to defend marriage. He disagrees but has not posed any viable alternatives within our society. A problem with denouncing our current setup is that you must come up with a valid and viable alternative. I think that licensing works fine in our present situation and I've never heard a priest denounce the practice at all. In fact, I can't think of any bishops off the top of my head who have not supported it.

The second argument against the use of Natural Law in this case revolved around the idea that not all aspects of Natural Law need to be legislated for the common good. Occasionally it is a bad practice for us to try to create laws that are too strict. This argument is proven completely false by the recognition that marriage is an intrinsic part of societal good.

3) The final argument against a national defense of marriage, mostly by libertarians and old conservatives, says that it is a states' rights issue and each state should be allowed to decide. This is as silly a claim as each state should decide whether slavery is permissible or what currency they will use. My recent post with the Maryland law claim shows that it is impossible for each state to decide on their own whether or not they will permit "gay marriage." This argument is tossed out by supporters of Ron Paul as a good thing because they are worried that the federal government will decide to enact "gay marriage." Well, look at Texas' recent Supreme Court case and see what happens when that whole question goes before the United States Supreme Court. It just isn't a practical solution to give it to the states. Again, go to my first response about the good of our society as a whole and you'll see why I think this is a federal issue and not a state issue.

These are really a summary of my position. I hope it helps. Unfortunately the defense of marriage as proposed by the USCCB is being attacked by Catholics on all sides because it either goes too far (and is discriminatory) or it supports a federal state. I think that any Catholic that makes either argument better be careful that they haven't put politics ahead of their religion. Furthermore, I think that neither argument is sustainable.

[Aloysius]

I don't think I'll ever quite get why it's such a big deal for the state to offer the same easily dissolvable contract to two men as it offers to a man and a woman.

I mean, is it immoral for the state to allow two people to sign on to a contract that says they want to live together, share expenses, share a tax status, be each other's emergency contacts? whether or not they have sex is irrelevant, gay people have plenty of sex without the civil contract and you're not discouraging anyone from sinning by not letting them sign a contract to only sin with one person for a while.

if the civil marriage license contract was truly enforced as a contract these days, maybe it'd be worth defending. as it is now, it is not on my high priorities: it as already fallen to easy-to-obtain divorce, so it is already a dead letter. the very existence of the modern state's dissolvable marriage contract is actually the greatest threat to the sanctity of marriage that exists today, and we would all be in a much better state if the government stopped offering it altogether rather than offering it as such a dissolvable contract. I suppose the Bishops don't see that, and sure it would be ideal for the state to recognize and enforce marriage.

but the reality is that the state ALREADY DOESN'T recognize and enforce marriage. it recognizes and enforces something like marriage, but wen it's easier to get out of the marriage contract than your cell phone contract, the marriage contract is no longer anything like the marriage we support, and ultimately the very existence of such a temporary contract masquerading as marriage is detrimental to the sanctity of marriage. so I don't really mind if that false contract happens between a man and a woman, two men and a monkey, or three dogs and a pig. people should have the ability to sign all sorts of loopy crazy contracts if they really want to do so, all I care about is protecting the indissolvable sacrament of marriage.

in short: [b]I see no problem in legalizing gay divorce. [/b]

anyway, Ron Paul's constitutional plan actually wants to limit it so fully to the states that, with the passage of the We the People Act, the Federal Courts would not even have jurisdiction to hear cases on the matter, fully allowing the principle of subsidiarity to rule this issue so that the Federal Government could not decide it one way or another. And I fully support deciding it at a state level, I don't support any Federal laws on the matter any more than I would support international laws on the matter.

[filius_angelorum]

Aloysius, I think you are leaving out some key aspects of gay marriage.

First, allowing gay marriage/civil unions will also allow gay couples to adopt, which is a violation of natural law and will lead to a need for greater 'acceptance' of the homosexual lifestyle by civil society.

Second, the recognition of gay marriage/civil unions, even if it is merely allowing gay divorce, will incentivize the government's recognition of homosexuals as a protected class.

