Posted on 11/25/2014 8:26:36 AM PST by Mrs. Don-o
This week, the Vatican has hosted an international colloquium called Humanum dedicated to “the complementarity of man and woman” and the importance of marriage. Not just limited to Catholics, the conference has included people from many different faiths, including a litany of the United States’ anti-LGBT conservatives.
The messages of Humanum have sounded mostly like excerpts from Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus, asserting various archaic gender stereotypes as evidence that men and women are uniquely designed to be together — and that no other relationship should ever be considered a marriage. For example, Russell Moore, media-savvy head of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, told the conference that spouses are not interchangeable. “We are not created as ‘spouse A’ and ‘spouse B,’” he insisted, “but as man and as woman, and in marriage as husband and as wife, in parenting as mother and as father.Masculinity and femininity are not aspects of the fallen order to be overcome, but are instead part of what God declared from the beginning to be ‘very good.’”
Even in his remarks opening the conference, Pope Francis alluded to the “unique” way that men and women define marriage when he prayed that the colloquium “will be an inspiration to all who seek to support and strengthen the union of man and woman in marriage as a unique, natural, fundamental and beautiful good for persons, communities, and whole societies.”
Not only were these gender stereotypes used to oppose same-sex marriage, but they were also used to erase LGBT people entirely. This was particularly evident in a series of six video segments that were shown throughout the conference, featured spiritual leaders from across the globe. The third of these clips features Thérèse Hargot-Jacob, a French philospher, sexotherapist, and blogger, explaining that a person’s sexuality is determined entirely by whether they have a man’s body or a woman’s body. “How can you know what being a homosexual or heterosexual means?” she asks, concluding the terms are “meaningless” and merely “created for political battles.”
Her interview is followed by Phillipe Ariño, who explains that, as a person with homosexual desire, he has embraced non-sexual friendships to somehow learn how to love himself as a man. The National Organization for Marriage has previously highlighted Ariño as a “gay voice against gay marriage.” Watch the Humanum clip:
These videos, according to the Southern Baptist Convention’s chief opponent of transgender equality, were apparently produced by none other than infamous anti-gay researcher Mark Regnerus.
The colloquium has been fairly lacking in substance, which was particularly evident when Pastor Rick Warren spoke. He spent the first few minutes of his remarks “not kidding” about how all of the points he originally intended to make had already been made by other speakers. Warren still found plenty to say, including the idea that the sexual revolution, including same-sex marriage, is merely “in style” and all styles go out of style.”Every lie eventually crumbles under its own deception,” he said, “but the Word of God and the Church of God continues.”
It’s unclear if Humanum has any clear outcome, but if nothing else, it cements the idea that religious conservatives are going to continue to assert theology to dismiss the lived experiences of LGBT people. As was similarly laid out at the Southern Baptist Convention’s recent conference on the topic, the only “choice” for people with same-sex orientations is celibacy; “family” only means couples with a marriage between a man and a woman; and biology determines gender, so transgender people simply don’t exist. Though science is increasingly debunking essentialist gender stereotypes — “Men Are From Mars, So Are Women,” as Forbes wrote in 2012 — they will continue to be the foundation for religious opposition to LGBT equality.
Pope says "¡Si, Si, Si!"
And the sex-parodists and genital-mutilators --- the alphabetic series that begins with LGBT and ends with STD and AIDS --- are not at all amused.
They see they have real opposition here.
Pretty encouraging.
Go to the link to find some really fine videos from the conference. In a word, "Yay."
Oh, those Trite Gender Norms. I think they had a couple of hit songs last year on the Octane channel, but then the lead guitarist OD’d ...
Men and women WERE created to be together. Even the most rank, vile materialist should see the self-evident truth in that, but the Deceiver has blinded their eyes and hearts.
I think the Vatican could be better served sticking with what it is written in the Bible about many of these matters.
The nature of sin has not changed much in thousands of years of recorded human history.
I love to counter the LGBT bunch with - “Male/female marriage: Proven by four million years of evolution!”
ROTFL!
Say it isn’t so!
</grammar alert> Words have gender, beings have a sex. Sex is displayed in the chromosomes. That is all.
Interesting that the left now refers to ojective physical realities as “sterotypes”.
I don’t need to read all that swill. But if the Vatican and this conference are bringing some sanity back, then I’m for it.
What does the Bible say about sex reassignment surgery?
“”Trite” = “firmly established in nature and Western culture for millennia.”
Eastern, Northern, and Southern culture too!!
When do I get to be on TV and get some some money?
The GiBLeT people are not amused.
I think you have to swap some of her cat parts for dog parts. That would probably lead to you being lauded for your incredible courage!
I think the Bible would say for a person to accept the way the Good Lord originally created him.
I am in awe of my trans cat’s courage.
But what does the Bible actually say?
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