Posted on 11/15/2009 6:04:29 PM PST by wide meadow
The D.C. Council is considering a law forbidding discrimination against those in gay marriages. The law would apply to all groups that have contracts with the District, including Catholic Charities, one of the city's largest social services providers. The Archdiocese of Washington says that because of the Church's opposition to same-sex marriage, it would have to suspend its social services to the poor, the homeless and others rather than provide employee benefits to same-sex married couples or allow them to adopt.
(Excerpt) Read more at views.washingtonpost.com ...
Really, now?
I have long had a moral objection to paying taxes to this spendthrift government, let's see how far I get with that...
I’m not saying there will be no consequences! There actually were lefty pacifists during Vietnam who stopped paying their taxes because they objected to the war. While they were nuts, they did at least follow up on their conviction. Of course, the government got the money anyway, ultimately, and some of them also went to jail.
But I’m talking about laws that affect behavior that is considered to impact on one’s personal morality. US law is based on the Constitution, which is shaped by natural law theory. In other words, the state cannot simply come along and impose some idea that the state feels may be good for it but which has no justification or support in natural law. (Islam does not accept natural law, btw, which is why all of their “law” is basically ritual law and they regard the violation of ritual law as being on the same level with something that we might regard as a moral offense, such as murder.)
Until now, the US has always respected the individual conscience in moral matters: hence the conscientious objector status granted to pacifists.
But we are living in an era when the state is trying to take over every aspect of individual life and define even the bases of our behavior, completely independent of the moral law upon which this system was built. The Church must protest against this and should not accept it.
Secular Humanists don’t have room for more than “the Church of Man.”
I agree with your assertion, that push come to shove, most people will put a strongly-held moral belief above the law - even to the point of being in violation of the law. It's wishful fantasy on the part of many, if not most lawmakers, that the law is effective at changing hearts and minds.
The poll question isn't useful to discriminate where the responders would draw the line. Ask them if it's okay to steal a loaf of bread to feed a starving child, and the poll will yield the opposite result (even though stealing bread is against the law, and at bottom is, I think, immoral as well).
Should Catholic Charities be compelled to charity? Obviously, that's an oxymoron. Charity that happens only on account of compulsion, or threat of compulsion, isn't charity at all.
When you accept Ceasars gold, you also inherit Ceasars rules.
Giving charity is Job #1 for the Church, ma’am. The right way appears to be complying with the law (which makes the Church ineligible to participate in any DC-generated charity effort) and to provide services on a go-it-alone basis, without reference to the DC ‘government’. I don’t know how that would be framed or constituted but behaving lawfully and obeying Jesus Christ is what the Church must do.
This is a power play on the part of the State to subjugate the Church. Has happened before and will happen again. Usual result is: Church suffers in the near term, State collapses and many people die in the long term.
Sure wish there was another way to correct this, but that’s the historical record in the matter. Just history repeating itself by aid of people who believe that history doesn’t apply to them (assuming they’re aware that history is available on the topic).
Far more succintly put than my comment.../hat tip
Rather than being forced to accept something antithetical to its teaching, the Church should instead withdraw from charitable works in DC and let the denizens thereof live with those consequences. Again, the misapprehension on this thread is that the CHURCH is somehow BENEFITING from this. The Ceasers gold you reference does NOT benefit the church, but rather the objects of Charity in DC.
The question should have been worded "Should DC have the power to pass a law mandating that the Church accept homosexuality". Because of the poor wording of the question, it could apply to almost anything controversial and mean something totally different. Like Marisa Tomei said in My Cousin Vinny, "it's a BS question."
I think that is where some on this thread are coming from: Churches shouldn't be able to just decide which laws they consider moral and which ones they don't.
even your question isn’t accurate. The question really is will the District grant an exemption in exchange for the charitable works that the Church performs. If Muslims wanted an exemption from a particular law in exchange for a service/charity that it performs, that would be a cost/benefit analysis that the governmental entity would have to perform, as well. The proponents have exalted the legal sanctioning of homosexuality to the exclusion of all else— fine, then they can do without the benefit of the charitable work that the Catholic Church does in DC and i assure you, it’s CONSIDERABLE.
More accurate wording would be
“Should Catholic Charities in it’s Contract with the District of Columbia (DC), be allowed to distribute DC funds (tax revenues) without regard to the rules of the DC.
I guess you missed the part about Congress passing no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.
Catholic Charities is a private, religious, social services organization. Since when should there be a law dictating who they choose to help?
Religious organizations have been exempt from other laws they consider immoral.
People are allowed conscientious objector status for not engaging in combat or serving in the military. How is this any different?
yup... i grew up one block from the church, the convent 1/2 block away. we still have a convent but we're down to two Nuns(i think)from eight when i was young(but then we had a head priest, two juniors and a monk) and as far as wearing the habit, feh. haven't seen one in years.
they don't even have a basketball team anymore.
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