I actually also agree with Ron Paul's approach, though, because I think that the federal government is no place to have this debate, unless the federal government is going to start performing marriages itself (which would be a gross violation of the principle of subsidiarity). I also think that gay marriage proponents may have a case if they take states to federal court over their gay marriage laws/amendments. Many of these laws deny recognition to gay marriages performed in other states, which would be all well and good, if there were not this whole "full faith and credit" clause in the federal constitution, along with the insidious principle of "equal protection under the law". So, the only way to effectively safeguard the states' rights to legislate on this issue is to pass a federal amendment decisively giving the states the sole authority over matters such as marriage, divorce, adoption, etc.

[kujo]

How is it that granting the ability to marry the person you love to a group of people make them a "protected class?" If anything, it levels the playing field entirely.

[add]

is being opposed to free contraceptives, discrimination against women as implied by the Democratic party.   

[kujo]

[quote name='add' timestamp='1332339636' post='2404698']
is being opposed to free contraceptives, discrimination against women as implied by the Democratic party.
[/quote]

I can't speak for the Democratic Party, or Democrats in general, but in my view, the answer to your question is no.

Predictably, Republicans have fallen into the trap of allowing Dems in the media and elsewhere to turn this into a morality debate, when it should never have been so--exemptions to federal laws exist for precisely this reason. There have been conscientious objections for laws, policies and wars throughout the history of our country, and this new HHN mandate ought to have been no different. It's not about the contraception, and the religious base of the GOP ought to have been thrown into a trunk and muzzled while the adults in this party had a grown-up conversation about federalism and the proper role of government in our lives. Instead, we have idiots like Rush and an endless parade of "pastors," and "outraged citizens"--and not to mention Sen. Rick "Culture Warrior" Santorum, talking about how evil and immoral our society has become. The discussion ought to have been political; instead it's become religio-social, and level-headed Democrats and open-minded independents have been shoved aside as part of the "culture of death." [color=#282828]Meanwhile, Oba[/color]ma and other liberals have laughed their backsides off as the crazy cousins of the party have seized control.

[add]

Obviously, this denial of free contraceptives is not discrimination to women, as birth control can be obtained easily and at low cost, however this argument is gaining traction in the media.

In reality the opposite may be true (harmfull to woman(hood)) by reducing human sexuality to a cheap and  tawdry, loveless relationship and noncommittal activity.

Edited March 21, 2012 by add

[qfnol31]

[quote name='Aloysius' timestamp='1332319049' post='2404656']
I don't think I'll ever quite get why it's such a big deal for the state to offer the same easily dissolvable contract to two men as it offers to a man and a woman.[/quote]I assume you mean this sarcastically. The offering of divorce doesn't change the nature of marriage. The idea behind marriage implicit in the state is permanence.

You can't throw out all the rest of the law because one half is imperfect. Would you argue that it's okay for an unwed couple to use contraception when they have sex? If not, why's that different than this case.

[quote]I mean, is it immoral for the state to allow two people to sign on to a contract that says they want to live together, share expenses, share a tax status, be each other's emergency contacts? whether or not they have sex is irrelevant, gay people have plenty of sex without the civil contract and you're not discouraging anyone from sinning by not letting them sign a contract to only sin with one person for a while.[/quote]

Read the bishops' website. Marriage is fundamentally between a man and a woman. Any attempt to reproduce marriage outside of marriage is a grave wrong. It is unjust to have something that looks and acts like marriage but isn't. Unjust things are bad, no? Civil unions are not a perfect replica of marriage. Therefore they're unjust. This injustice is evil.

[quote]if the civil marriage license contract was truly enforced as a contract these days, maybe it'd be worth defending. as it is now, it is not on my high priorities: it as already fallen to easy-to-obtain divorce, so it is already a dead letter. the very existence of the modern state's dissolvable marriage contract is actually the greatest threat to the sanctity of marriage that exists today, and we would all be in a much better state if the government stopped offering it altogether rather than offering it as such a dissolvable contract. I suppose the Bishops don't see that, and sure it would be ideal for the state to recognize and enforce marriage.

but the reality is that the state ALREADY DOESN'T recognize and enforce marriage. it recognizes and enforces something like marriage, but wen it's easier to get out of the marriage contract than your cell phone contract, the marriage contract is no longer anything like the marriage we support, and ultimately the very existence of such a temporary contract masquerading as marriage is detrimental to the sanctity of marriage. so I don't really mind if that false contract happens between a man and a woman, two men and a monkey, or three dogs and a pig. people should have the ability to sign all sorts of loopy crazy contracts if they really want to do so, all I care about is protecting the indissolvable sacrament of marriage.[/quote]

So in short you're okay with laws that aren't based in the natural law because we have them already.

