Posted on 11/11/2012 6:16:42 AM PST by marshmallow
VATICAN CITY (AP) -- The Vatican is digging in after gay marriage initiatives scored big wins this week in the U.S. and Europe, vowing to never stop insisting that marriage can only be between a man and a woman.
In a front-page article in Saturday's Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano, the Holy See sought to frame itself as the lone voice of courage in opposing initiatives to give same-sex couples legal recognition. In a separate Vatican Radio editorial, the pope's spokesman asked sarcastically why gay marriage proponents don't now push for legal recognition for polygamous couples as well.
Catholic teaching holds that homosexuals should be respected and treated with dignity but that homosexual acts are "intrinsically disordered." The Vatican also opposes same-sex marriage, insisting on the sanctity of marriage between a man and woman as the foundation for society.
The Vatican's anti-gay marriage media blitz came after three U.S. states approved same-sex marriage by popular vote in the election that returned Barack Obama to the U.S. presidency, Spain upheld its gay marriage law, and France pushed ahead with legislation that could see gay marriage legalized early next year.
"One might say the church, at least on this front, has been defeated," L'Osservatore Romano wrote. "But that's not the case."
(Excerpt) Read more at hosted.ap.org ...
Onward Christian Soldiers!
“Now, since the family and human society at large spring from marriage, these men will on no account allow matrimony to be the subject of the jurisdiction of the Church. Nay, they endeavor to deprive it of all holiness, and so bring it within the contracted sphere of those rights which, having been instituted by man, are ruled and administered by the civil jurisprudence of the community. Wherefore it necessarily follows that they attribute all power over marriage to civil rulers, and allow none whatever to the Church; and, when the Church exercises any such power, they think that she acts either by favor of the civil authority or to its injury. Now is the time, they say, for the heads of the State to vindicate their rights unflinchingly, and to do their best to settle all that relates to marriage according as to them seems good.”
—Pope Leo XIII, 1880
Freegards
The Catholic Church needs to recognise the fact that 90% of those attending their Church are Cafetaria Catholics.
They look at all of the rules and pick the ones they will obey.
Now I am not in any way saying that they should change all of their rules to adapt to the popular vote on which ones Catholics obey, I am only stating a fact.
Catholics use Birth Control, Catholics have abortions, Catholics live together out of wedlock, Catholics divorce, Catholics take Communion without going to Confession ,Some Catholics are Homosexual,
The Church can and should fight for what is right, the problem is that in todays world, the people are picking and choosing what they think is right. Even the nuns.
The Church lets Pelosi and Biden and other do what they like and say nothing, and then they expect ordinary people to do as the Church says. People see this and they do as they please the same as Pelosi and Biden. The Church cannot continue to allow its people who are in the limelight to do one thing and expect the lay people to not do the same.
So the people pick and choose.
The Catholic Church has outlasted every government and every unfaithful internal movement that has tried to coerce it to leave the teachings of Jesus Christ and do what the “world” says. As a child, we prayed for the conversion of Russia - now we need to pray for the conversion of America!
So called “Homosexual Marriage” is like “Unicycle Spaceflight” First, there ain’t no such animal and second, redefining spaceflight to include unicycles can only be done in the minds of the insane.
It is those Catholics that are wrong - not the Church. They choose the wrong path. Jesus said the path would be hard. The Church always has the doors open. Even the worst can be saved, if they choose to take the path Christ has laid out. As far as Pelosi and Biden? God gives us free will - when they receive communion unworthily, they bring judgement upon themselves. What is new about Catholics - or people of any Christian religion - picking and choosing what they want to believe? It has ever been so. We choose to sin or not to sin.
Where I very much agree is about nuns. They take a vow of obedience. They and our priests and bishops should set the example of holiness and obedience.
Just my uneducated and humble opinion.
God Bless
sneaks
Time for the Pope to step up: issue a formal proclamation that all who proclaim support for gay marriage and abortion (pro-choice) are prohibited from taking Holy Communion.
I think the Vatican understands that the democrat party here in the US probably don’t give a hoot about so called “gay marriages”, they are directly attacking Christianity...These are Marxists, they hate Christianity, they hate liberty, they hate morality, hence they hate us.
