Posted on 03/18/2007 6:12:58 AM PDT by NYer
The challenges of raising three children in the Maguire-Newman home are much the same as those faced in suburban America across the country. The Catholic household, two parents with three school-age children, springs to life at 7 a.m. on most days. While one parent makes breakfast and packs lunches, the other makes beds and monitors homework assignments.
"My observation is that children are a lot more receptive to work and instruction in the first 90 minutes before they have enough energy to be resistant," says Gregory Maguire, a celebrated author of children's literature. He is best known for the widely popular novel Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, a bestseller written for adults that has been adapted into a Tony Award-winning hit musical.
Maguire is quick to explain, "It's not because we want them to be superstars" nor do they have "serious learning problems." Rather, he said, it's a matter of "keeping up in a highly functioning school system in which we find ourselves."
All three children -- two boys and a girl, ages 5, 6 and 9 -- were adopted from countries in Latin America and Southeast Asia. They are by Maguire's account "noisy, smart and obedient within a range," having settled comfortably into an all-American way of life, with interests varying from ballet and piano to soccer and computer games. They are well-liked by their friends, Maguire said, adding, "We have yet to hear or face in nine years living in Concord any resistance to us as a gay couple with a family."
Maguire and his partner, artist Andy Newman, are not only a gay couple raising children, but they are legally married under a new law in Massachusetts, the only state with equal marriage rights for lesbians and gay men.
Maguire was scheduled to give a talk on "Conscience and Same-Sex Marriage" at New Ways Ministry's Sixth National Symposium on Catholicism and Homosexuality March 16-18 in Minneapolis. New Ways Ministry describes itself as "a gay-positive ministry of advocacy and justice for lesbian and gay Catholics."
The Maguire and Newman clan is part of a changing landscape of contemporary American family life. More than 8,500 same-sex couples have married in Massachusetts since May 2004, including many with children. Nationwide, estimates of lesbian and gay parents range from 2 million to 8 million.
But a political battle to roll back civil-marriage rights for gays looms. Massachusetts state lawmakers have voted to send a proposed constitutional same-sex marriage ban to voters. If the legislature approves the measure again, this year or next, voters would have the final say in November 2008.
The local church has been an active player, with the Boston Cardinal Sean O'Malley and other local bishops lobbying lawmakers to restore a traditional definition of marriage.
Maguire and Newman are doing their part to prevent that from happening. Last year they testified at legislative hearings against the ban. This year they will host a fundraiser for MassE quality.org, a statewide organization dedicated to protecting same-sex marriage. The couple has joined thousands of others across the state who have signed an online statement for Roman Catholics supporting the civil marriage rights of same-sex couples.
Despite pronouncements from Rome and Boston, Maguire, a cradle Catholic, remains devout. Newman is a convert. Together, they are instilling in their children the basics of Catholicism. All three have been christened. The oldest has received first Communion. The family begins every meal by saying grace. The children know the Our Father, Hail Mary and the rosary. A cross hangs by the front door. "We are a Catholic family," Maguire said. "We go to church on a regular basis, are respected in our parish, and are healthy contributors financially and morally."
In an interview with NCR, Maguire extended an invitation for Pope Benedict XVI to share a meal and meet the family. He would like the pope to see "we're teaching by example how we must take care of each other, love each other," he said. "That is the heart of the Christian message."
Locally, many gay Catholics, as well as supportive clergy, hope for dialogue. A group of more than 700 interfaith clergy, the Religious Coalition for the Freedom to Marry, has asked for a meeting to discuss a civil marriage with O'Malley. The clergy wish to explain more fully a key distinction between civil and religious marriage and how a gay-marriage ban will discriminate against the religious liberties of gay people. But so far the chancery has not responded to the request.
"The hope is that the conversation occurs among the people in the pews," Maguire said. "If we can't get the message to the clergy that discrimination will not be tolerated, the people will go around" the leadership, and the "clergy will play catch-up."
A recent poll from Decision Research shows that a majority of Catholics in Massachusetts -- 53 percent -- favor same-sex civil marriage.
