Heterosexual Rejection of Marriage Values Leads to Homosexual Marriage, Says Catholic Theologian

LifeSiteNews ^ | 12/18/06 | Gudrun Schultz

[wagglebee]

OTTAWA, Canada, December 18, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Individual couples’ faithfulness to the traditional values of Catholic marriage is vital in countering the push for same-sex “marriage,” a Catholic moral theologian said recently, saying people are more influenced by witnessing faithfulness than by arguments and debates.

Deborah Gyapong, for the Canadian Catholic News Service, reported on a presentation by Dr. Pia de Solenni to an Ottawa gathering on Dec.9, sponsored by the Ottawa Cosmos and Damian Society for Medical Ethics and the Ottawa Catholic Physician’s Guild.

It becomes “very difficult” to argue against same-sex marriage, Dr. de Solenni said, when heterosexual couples fail to respect the traditional values of marriage. Using contraception, regarding sex as simply a pleasure activity, considering children a “maybe,” and divorcing easily  -  all contribute directly to society’s growing acceptance of homosexuality.

“Outside of the Catholic Church there is no context or vision for sex,” said Dr. de Solenni, who is adjunct professor at Notre Dame Graduate School in Virginia and former director of Life and Women’s Issues at the Family Research Council in Washington, D. C.

Society’s obsession with sex reflects the split between sexuality and identity in today’s culture, Dr. de Solenni said, criticizing gender theory for attempting to divorce human identity from gender.

Forty years of feminism have “trained women to think about sex the way a not very good man thinks about it,” she said. Casual sex and one-night stands are the weapon society uses to avoid intimacy and the vulnerability of a genuine sexual encounter, she said.

The marriage relationship, however, is meant to be as intimate as the relationship between Christ and the Church, Dr. de Solenni said, leading men and women to a genuine encounter of themselves, each other and ultimately, God.

Sexual sin and disorder is so deeply personal, “in your face, in front of us all the time” that it leads to a profound sense of shame, causing men and women to hide their sexual differentiation in today’s culture.

Dr. de Solenni said she believes young people today are becoming more open to a traditional understanding of the sacred nature of marriage, saying young people have lived through the “divorce culture.” She called for more careful preparation of youth for dating and marriage, saying communication skills and an understanding of Natural Family Planning should be part of high school instruction.

Read coverage at Catholic Online:
http://www.catholic.org/international/international_story.ph...

[wagglebee]

It becomes “very difficult” to argue against same-sex marriage, Dr. de Solenni said, when heterosexual couples fail to respect the traditional values of marriage. Using contraception, regarding sex as simply a pleasure activity, considering children a “maybe,” and divorcing easily - all contribute directly to society’s growing acceptance of homosexuality.

Well said.

[wagglebee]

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[wagglebee]

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[umgud]

Don't forget that a lot of young men see the ravages of divorce and stay away from it not wanting the liabilities that go along with it. Women, unfortunately suffer because of this.

[wagglebee]

Unfortunately, society treats ending a marriage about as seriously as changing a hairstyle.

[little jeremiah]

Saw the title and was going to read/ping it out. Thanks for finding and posting it!

[rzeznikj at stout]

Part of the issue is that we need to respect traditional marriage. And that means that our youth need to see the inherent value in it.

A lot of my peers (both young men and women) see marriage as a liability, given that now well over half of all marriages ultimately fail.

In class, a couple of the reasons why young women might not necessar have mentioned that it's not worth the emotional rollercoaster--why put everything in and after a few years be left with nothing.

Whereas, with men, it's real simple. Consider the cow and the car. The attitude here can be described as a split analogy--with one part being "why buy the cow when one can get the milk for free," and the other part being "why drive an older, worn out car when you can "trade up" for a newer, better-looking model."

A shame, really. That my male peers see it all for the sex and the woman's body and my female peers fear marriage, lest they develop a lot of emotional baggage. This, I believe, says a lot about how we value other people in our society, and a paradigm that requires serious change.

