Posted on 03/23/2014 5:46:26 PM PDT by ebb tide
Archbishop Kaigama, once again (see here and here) you and your fellow Bishops of the Martyr-Church of Nigeria stand with the Catholic saints and prophets of all times and places, with the firm and unswerving moral teaching of the Church of all ages: thank you for your witness.
The universal Church cannot hinder but instead must help the Church in Nigeria in its struggle to present and teach the unchanging truth of the Catholic Magisterium.
“It is a mischievous and faulty generalization to reason that because we resist same-sex ‘marriage’ we differ from our Pope who said: ‘If a person is gay and seeks God and has goodwill, who am I to judge?’ The Archbishop continued: “Our compassion for the weak, the marginalized and those who suffer discrimination is unwavering and uncompromising. We minister to all.”
The Metropolitan of Jos Province further explained: “We stand for the promotion and protection of human rights which are consistent with our religious and cultural values. Legalizing same-sex ‘marriage’ will open the flood gates to so many moral issues that can seriously compromise our African culture and becloud our evangelization efforts in Nigeria.”
“Nigerian Catholics do not hate men and women who are of biologically gay orientation, but strongly affirm that gay unions or ‘marriages’ are simply not in conformity with our Christian theology or traditional Nigerian morality.”
The explanation of Archbishop Kaigama became necessary following the attack from some quarters on the Catholic Bishops’ Conference for commending President Goodluck Jonathan for signing the Anti-same –sex Bill into Law. ... “When the CBCN sent a letter commending President Goodluck Jonathan on the stand against same-sex union or ‘marriage’, we did so to uphold the age-long biblical and traditional morality of our people that marriage has always been a union between a man and a woman. Same-sex unions or so-called ‘marriages’ are alien to us and we resist the idea but we will always extend compassion of Christ to men and women with biological orientation that is gay or lesbian and defend their rights just as we have constantly defended the rights of all persons discriminated against.”
Archbishop Kaigama therefore called on “individuals, pressure groups and governments from abroad who are very anxious to fight for the rights of gays in Nigeria” to “first help us deal with the menacing activities of terrorists who claim that it is their right to kill and destroy, and have caused so many deaths of innocent Nigerians.”
[Source: Catholic News Service of Nigeria]
IBAMIDPI
A few days later, however, a strongly worded editorial in the The Southern Cross, a newspaper run jointly by the bishops of South Africa, Botswana and Swaziland, took aim at the new law, calling on the Catholic Church in Africa “to stand with the powerless” and “sound the alarm at the advance throughout Africa of draconian legislation aimed at criminalizing homosexuals.”
The editorial decried the “deep-seated sense of homophobia” in Africa and said the church had too often been “silent, in some cases even quietly complicit” in the face of the new anti-gay measures. It also noted that the Catechism of the Catholic Church (No. 2358) explicitly states that gay people “must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity” and that “every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided.”
The differences are manifesting themselves elsewhere, as well.
For example, the Southern Cross editorial blasted as “astonishing” a claim last month by a retired Spanish bishop, Fernando Sebastian Aguilar, who said that homosexuality is a “defect” comparable to his own high blood pressure.
Calling it *biologically gay orientation* is the chink in the armor.
They're doomed. It's just a matter of time before it's accepted and blessed.
They're doomed. It's just a matter of time before it's accepted and blessed.
They are weakening the defenses, and soon they will find their position undefendable.
They are speaking with the language of the left, and as long as they play on their terms they will loose.
Good catch. There is no such thing.
[“It is a mischievous and faulty generalization to reason that because we resist same-sex ‘marriage’ we differ from our Pope who said: ‘If a person is gay and seeks God and has goodwill, who am I to judge?’...]
Or try this one on for size:
‘If a person is in the Italian Mafia and seeks God and has goodwill, who am I to judge?’ Francis didn’t say this one but rather something quite opposite. Why the different approach to the different type of sinner, I wonder?
Agreed. That stood out to me as well. That phrase isn’t even in the JPII-post Vatican II Catechism.
They are speaking with the language of the left, and as long as they play on their terms they will loose.
Absolutely.
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