OMG you guys, fun! Some Roman Catholic leaders say they just simply aren’t going to follow any same-sex marriage laws that force them to take part. They also won’t follow any abortion laws that do the same. Which, actually, IS NOT A NEWS STORY, because religious institutions will always remain exempt from these rules.
In what amounts to a grand publicity stunt, a manifesto (a manifesto! loves it!) will be released today in D.C., where the signatories “pledge to each other, and to our fellow believers, that no power on earth, be it cultural or political, will intimidate us into silence or acquiescence.” Civil disobedience, y’all. It’s like gays who refuse to pay their taxes, but with Jesus’s backing.
For a group that accuses the gays of a radical homosexual agenda, it’s curious to see a group of Roman Catholic and Orthodox Christian leaders fronting a radical Christian agenda, hoping to score a leg up in the health care debate, the ENDA debate, the stem cell and abortion debate, the gay marriage debate, and, probably, the boxers-or-briefs debate.
The document — authored by evangelical Prison Fellowship founder Charles Colson (pictured); openly practicing Catholic, National Organization for Marriage chairman, and Princeton professor Robert George (this guy!); and Alabama’s Beeson Divinity School dean Rev. Timothy George — is called “Manhattan Declaration: A Call of Christian Conscience.” It’s 4,700 words. It’s signed by Maggie Gallagher! And it is hilarious!
Particularly because, uh, it misses the entire point of any of these pieces of legislation: Religious groups, including the “always-victimized” Catholic Church, remain exempt. They don’t have to conduct gay wedding ceremonies. They don’t have to have their hospitals perform abortions. They can continue discriminating against gays in hiring.
What they can’t do, however, is continue receiving taxpayer dollars to fund their projects that do discriminate. That’s not an elimination of rights. That’s a correction of them.
NEXT PAGE: The entire text of the manifesto.
Preamble
Christians are heirs of a 2,000-year tradition of proclaiming God’s word, seeking justice in our societies, resisting tyranny, and reaching out with compassion to the poor, oppressed and suffering.
While fully acknowledging the imperfections and shortcomings of Christian institutions and communities in all ages, we claim the heritage of those Christians who defended innocent life by rescuing discarded babies from trash heaps in Roman cities and publicly denouncing the Empire’s sanctioning of infanticide. We remember with reverence those believers who sacrificed their lives by remaining in Roman cities to tend the sick and dying during the plagues, and who died bravely in the coliseums rather than deny their Lord.
After the barbarian tribes overran Europe, Christian monasteries preserved not only the Bible but also the literature and art of Western culture. It was Christians who combated the evil of slavery: Papal edicts in the 16th and 17th centuries decried the practice of slavery and first excommunicated anyone involved in the slave trade; evangelical Christians in England, led by John Wesley and William Wilberforce, put an end to the slave trade in that country. Christians under Wilberforce’s leadership also formed hundreds of societies for helping the poor, the imprisoned, and child laborers chained to machines.
In Europe, Christians challenged the divine claims of kings and successfully fought to establish the rule of law and balance of governmental powers, which made modern democracy possible. And in America, Christian women stood at the vanguard of the suffrage movement. The great civil rights crusades of the 1950s and 60s were led by Christians claiming the Scriptures and asserting the glory of the image of God in every human being regardless of race, religion, age or class.
This same devotion to human dignity has led Christians in the last decade to work to end the dehumanizing scourge of human trafficking and sexual slavery, bring compassionate care to AIDS sufferers in Africa, and assist in a myriad of other human rights causes – from providing clean water in developing nations to providing homes for tens of thousands of children orphaned by war, disease and gender discrimination.
Like those who have gone before us in the faith, Christians today are called to proclaim the Gospel of costly grace, to protect the intrinsic dignity of the human person and to stand for the common good. In being true to its own calling, the call to discipleship, the church through service to others can make a profound contribution to the public good.