Raised in an orphanage by priests and nuns, as well as by a Catholic family, Maguire attended parochial schools in upstate New York. "The fact that I grew up as a Catholic, part of my system of thinking -- the grammar of how I frame the moral questions is Catholic grammar," Maguire said. "I have the great blessing and good fortune of finding myself during formative years in a very progressive church that was always eager to ask the next question rather than provide the next answer." And Maguire explained, "A parent's first obligation is to speak to his children with the most authentic language he has. For me, that is Catholicism."
His "intellectual and spiritual training" to "question, but not necessarily conclude," he considers a "birthright" and "inheritance."
"So I don't feel as much of a disjuncture as many people do," he said, "because when I sit in the pew and hear a letter from a bishop, or an injunction even from the pope about gay parents doing damage to children, I just say: Well, he has not asked the right question -- hasn't asked Andy and me, 'Why are you making so many sacrifices to take care of these orphans?' "
At New Ways Ministry's national symposium, Maguire plans to tell his story, leading a focused discussion on gay parenting in a sacramental church. "It means far less to them [his children] that they have two dads than two parents who are there when they go off to school and when they return," he said.
The tangible benefits and social status of marriage -- its legal, public and moral commitments -- also helps, Maguire explained. "We are able to say to our children honorably that we are married." Among all the differences they embody, "being brown-skinned, adopted and from foreign countries, at least they don't have to deal with that difference. Their parents are as married as any others."
Nonetheless, remaining in the church, Maguire acknowledges, is a struggle. "I run the great risk of being misunderstood or dismissed," he said. A declaration from the Vatican in 2003 that gay parents do "violence" by raising children caused us "grave distress," Maguire added.
But he explained, to "leave the church over what it's saying, I would have to pluck out my eyes because I don't like what I am seeing." For Maguire, that action would be tantamount to spiritual suicide, he said. "I would far rather be brave and sit in the pew" and "with a fair amount of respect, be the Rosa Parks of the situation. I am not moving. I didn't move before, and I'm not moving now. I am going to be buried from this church."
One can only imagine the abuse these little boys will eventually be subjected to. I wonder if these sickos are Nambla members? I can guarantee not a single normal human will ever have access to their computers.
These men seem not to understand the difference between legality and morality. They also clearly do not understand what it means to be a Catholic.
Some of my Orthodox FRiends have patiently explained why they number "self-esteem" among the "deadly sins". I think, maybe, I'm beginning to understand.
They are actually guardians, not parents.
Gay, Catholic CINO and parents of three
There we go. That makes this heresy a bit better!
On occasion, I watch Discovery Health. They offer some interesting programs on birth and adoption. Last week, I turned it on after the segment had begun and saw a woman getting ready to give birth. The ob/gyn came across as 'gay' but I dismissed it. Then the camera panned to a man pushing a stroller into the labor ward and another man carrying a young child. The woman in the bed, popped out a beautiful child and the two men ran over to 'oooh and aaaah' over it. (made me physically nauteous) How could this woman give up the child she just bore? Oh wait ... she is a lesbian with two children and wanted them to know the joy of having one of their own. (triple barf alert)
Maguire extended an invitation for Pope Benedict XVI to share a meal and meet the family.
Un-be-fricking-lievable.
The fact that this pervert gets ink is the beginning of his power. He should be getting walked to the door and laughed at.
The media is the biggest enemy of Christianity and it is the media that this pervert is using against what he professes to want to be a part of. He might as well run to witches for support.
They are obviously not Catholic. (You cannot be a habitual practitioner of homosexual behavior and be Catholic, or Christian for that matter)
They are not parents. Just because they have purchased some children to abuse doen't make them parents. A parent would not subject their child to a broken and hopeless life where they would be intentioanlly taught lies that will destroy them in due time.
The third law of homosexuality:
Any exposure of children to homosexual behavior is child abuse
Gay, Catholic and parents of three
Isn't that an oxymoron?
Has John Edwards weighed in on this?
Indeed. Given the direction in I Corinthians 5:1-13, one wonders why these sodomites are permitted in the door.
I don't know whose teachings these gay men are following, but it sure isn't Jesus's!
For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. 2 Timothy 4:3
Grey quote. Who was it said something like:
If a thing/idea/opinion/judgement (take your pick) is wrong, it matters not how many think it's right. The number of supporters has little to do with the rightness or wrongness of the judgement.
Sorry, previous should have read "Great quote" not "Grey."
Thank you. It's from the Word of God.
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