Posted on 05/04/2015 6:14:42 AM PDT by marshmallow
In a must-read column for the Wall Street Journal, Rev. Donald Sensing, a Methodist minister from Tennessee, argues that acceptance of same-sex marriage “will not cause the degeneration of the institution of marriage; it is the result of it.”
Understand that Rev. Sensing is not happy with the situation as he sees it. “I believe that this state of affairs is contrary to the will of God,” he writes. But he argues persuasively that the public understanding of marriage was doomed when society accepted the Pill, and thereby severed the link between marriage and procreation. Marriage, he observes, had traditionally been recognized and protected by society as the only institution in which sexual intercourse—and, therefore, child-bearing—was sanctioned.
”Society's stake in marriage as an institution is nothing less than the perpetuation of the society itself, a matter of much greater than merely private concern,” Rev. Sensing writes. But once contraception became the norm, and procreation was deemed incidental, the fundamental reason for legal protection of marriage was obscured.
Today, marriage is generally understood as a social and legal contract between two people: nothing more. (In fact marriage is the only legal contract that society does not enforce; either partner can break the bond with impunity.) “But what weddings do not do any longer,” Rev. Sensing remarks, “is give to a man and a woman society’s permission to have sex and procreate.”
In today’s America, an increasingly large proportion of young people believe that they have permission to have sex whenever they want, with whomever they want. As for procreation, that too is taking place, more and more frequently, outside the bounds of wedlock.
But public attitudes could change, as they have changed in the past 50 years, and a change in attitudes could lead to another change in laws. So.....
(Excerpt) Read more at catholicculture.org ...
Provocative, thanks for posting:
However, while the author(s) make some valid points, I am not sure I buy the notion that “the pill” separates marriage from procreation - defacto. I would suspect, though I’ve never seen the stats, that in most marriages where there is some birth control practiced, there is also procreation. The two are not mutually exclusive concepts over the course of time.
Thus I don’t think same sex marriage is caused by this deterioration in real marriage. A factor? No doubt. But the gaystapo was going to do what they were going to do regardless.
We can debate whether each of these is good or bad. But marriage has been under assault for years. We can't say no fault quickie divorces are acceptable but gay marriage isn't. It all weakens marriage.
The pill was just a new form of birth control. People have been using birth control for a very long time.
I haven't read the article yet, but the title is fascinating and the first word I saw after opening is ... "provocative"
Now I'll go read
The problem goes back much further than the pill.
It goes back to allowing divorce.
I’ve said for a long time that the power of a woman to control her fertility was the most revolutionary event in the last 250 years, maybe in the history of our species. And the key word is control. Yes, people who use birth control also procreate but the issue remains, who decides, the couple or God?
When my wife and I got married, we were young, stupid and broke. We used “The Pill” to ensure that when we had children we were mature, wiser and solvent. Yeah, I can see the whole fabric of society collapsing if EVERYONE did that.
One of the most profound arguments for keeping marriage between a man and a woman is the history of marriage “rights” or “privileges,” however you want to label them:
Because the union could result in a child, special considerations applied.
In unions that cannot biologically produce a child, they don’t apply, because the couple has a choice in adoption or technologically assisted conception.
Simple but perhaps thought-provoking in relation to the argument in the article.
Every technological intervention into the natural progress of sex produces unseen but vast changes to the culture.
Contraception was the edge of the, well not the cliff, but it was a more precipitous slide than just a “slippery slope” and it is irreversible short of a tremendous religious wave sweeping over society. If such a wave were to come, though, I think a real early days sort of Persecution would begin in earnest.
There have been many factors that caused the demise of TM, but equating it to homosexual marriage was the curb stomp.
Sorry, but reaching a bit on this one... Contraception has been part of the human experience as long as humans have been able to figure out ways to use it. I forget the name of the plant, but there was a plant that was literally harvested to extinction because it was known for its contraceptive properties: http://www.jstor.org/stable/29774642?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents alligator dung, honey, 1/2 a lemon and various other techniques have been documented as used for such purposes all the way back to at least 2000BC.
Sure the pill may be far more medically reliable, but birth control is hardly something that is new in the history of marriage and human sexuality.
Indeed!
Contraception promised sex without consequences.
Because it is not perfect it necessitated abortion and undermined fidelity and marriage.
I disagree. Marriage is still necessary to protect the ability to raise kids. Group health ins, shared retirement, etc.
It may not be fashionable, but protecting the environment to raise kids is still necessary.
Well, then.
We should just abandon the concept altogether!
Which was part of my point, yes. However, the pill is different from some other forms - since the pill, or some pills, apparently do not prevent conception. But that's another topic, and I don't pretend to know enough about that to speak of it in depth.
that’s a stretch...a biiiiiiiiiig stretch.
“The pill was just a new form of birth control.”
No. It was a radically new method of birth control. Also, it was THE beginning of the Sexual Revolution which has been endlessly destructive.
“People have been using birth control for a very long time.”
Yes, but it was NEVER officially approved of by any state or church until quite recently in human history. Notice that? Ever wonder why?
So has adultery. That does not make it legitimate. Contraception within marriage denies the openness to children as one of the primary ends of sex and marriage. It is a revolt against our surrender to the will of God, seeking only the pleasures of marriage without the responsibilities. It is also a invitation to non-marital sexual relations that seek the pleasure of sex as an end in itself. If married couples can engage in sexual activity without the purpose of begetting and raising children, why cannot others?
Wow dude, wow. How absurd. First of all, the adultery analogy is simply a non-starter. There is no legitimate marriage with adultery. There is legitimate marriage with birth control, since most who practice it have also had children. Epic fail on that one.
Also absurd is the notion that within marriage, that sex should always bring with it the possibility of conception. What about those who've had multiple kids and don't want more - and thus have surgically made the decision not to? What about post menopausal sex? Are these not legitimate? That's just ridiculous.
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