Declaration
We, as Orthodox, Catholic, and Evangelical Christians, have gathered, beginning in New York on September 28, 2009, to make the following declaration, which we sign as individuals, not on behalf of our organizations, but speaking to and from our communities. We act together in obedience to the one true God, the triune God of holiness and love, who has laid total claim on our lives and by that claim calls us with believers in all ages and all nations to seek and defend the good of all who bear his image. We set forth this declaration in light of the truth that is grounded in Holy Scripture, in natural human reason (which is itself, in our view, the gift of a beneficent God), and in the very nature of the human person. We call upon all people of goodwill, believers and non-believers alike, to consider carefully and reflect critically on the issues we here address as we, with St. Paul, commend this appeal to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God.
While the whole scope of Christian moral concern, including a special concern for the poor and vulnerable, claims our attention, we are especially troubled that in our nation today the lives of the unborn, the disabled, and the elderly are severely threatened; that the institution of marriage, already buffeted by promiscuity, infidelity and divorce, is in jeopardy of being redefined to accommodate fashionable ideologies; that freedom of religion and the rights of conscience are gravely jeopardized by those who would use the instruments of coercion to compel persons of faith to compromise their deepest convictions.
Because the sanctity of human life, the dignity of marriage as a union of husband and wife, and the freedom of conscience and religion are foundational principles of justice and the common good, we are compelled by our Christian faith to speak and act in their defense. In this declaration we affirm: 1) the profound, inherent, and equal dignity of every human being as a creature fashioned in the very image of God, possessing inherent rights of equal dignity and life; 2) marriage as a conjugal union of man and woman, ordained by God from the creation, and historically understood by believers and non-believers alike, to be the most basic institution in society and; 3) religious liberty, which is grounded in the character of God, the example of Christ, and the inherent freedom and dignity of human beings created in the divine image.
We are Christians who have joined together across historic lines of ecclesial differences to affirm our right—and, more importantly, to embrace our obligation—to speak and act in defense of these truths. We pledge to each other, and to our fellow believers, that no power on earth, be it cultural or political, will intimidate us into silence or acquiescence. It is our duty to proclaim the Gospel of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ in its fullness, both in season and out of season. May God help us not to fail in that duty.
****
Life
So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. Genesis 1:27
I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. John 10:10
Although public sentiment has moved in a pro-life direction, we note with sadness that pro-abortion ideology prevails today in our government. The present administration is led and staffed by those who want to make abortions legal at any stage of fetal development, and who want to provide abortions at taxpayer expense. Majorities in both houses of Congress hold pro-abortion views. The Supreme Court, whose infamous 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade stripped the unborn of legal protection, continues to treat elective abortion as a fundamental constitutional right, though it has upheld as constitutionally permissible some limited restrictions on abortion. The President says that he wants to reduce the “need” for abortion—a commendable goal. But he has also pledged to make abortion more easily and widely available by eliminating laws prohibiting government funding, requiring waiting periods for women seeking abortions, and parental notification for abortions performed on minors. The elimination of these important and effective pro-life laws cannot reasonably be expected to do other than significantly increase the number of elective abortions by which the lives of countless children are snuffed out prior to birth. Our commitment to the sanctity of life is not a matter of partisan loyalty, for we recognize that in the thirty-six years since Roe v. Wade, elected officials and appointees of both major political parties have been complicit in giving legal sanction to what Pope John Paul II described as “the culture of death.” We call on all officials in our country, elected and appointed, to protect and serve every member of our society, including the most marginalized, voiceless, and vulnerable among us.
A culture of death inevitably cheapens life in all its stages and conditions by promoting the belief that lives that are imperfect, immature or inconvenient are discardable. As predicted by many prescient persons, the cheapening of life that began with abortion has now metastasized. For example, human embryo-destructive research and its public funding are promoted in the name of science and in the cause of developing treatments and cures for diseases and injuries. The President and many in Congress favor the expansion of embryo-research to include the taxpayer funding of so-called “therapeutic cloning.” This would result in the industrial mass production of human embryos to be killed for the purpose of producing genetically customized stem cell lines and tissues. At the other end of life, an increasingly powerful movement to promote assisted suicide and “voluntary” euthanasia threatens the lives of vulnerable elderly and disabled persons. Eugenic notions such as the doctrine of lebensunwertes Leben (“life unworthy of life”) were first advanced in the 1920s by intellectuals in the elite salons of America and Europe. Long buried in ignominy after the horrors of the mid-20th century, they have returned from the grave. The only difference is that now the doctrines of the eugenicists are dressed up in the language of “liberty,” “autonomy,” and “choice.”