[narses]

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[Mrs. Don-o]

All the homo-advocates are saying, How would our marriage threaten your marriage? I'll grant them this much: the principal weakening and deforming wounds to traditional heteosexual marriage are self-inflicted:

--rampant nonmarital sex (which enfeebles or eliminates the realization that sexual union is something sacred which should be reserved as a sign of permanent self-donation)

--intentional, planned non-marital childbearing (which now exceeds marital childbearing in the USA and is rapidly making fathers an optional redundancy --- with horrible consequences for kids down the line)

--contraception-sterilization-abortion (which treats normal fertility as a disease, the normal functioning of sexuality as a negative, and the normal advent of the new baby as a license for bloody murder)

--no-fault divorce (which makes a farce of the vows -- hah, "vows" -- and opens the way to...)

--serial polygamy (which is the main marriage-form in America and has nothing to do with the "traditional marriage" we claim to be preserving from the gays.)

"Gay marriage" (or domestic partnership or civil union or whatever) is just the latest assault; but it too threatens heterosexual marriage because, among other things, its legal recognition will mandate the infusion of pro-perverted-sex propaganda in all our public schools and public institutions.

So yes, marriage is collapsing. But we did it to ourselves. We queered marriage.

[little jeremiah]

I agree absolutely. Once sex is purely recreation, then there are no limits, since "who are you to judge" if someone likes this perversion or that?

The acceptance of contraception as benign was a bad, bad move. It opened the door to EZ divorce, sex outside of/before marriage, and using others as mere gratification tools.

[little jeremiah]

The destruction of marriage is a continuum, it started quite a while ago. Can it be saved?

Not without the context of eternal religious principles. A lifelong or good marriage can exist even if the husband and wife are not religious, but their marriage exists on the foundation of religious principles, whether they know it or not.

[TAdams8591]

He's right.

[TAdams8591]

"The acceptance of contraception as benign was a bad, bad move. It opened the door to EZ divorce, sex outside of/before marriage, and using others as mere gratification tools."

The above is something I well understood and believed in college. Too bad, after all the negative ramifications of the sexual revolution, more people aren't willing to admit it.

[Pyro7480]

Dr. de Solenni is a woman. ;-) I've seen her speak.

[TAdams8591]

I stand corrected. : ) "She's" right.

[little jeremiah]

Always good to see you, TAdams!

As you can imagine (and maybe you witnessed), there have been very contentious threads about this. So many people see contraception as a basic human right. But what is that "right" based on? It's really based on the desire to flaut the laws of nature. It's playing God. It divorced the sexual act from life. It hardens hearts. People look at each other more and more as "meat", not as a living soul.

And I'm not even talking about the contraception which actually kills.

It's very sad. The Catholic Church has held firm against the onslaught of hedonism, when most if not all Protestant denominations have surrendered.

[TAdams8591]

"It divorced the sexual act from life."

Yes, contraception did all that. And I used your very argument in my college classrooms. The idea of sex for procreation cannot be separated from the sexual act without dire consequences. And this dynamic paved the way for the legalization of abortion.

The Catholic church is as correct on the issue of contraception as they are on so many other issues. But sadly, it can be tough defending that stance even when among a group composed entirely of Catholic's, as I well know.

[TAdams8591]

"As you can imagine (and maybe you witnessed), there have been very contentious threads about this."

Yes, I have. Kind of similar to the discussion thread Mary Cheney's artificial insemination, fostered, to which I wanted to comment at greater length but didn't have time. So many people's opinions are so mischaracterized, particularly on our side, one must really carefully read the posts to truly understand a person's opinion.

[SteveMcKing]

"... the way a not very good man thinks about it,”

Like the way a not very good statement is constructed.

Incredibly weak language. How can one take the thought seriously?

[little jeremiah]

I participated in several of those threads; probably some of my comments were a bit hot-headed. The homosexual/hedonist/libertine cheerleaders are quite numerous lately and their method of "debate" is more like monkeys flinging what monkeys fling than a rational discussion...

Maybe I'll revert back to my regular tagline...