I agree with your opinion, I was just pointing out in my incompetent way that if catholics pick and choose what sins they commit they also pick who they vote for, and they pick the guy that supports their sins.
Time to sack up and start Excommunicating these vectors for issues like abortion.
God defines marriage, not the State. Any “marriage” a State defines is just as much as legal fiction as when it tells us that a corporation is a “person” that has freedom of speech.
Jesus tells us in Matthew chapter 19 that from the beginning of humanity, it was God’s intent that marriage would only be one man and one woman. Scripture in many ways and places also tells us that God defines sexual morality and that people who refuse to practice that His morality simply do not qualify for His freely given gift of eternal life. (for example, see Ephesians chapter 5)
The State attempts to force us to recognize its power. One way is to presume the power to define who is married and who is not. We cede this power in part because we allow the State to tax incomes and estates. To administer such taxing power, the State must define who it considers to be “married” and who is not. Just as when it defines a corporation to be a “person”, as silly as this would be to God, the State does not hesitate to define anyone it pleases as being “married, totally apart from how God would define them.
If you review the arguments advanced by supporters of same-sex marriage, you will find that many of them are related to taxation, inheritance and medical issues. But existing law addresses those and any defects in the law can be easily repaired apart from the issue of “marriage”.
I don’t want a government that can tell me what I may or may not do in the privacy of my own home or relationships. In a Constitutional Republic with a provision that prohibits Congress from making any law respecting religion, I have to allow others to have their own beliefs and morality. I can only be an advocate for the morality and beliefs that I think are true. I take my understanding of sexual morality from Scripture and that is where I learn that God considers sodomy to be an abomination to Him.
If a State decides that two (or more) people can marry, if that is all that happened, I could live with that because I don’t have to approve, change my beliefs or what beliefs I pass on to my children.
However, once gays and their supporters have sufficient influence with a State to redefine marriage, they don’t stop there. They use the State to forbid me from acting on my morality and beliefs. In fact, the State in some cases forces me to accommodation in their practices.
If I have children in public school, the State will insist on teaching them that gay marriage is just as normal as the God’s marriage. You will be sanctioned as a parent if you attempt to remove your child from such indoctrination.
If you run a business that could provide services to the public, you will be sanctioned if you decline to treat gays as non-gays. For example, if you run a wedding photography business, you will be sanctioned if you decline to photograph a gay wedding.
In short, gays will demand that non-gays accept them as moral equals, which they are not and cannot be. When the State says they are equal it is forbidden for a private citizen to dissent from that status. In doing so, they seek to force me to give them approval for something that I will never approve of. It is that last point that galls gays the most.
Curiously, when advocates of gay marriage are asked if their policy also would allow polygamy or polyandry, they recoil in horror and insist that it does not. However, logic demands that it does. I would ask how same-sex parents are going to react in the future when, for example, Utah public schools insist on indoctrinating the children that LDS-related polygamy is just as “normal” as same-sex “marriage”. The fact that this will be an issue will show yet again that gay “marriage” is not about marriage at all it is about forcing the rest of us to approve of repugnant sexual immorality, something that LDS polygamists never demanded.
Followup to my post:
Refusing To Shoot Gay Marriage Is Discrimination, Says New Mexico Appeals Court
I prefere a church with strong voice backed by action, not the mealy-mouthed blessings and mumbling from the pope. If you do not want homosexual marriage SAY SO! Loud and clear. Condemn homosexual marriage. God and your followers may actually get behind you and fight for righteousness once again.
Internal homosexuality has weakened the Church’s voice and standing in the world. Here is an opportunity to begin restoring the name “Catholic Church” to once again fight for things good, beautiful, and true like marriage between a man and a woman.
That's why the Catholic Church has lost it's credibility.
The Catholic Church 30 or so years ago should have started excommunicating high profile politicians who held and encouraged views contrary to the dogmatic teaching of the Church.
It's a 2 step process, You send a letter notifying the person his views are in conflict with the Church's- if they persist in those views you excommunicate them. The Church hasn't done that and they have lost credibility with the public. -tom
Even though they know in their hearts that the devil is now in the driver's seat of what was once the most moral government on planet earth.
Correct.
And every Catholic knows there are no repercussions.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.