We will be united and untiring in our efforts to roll back the license to kill that began with the abandonment of the unborn to abortion. We will work, as we have always worked, to bring assistance, comfort, and care to pregnant women in need and to those who have been victimized by abortion, even as we stand resolutely against the corrupt and degrading notion that it can somehow be in the best interests of women to submit to the deliberate killing of their unborn children. Our message is, and ever shall be, that the just, humane, and truly Christian answer to problem pregnancies is for all of us to love and care for mother and child alike.
A truly prophetic Christian witness will insistently call on those who have been entrusted with temporal power to fulfill the first responsibility of government: to protect the weak and vulnerable against violent attack, and to do so with no favoritism, partiality, or discrimination. The Bible enjoins us to defend those who cannot defend themselves, to speak for those who cannot themselves speak. And so we defend and speak for the unborn, the disabled, and the dependent. What the Bible and the light of reason make clear, we must make clear. We must be willing to defend, even at risk and cost to ourselves and our institutions, the lives of our brothers and sisters at every stage of development and in every condition.
Our concern is not confined to our own nation. Around the globe, we are witnessing cases of genocide and “ethnic cleansing,” the failure to assist those who are suffering as innocent victims of war, the neglect and abuse of children, the exploitation of vulnerable laborers, the sexual trafficking of girls and young women, the abandonment of the aged, racial oppression and discrimination, the persecution of believers of all faiths, and the failure to take steps necessary to halt the spread of preventable diseases like AIDS. We see these travesties as flowing from the same loss of the sense of the dignity of the human person and the sanctity of human life that drives the abortion industry and the movements for assisted suicide, euthanasia, and human cloning for biomedical research. And so ours is, as it must be, a truly consistent ethic of love and life for all humans in all circumstances.
Marriage
The man said, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called woman, for she was taken out of man.” For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. Genesis 2:23-24
This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. Ephesians 5:32-33
In Scripture, the creation of man and woman, and their one-flesh union as husband and wife, is the crowning achievement of God’s creation. In the transmission of life and the nurturing of children, men and women joined as spouses are given the great honor of being partners with God Himself. Marriage then, is the first institution of human society—indeed it is the institution on which all other human institutions have their foundation. In the Christian tradition we refer to marriage as “holy matrimony” to signal the fact that it is an institution ordained by God, and blessed by Christ in his participation at a wedding in Cana of Galilee. In the Bible, God Himself blesses and holds marriage in the highest esteem.
Vast human experience confirms that marriage is the original and most important institution for sustaining the health, education, and welfare of all persons in a society. Where marriage is honored, and where there is a flourishing marriage culture, everyone benefits—the spouses themselves, their children, the communities and societies in which they live. Where the marriage culture begins to erode, social pathologies of every sort quickly manifest themselves. Unfortunately, we have witnessed over the course of the past several decades a serious erosion of the marriage culture in our own country. Perhaps the most telling—and alarming—indicator is the out-of-wedlock birth rate. Less than fifty years ago, it was under 5 percent. Today it is over 40 percent. Our society—and particularly its poorest and most vulnerable sectors, where the out-of-wedlock birth rate is much higher even than the national average—is paying a huge price in delinquency, drug abuse, crime, incarceration, hopelessness, and despair. Other indicators are widespread non-marital sexual cohabitation and a devastatingly high rate of divorce.
We confess with sadness that Christians and our institutions have too often scandalously failed to uphold the institution of marriage and to model for the world the true meaning of marriage. Insofar as we have too easily embraced the culture of divorce and remained silent about social practices that undermine the dignity of marriage we repent, and call upon all Christians to do the same.