[quote]in short: [b]I see no problem in legalizing gay divorce. [/b]

anyway, Ron Paul's constitutional plan actually wants to limit it so fully to the states that, with the passage of the We the People Act, the Federal Courts would not even have jurisdiction to hear cases on the matter, fully allowing the principle of subsidiarity to rule this issue so that the Federal Government could not decide it one way or another. And I fully support deciding it at a state level, I don't support any Federal laws on the matter any more than I would support international laws on the matter.
[/quote]Subsidiarity has two aspects that you've neglected. 1) Subsidiarity includes the question of prudential judgment. I know you know what this is because you'd apply this concept to the question of capital punishment. Prudential judgment cannot allow for gay marriage period. 2) Subsidiarity implies that there is more than one correct option. In response to this, see my response to the first problem. There is no good that comes from allowing gay marriage.

Don't throw out all the good in our laws simply because there is also bad in them. Abortion was legalized. Should we now legalize all murder in our country because we don't view life correctly?

[Anomaly]

Government should be limited to the fullfillment and protection of Universal Human Rights. There are social morals that can be established and protected within a society.
[size=5][i]Article 29[/i][/size]
[size=5][i](1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible. (2) [b]In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for the purpose of securing due recognition and respect for the rights and freedoms of others [u]and of meeting the just requirements of morality, public order and the general welfare in a democratic society.[/u][/b] (3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.[/i][/size]
[size=5] [/size]
[size=5][size=4]Catholics and/or other religions cannot force their moral view of marriage onto the populace. Catholics should be able to demand the Government to recognize their Marriage as a 'civil union', and allow Governments to determine what legal benefits and responsibilites go along with 'civil unions'. It's only semantics to debate wether a civil union is a marriage because it's all about how either are defined. However, Religions should not have to accept whatever Governments define as 'civil marriages' as a marriage within their religions. [/size][/size]

[Anomaly]

[quote name='qfnol31' timestamp='1332358402' post='2404824']
There is no good that comes from allowing gay marriage.
[/quote]That is an indefensible statement. Provide some data or studies that backs that up. As Aloy pointed out, civil marriages are easily entered and exited now. What difference does it make if it's to persons of the same sex?

[Era Might]

[quote name='Anomaly' timestamp='1332362172' post='2404853']
That is an indefensible statement. Provide some data or studies that backs that up. As Aloy pointed out, civil marriages are easily entered and exited now. What difference does it make if it's to persons of the same sex?
[/quote]
We may be coming to the root of the matter. Maybe what we're seeing is not the triumph of godless liberalism, but the logical consequence of the very American experiment. America is self-consciously a rupture from the past...that's something Rick Santorum plays up a lot, that the American conception of authority and individualism was a radical change from the past. Marriage has already become a romantic individualistic enterprise, no longer the traditional anchor of bloodlines and property.

Maybe what is on trial here is not contemporary liberalism, but the very American principles that Santorum defends (it is somewhat strange to hear a Catholic like Santorum glorify American "individualism" with no seeming conception of Catholic history). Let's remember that the American experiment was liberal in its day.

America is built on essentially secular principles, divorced from any ethnic/religious basis. America is not so much the incarnation of Christianity as the abstraction of Christianity...hence the first amendment.

I certainly don't believe in "gay marriage" or consider homosexuality a moral good...but I also think Christian conservatives may be missing the real point. They are arguing from the basis that homosexuality is unnatural...but the argument can be made that America itself is an unnatural experiment, and contemporary "gay marriage" is just the logical evolution of what began in the 18th century (and long before, of course, through various ideas and ideologies).

