Church opposition to same-sex marriages sharpens...

Vivificat! News, Opinions, Commentary, Reflections, from a personal Catholic perspective ^ | 16 February 2007 | Teófilo

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...in Italy...

Vatican, Feb. 16, 2007 (CWNews.com) - With many Italian Catholics expressing support for a legislative proposal that would grant civil-union recognition to same-sex couples, the Vatican newspaper has defended the right of Church leaders to speak out on the issue.

L’Osservatore Romano decried the calls from liberal Catholics for an end to public pronouncements from the Italian bishops’ conference. The proposed legislation has a clear impact on public morality, the Vatican newspaper reasoned. “Maybe it is necessary to recall that the things of God and the things of man coincide more often than we recognize,” L’Osservatore Romano added.

The newspaper’s response came after the daily La Repubblica published a survey showing that 67% of the country’s practicing Catholics supported the civil-union proposal. The newspaper found 80% support for the legislation among the general population.

La Repubblica called attention to the support expressed by former Italian President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro, a devout Catholic, who said that overt intervention by the bishops threatened the freedom of Catholic members of parliament.

In Bologna, a group of prominent Catholics issued a public manifesto, calling upon the bishops to refrain from further comment on the civil-union legislation.

...and in Puerto Rico.

San Juan, Feb 16, 2007 / 01:05 pm (CNA).- The President of the Puerto Rican Bishops’ Conference, Archbishop Roberto Gonzalez Nieves of San Juan, reaffirmed the Catholic Church’s opposition to a move that would make homosexual unions equal to marriage. The archbishop warned that such a move in Puerto Rico would obscure “the fundamental values that belong to the common and original patrimony of the human family.”

During a speech before the Puerto Rican Senate, which is debating a reform of the Civil Code, Archbishop Gonzalez explained that making the two equal would affect the moral fiber of society. He pointed out that while the Church does not reject homosexuals as persons, mankind cannot redefine nature as it is created by God.

“Some statutes of the Civil Code would do irreversible damage to the dignity of the human person and would constitute an attack upon the integrity of the Puerto Rican family,” he warned.

The archbishop made his comments during special hearings held by the Senate committee charged with reforming the Civil Code. Committee leaders Jorge De Castro Font and Liza Fernandez publicly stated their opposition to passing laws in support of any kind of consensual civil union, whether heterosexual or homosexual.

Senator Jose Emilio Gonzalez moved to eliminate the proposals for homosexual unions from the reforms under consideration, arguing that it was meaningless to debate something that was not going to be approved. However, the other members of the committee, including De Castro Font, voted to leave the proposals in place in order to allow other members to express their opinions on the issue.

The committee will be debating reforms of the Civil Code each Wednesday until the end of March.

Commentary. I applaud the witness of the Italian and my native Puerto Rican Catholic Churches in favor of the inviolability and integrity of the family and the natural design of marriage, defined as between one man and one woman.

In different political and cultural contexts, the Church continues her fight against the forces of evil which seek to overturn traditional morality, destroy the family, and expel the Church from the public debate on matters of concern.

Guess what, we are not going to let it happen. We are not going to lay dead while the world, the flesh, and the devil walk over us in triumph. Fat chance. Ain't gonna happen. We won't let them.

Let us pray for the Holy Father, Pope Benedict, and the bishops of Italy, Puerto Rico, and everywhere in the world where they are facing down the manifold threats against the family and the very nature of man the culture of death and its minions portent. This is a spiritual battle, so let us pray,

Saint Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle. Be our protection against the wickedness and snares of the devil. May God rebuke him, we humbly pray; and do Thou, O Prince of the Heavenly Host - by the Divine Power of God - cast into hell, satan and all the evil spirits, who roam throughout the world seeking the ruin of souls.

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Typos. Blunders. Mine.

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PING!