To strengthen families, we must stop glamorizing promiscuity and infidelity and restore among our people a sense of the profound beauty, mystery, and holiness of faithful marital love. We must reform ill-advised policies that contribute to the weakening of the institution of marriage, including the discredited idea of unilateral divorce. We must work in the legal, cultural, and religious domains to instill in young people a sound understanding of what marriage is, what it requires, and why it is worth the commitment and sacrifices that faithful spouses make.
The impulse to redefine marriage in order to recognize same-sex and multiple partner relationships is a symptom, rather than the cause, of the erosion of the marriage culture. It reflects a loss of understanding of the meaning of marriage as embodied in our civil and religious law and in the philosophical tradition that contributed to shaping the law. Yet it is critical that the impulse be resisted, for yielding to it would mean abandoning the possibility of restoring a sound understanding of marriage and, with it, the hope of rebuilding a healthy marriage culture. It would lock into place the false and destructive belief that marriage is all about romance and other adult satisfactions, and not, in any intrinsic way, about procreation and the unique character and value of acts and relationships whose meaning is shaped by their aptness for the generation, promotion and protection of life. In spousal communion and the rearing of children (who, as gifts of God, are the fruit of their parents’ marital love), we discover the profound reasons for and benefits of the marriage covenant.
We acknowledge that there are those who are disposed towards homosexual and polyamorous conduct and relationships, just as there are those who are disposed towards other forms of immoral conduct. We have compassion for those so disposed; we respect them as human beings possessing profound, inherent, and equal dignity; and we pay tribute to the men and women who strive, often with little assistance, to resist the temptation to yield to desires that they, no less than we, regard as wayward. We stand with them, even when they falter. We, no less than they, are sinners who have fallen short of God’s intention for our lives. We, no less than they, are in constant need of God’s patience, love and forgiveness. We call on the entire Christian community to resist sexual immorality, and at the same time refrain from disdainful condemnation of those who yield to it. Our rejection of sin, though resolute, must never become the rejection of sinners. For every sinner, regardless of the sin, is loved by God, who seeks not our destruction but rather the conversion of our hearts. Jesus calls all who wander from the path of virtue to “a more excellent way.” As his disciples we will reach out in love to assist all who hear the call and wish to answer it.
We further acknowledge that there are sincere people who disagree with us, and with the teaching of the Bible and Christian tradition, on questions of sexual morality and the nature of marriage. Some who enter into same-sex and polyamorous relationships no doubt regard their unions as truly marital. They fail to understand, however, that marriage is made possible by the sexual complementarity of man and woman, and that the comprehensive, multi-level sharing of life that marriage is includes bodily unity of the sort that unites husband and wife biologically as a reproductive unit. This is because the body is no mere extrinsic instrument of the human person, but truly part of the personal reality of the human being. Human beings are not merely centers of consciousness or emotion, or minds, or spirits, inhabiting non-personal bodies. The human person is a dynamic unity of body, mind, and spirit. Marriage is what one man and one woman establish when, forsaking all others and pledging lifelong commitment, they found a sharing of life at every level of being—the biological, the emotional, the dispositional, the rational, the spiritual—on a commitment that is sealed, completed and actualized by loving sexual intercourse in which the spouses become one flesh, not in some merely metaphorical sense, but by fulfilling together the behavioral conditions of procreation. That is why in the Christian tradition, and historically in Western law, consummated marriages are not dissoluble or annullable on the ground of infertility, even though the nature of the marital relationship is shaped and structured by its intrinsic orientation to the great good of procreation.