Edited March 21, 2012 by Era Might

[Aloysius]

allowing for easily accessible divorce fundamentally defines the contract that the state offers, such that I fully disagree that the state is offering anything resembling "permanance" of any kind in the contracts that it offers. I fail to see any similarity to an unwed couple using contraception or abortion and all other murders; the state's "marriage" license is a temporary contract between two individuals who agree to live together and share expenses and get tax benefits for as long a period of time as they both wish to continue it. it is not a marriage, it is an unjust mockery of marriage in my eyes... I would rather see it gotten rid of entirely... for, as you have said, " It is unjust to have something that looks and acts like marriage but isn't." So the modern temporary marriage contract, which looks and acts like marriage but [i]isn't[/i], is unjust.

laws against murder are still laws against murder even if some murders are not illegal. but easily accessible divorce absolutely defines what the marriage contract fundamentally is, it defines it as a temporary agreement.

anyway, the way you have objected to my argument of subsidiarity makes it sound as if it would be just for an international law defining marriage... subsidiarity applies even to things that can never be moral and must always be illegal, ie the proper level of government ought to be the thing illegalizing them. in the United States it's hard to determine what the proper level of government is because we have that dynamic between states who are supposed to have a certain degree of sovereignty unto themselves and a federal government that is supposed to be extremely limited; so it would be different to say that the National Government of France should govern the laws of marriage of France than to say that the National Government of the United States should govern the laws of marriage of the United States; an analogy to Europe would actually be better served if we viewed the Federal Government like the European Union government; the EU government should not be defining marriage, it should be the individual nations of Europe that decide that issue. So it is with a Federalist view of the United States: just as the EU government or the UN government should not be the ones deciding these issues, neither should the US Federal Government decide them.

but again, I remain unconcerned as to whether temporary contracts can be entered into between two or three or eleven people who all want to share expenses and be housemates and each other's emergency contacts with full rights to visit each other in the hospital and such. It is no less a mockery of marriage to me than the current temporary "marriage" contracts offered by the state. I would much rather fight to see "covenant marriage contracts" being given legal recognition than care much about what that mockery of marriage, the temporary marriage license of the modern state, is up to.

[Lil Red]

is it bad that i just scroll down to read whatever al writes on the debate table topics and ignore everything else?

[Nihil Obstat]

[quote name='Era Might' timestamp='1332362814' post='2404855']
We may be coming to the root of the matter. Maybe what we're seeing is not the triumph of godless liberalism, but the logical consequence of the very American experiment. America is self-consciously a rupture from the past...that's something Rick Santorum plays up a lot, that the American conception of authority and individualism was a radical change from the past. Marriage has already become a romantic individualistic enterprise, no longer the traditional anchor of bloodlines and property.

Maybe what is on trial here is not contemporary liberalism, but the very American principles that Santorum defends (it is somewhat strange to hear a Catholic like Santorum glorify American "individualism" with no seeming conception of Catholic history). Let's remember that the American experiment was liberal in its day.

America is built on essentially secular principles, divorced from any ethnic/religious basis. America is not so much the incarnation of Christianity as the abstraction of Christianity...hence the first amendment.
[/quote]

Frankly, I find American exceptionalism to be at best historically naive, and at worst very anti-Christian.

[qfnol31]

I have a fuller response below, but I needed this to stand on its own:

In the course of the overall argument, almost everyone here has denied the possibility of marriage for non-baptized couples married outside the Church. Because of the corruption of the government, as you put it, does that really invalidate a couple's ability to make a permanent commitment? NO! The ministers of the marriage here are the couple and not the state. This the the crux of the overall mistake: while the government's marriage contracts, as you put it, are not sufficient, a couple can still have a valid marriage within the law. The permanency of the married depends entirely on the couple's commitment to it, not their ability to break it at any point. The possibility of divorce alone does not diminish the ability of a couple to enter a valid marriage. A commitment to get divorced later would invalidate the marriage.

Al, your argument in particular has made the person marrying the couple the source of permanence, when in fact the source of permanence resides in the couple. The ability to divorce under the law (and not in any marriage license I have seen) does not change this fact at all.

On the other hand, a homosexual couple cannot enter into a marriage regardless of what the state offers. Nothing the state does can change this fact.

Do not confuse the faults of the state with the ability of a couple to get married. Their ability to promise permanence (implicit in the fact that the marriage is not for a specified amount of time) is not contingent on the state. This is a completely different issue than the case of homosexual unions.

Edited March 21, 2012 by qfnol31