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Posted on 02/17/2010 8:06:30 AM PST by NYer
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Public officials who openly support same-sex marriage cannot consider themselves to be Catholic, said an Italian cardinal.
"It's impossible to consider oneself a Catholic if that person in one way or another recognizes same-sex marriage as a right," said Cardinal Carlo Caffarra of Bologna.
The Vatican newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano, reprinted a portion of a doctrinal note the cardinal released Feb. 14 concerning "Marriage and Homosexual Unions." The note, which appeared in full on the archdiocese's Web site, was aimed at helping enlighten Catholics in public office so that "they would not make choices that would publicly contradict their affiliation with the church," he wrote.
Catholic politicians must not only promote the common good; they also "have a serious duty to make sure their beliefs, thoughts and proposals concerning the common good are consistent," he wrote.
"It's impossible for the Catholic faith and support for putting homosexual unions on equal footing with marriage to coexist in one's conscience -- the two contradict each other," said the note.
Even more serious would be the case of a Catholic lawmaker who introduces a measure or votes in favor of a law that supports gay marriage, he said. "This is a publicly and gravely immoral act," he wrote.
If a Catholic official were to ever implement or enforce such a law, "God forbid, we will, at the proper moment, give the necessary directives," he wrote.
Cardinal Caffarra, who holds a number of positions in the Roman Curia including as a member of the Pontifical Council for the Family, the Pontifical Academy for Life and the Vatican's highest tribunal, known as the Supreme Court of the Apostolic Signature, wrote that the consequences of same-sex marriage would be "devastating."
"One of the pillars of our legal order -- marriage as a public good -- would crumble," he wrote.
"The state's legal order must not be neutral on marriage and homosexual unions just as it can't be (neutral) on the common good: society owes its survival to families founded on marriage, not homosexual unions," he wrote.
The cardinal also said allowing same-sex couples to adopt children would seriously hinder the child's proper development because, without a mother and a father, the child would lack a male and female role model.
A consultor for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Franciscan Father Maurizio Faggioni, said the issue is not new and was addressed by the congregation in its 2003 document, "Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions between Homosexual Persons."
The document detailed the arguments against legal recognition of same-sex unions and asked lawmakers to fight growing movements to legalize gay marriage.
Father Faggioni said the church teaches respect for homosexual individuals and their rights as people, such as the right to employment and freedom from unjust discrimination.
"However, for the church, gay marriage is not part of an individual's rights," he told Catholic News Service Feb. 16.
Wanting to put a homosexual union on par with a marriage between a man and a woman "is unacceptable," he said.
However, he said, supporting gay marriage laws would not incur excommunication since that sanction is reserved to extremely serious crimes like abortion or abuse of the sacraments.
The church seeks to encourage Catholic politicians to be inspired by church teaching and be consistent with what they believe and do, he said.
"Otherwise why would someone still call himself a Catholic if he is not inspired by the magisterium?" he said.
Then Excommunicate them.
The Catholic Church has no strength to enforce its doctrine. Therefore it has no doctrine.
If you have a military and refuse to use it, you have no military.
Quit talking and start engaging your blaspheming and apostate followers. Make the word CATHOLIC mean something. Then the pews will be filled and the Mass will have meaning.
A Catholic priest is not even to marry a man and a woman, if they openly tell him they have no intention on procreating. The purpose of marriage is procreation (family). If a couple cannot physically have their own children, I would imagine then they should be open for adopting before a priest can marry them, however, I do not know those details in full, only the former ones.
Will the church refuse to accept the donations from those that say are not real Catholics?
Does a couple have to meet a minimum financial criteria before they can adopt?
All bishops, including the Pope, must say this, and authoritatively. Look at how many alleged-Catholic US politicians have come out for homosexual marriage in recent years. And their bishops have been near silent.
I imagine they do ...
“Otherwise why would someone still call himself a Catholic if he is not inspired by the magisterium?” he said.
Good, it’s what we’ve been saying all along. I’m glad he’s calling them out.
FYI to others - they’ve already excommunicated themselves. Now even moreso...
Homosexuals are fond of saying that the government has no right to legislate what happens in the privacy of ones bedroom, but that is an easy straw man to knock down because the government DOES tell you what you can and cannot do in the privacy of bedroom. You cannot engage in child molestation, make meth, plan an overthrow of the government, engage in identity theft, or any of thousands of illegal activities.
So the government DOES have the power to decide where the line should be and since we the people still have some semblance of control of the government, we have decided that marriage shall be between on eman and one woman ONLY.
“Will the church refuse to accept the donations from those that say are not real Catholics?”
Do they ever get any?
They just need to find the spine to excommunicate these people, which would break the link between these corrupt politicians and the Cathollic Church, period. One wonders why they struggle to do this. What do they fear from doing what is right? Are they just plain old fashioned cowards? But they have no problem excommunicating those traditional minded priests and bishops who simply try to hold the Church to her own teachings. I look for this brave Cardinal to be silenced by the Vatican. What a tragic mess the heirarchy have made of the Catholic Church.
“The purpose of marriage is procreation (family)”
I’d say the purpose of marriage is to create a family. A husband and wife are a family even without children. I’ve never seen a Church doctrine which requires people to have children if they are infertile.
How can you “not be considered Catholic” if you are not excommunicated? I don’t get it.
I wish the Church would stop looking to the gubberment to defend and define marriage; it has been awful for the institution. Either a piece of paper from the gubberment saying two people are married is worthless or not.
Freegards
No, that part I didn’t know about ... I already stated that ...
Did you read the article? The Cardinal states: "However, he said, supporting gay marriage laws would not incur excommunication since that sanction is reserved to extremely serious crimes like abortion or abuse of the sacraments."
Would that mean that the church will not marry a couple that cannot procreate or have the income to adopt?
I know a young couple who where married in the Baptist Church. They have no intentions of having children. That surprised me because, as you both pointed out, the purpose of marriage is to form a family. Were a Catholic couple to choose not to have children, the Catholic Church would refuse to marry them. In marriage, one must be open to children, be it through natural means or adoption.
I would imagine there are many practising Catholics that support gay marriage, otherwise this wouldn’t be published, would it?
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