We understand that many of our fellow citizens, including some Christians, believe that the historic definition of marriage as the union of one man and one woman is a denial of equality or civil rights. They wonder what to say in reply to the argument that asserts that no harm would be done to them or to anyone if the law of the community were to confer upon two men or two women who are living together in a sexual partnership the status of being “married.” It would not, after all, affect their own marriages, would it? On inspection, however, the argument that laws governing one kind of marriage will not affect another cannot stand. Were it to prove anything, it would prove far too much: the assumption that the legal status of one set of marriage relationships affects no other would not only argue for same sex partnerships; it could be asserted with equal validity for polyamorous partnerships, polygamous households, even adult brothers, sisters, or brothers and sisters living in incestuous relationships. Should these, as a matter of equality or civil rights, be recognized as lawful marriages, and would they have no effects on other relationships? No. The truth is that marriage is not something abstract or neutral that the law may legitimately define and re-define to please those who are powerful and influential.
No one has a civil right to have a non-marital relationship treated as a marriage. Marriage is an objective reality—a covenantal union of husband and wife—that it is the duty of the law to recognize and support for the sake of justice and the common good. If it fails to do so, genuine social harms follow. First, the religious liberty of those for whom this is a matter of conscience is jeopardized. Second, the rights of parents are abused as family life and sex education programs in schools are used to teach children that an enlightened understanding recognizes as “marriages” sexual partnerships that many parents believe are intrinsically non-marital and immoral. Third, the common good of civil society is damaged when the law itself, in its critical pedagogical function, becomes a tool for eroding a sound understanding of marriage on which the flourishing of the marriage culture in any society vitally depends. Sadly, we are today far from having a thriving marriage culture. But if we are to begin the critically important process of reforming our laws and mores to rebuild such a culture, the last thing we can afford to do is to re-define marriage in such a way as to embody in our laws a false proclamation about what marriage is.
And so it is out of love (not “animus”) and prudent concern for the common good (not “prejudice”), that we pledge to labor ceaselessly to preserve the legal definition of marriage as the union of one man and one woman and to rebuild the marriage culture. How could we, as Christians, do otherwise? The Bible teaches us that marriage is a central part of God’s creation covenant. Indeed, the union of husband and wife mirrors the bond between Christ and his church. And so just as Christ was willing, out of love, to give Himself up for the church in a complete sacrifice, we are willing, lovingly, to make whatever sacrifices are required of us for the sake of the inestimable treasure that is marriage.
Religious Liberty
The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me, because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners. Isaiah 61:1
Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s. Matthew 22:21
The struggle for religious liberty across the centuries has been long and arduous, but it is not a novel idea or recent development. The nature of religious liberty is grounded in the character of God Himself, the God who is most fully known in the life and work of Jesus Christ. Determined to follow Jesus faithfully in life and death, the early Christians appealed to the manner in which the Incarnation had taken place: “Did God send Christ, as some suppose, as a tyrant brandishing fear and terror? Not so, but in gentleness and meekness…, for compulsion is no attribute of God” (Epistle to Diognetus 7.3-4). Thus the right to religious freedom has its foundation in the example of Christ Himself and in the very dignity of the human person created in the image of God—a dignity, as our founders proclaimed, inherent in every human, and knowable by all in the exercise of right reason.
Christians confess that God alone is Lord of the conscience. Immunity from religious coercion is the cornerstone of an unconstrained conscience. No one should be compelled to embrace any religion against his will, nor should persons of faith be forbidden to worship God according to the dictates of conscience or to express freely and publicly their deeply held religious convictions. What is true for individuals applies to religious communities as well.
It is ironic that those who today assert a right to kill the unborn, aged and disabled and also a right to engage in immoral sexual practices, and even a right to have relationships integrated around these practices be recognized and blessed by law—such persons claiming these “rights” are very often in the vanguard of those who would trample upon the freedom of others to express their religious and moral commitments to the sanctity of life and to the dignity of marriage as the conjugal union of husband and wife.
We see this, for example, in the effort to weaken or eliminate conscience clauses, and therefore to compel pro-life institutions (including religiously affiliated hospitals and clinics), and pro-life physicians, surgeons, nurses, and other health care professionals, to refer for abortions and, in certain cases, even to perform or participate in abortions. We see it in the use of anti-discrimination statutes to force religious institutions, businesses, and service providers of various sorts to comply with activities they judge to be deeply immoral or go out of business. After the judicial imposition of “same-sex marriage” in Massachusetts, for example, Catholic Charities chose with great reluctance to end its century-long work of helping to place orphaned children in good homes rather than comply with a legal mandate that it place children in same-sex households in violation of Catholic moral teaching. In New Jersey, after the establishment of a quasi-marital “civil unions” scheme, a Methodist institution was stripped of its tax exempt status when it declined, as a matter of religious conscience, to permit a facility it owned and operated to be used for ceremonies blessing homosexual unions. In Canada and some European nations, Christian clergy have been prosecuted for preaching Biblical norms against the practice of homosexuality. New hate-crime laws in America raise the specter of the same practice here.
In recent decades a growing body of case law has paralleled the decline in respect for religious values in the media, the academy and political leadership, resulting in restrictions on the free exercise of religion. We view this as an ominous development, not only because of its threat to the individual liberty guaranteed to every person, regardless of his or her faith, but because the trend also threatens the common welfare and the culture of freedom on which our system of republican government is founded. Restrictions on the freedom of conscience or the ability to hire people of one’s own faith or conscientious moral convictions for religious institutions, for example, undermines the viability of the intermediate structures of society, the essential buffer against the overweening authority of the state, resulting in the soft despotism Tocqueville so prophetically warned of. Disintegration of civil society is a prelude to tyranny.
As Christians, we take seriously the Biblical admonition to respect and obey those in authority. We believe in law and in the rule of law. We recognize the duty to comply with laws whether we happen to like them or not, unless the laws are gravely unjust or require those subject to them to do something unjust or otherwise immoral. The biblical purpose of law is to preserve order and serve justice and the common good; yet laws that are unjust—and especially laws that purport to compel citizens to do what is unjust—undermine the common good, rather than serve it.
Going back to the earliest days of the church, Christians have refused to compromise their proclamation of the gospel. In Acts 4, Peter and John were ordered to stop preaching. Their answer was, “Judge for yourselves whether it is right in God’s sight to obey you rather than God. For we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard.” Through the centuries, Christianity has taught that civil disobedience is not only permitted, but sometimes required. There is no more eloquent defense of the rights and duties of religious conscience than the one offered by Martin Luther King, Jr., in his Letter from a Birmingham Jail. Writing from an explicitly Christian perspective, and citing Christian writers such as Augustine and Aquinas, King taught that just laws elevate and ennoble human beings because they are rooted in the moral law whose ultimate source is God Himself. Unjust laws degrade human beings. Inasmuch as they can claim no authority beyond sheer human will, they lack any power to bind in conscience. King’s willingness to go to jail, rather than comply with legal injustice, was exemplary and inspiring.
Because we honor justice and the common good, we will not comply with any edict that purports to compel our institutions to participate in abortions, embryo-destructive research, assisted suicide and euthanasia, or any other anti-life act; nor will we bend to any rule purporting to force us to bless immoral sexual partnerships, treat them as marriages or the equivalent, or refrain from proclaiming the truth, as we know it, about morality and immorality and marriage and the family. We will fully and ungrudgingly render to Caesar what is Caesar’s. But under no circumstances will we render to Caesar what is God’s.
(via)
J.P.
Too bad we can’t ignore them. Next thing you know they’ll surround our children, molest them, and make the Catholic.
ggreen
Quit giving tax money to papist loving idolaters.
terrwill
Maybe time to revisit the separation of Church and State and the tax exemptions that they enjoy as a result of such laws. And same exemptions they are subject to lose if they violate such legislation. Funny ole’ Nino: the founding Fathers had THAT one right……….
MikeNYC
Well I guess all the lawsuits against the RC church haven’t taught them much. They flaunted the laws for years with cover up after cover up and now they claim the “moral” right to do as they please again. It’s time the US said enough and started telling the RC church that they don’t run this country.
Bill
I have nothing against Catholics. I even have a couple of Catholic friends.
I just personally do not approve of their lifestyle choice.
I also wish that they would stop cramming this down our throats.
Russ
Actually, for those who know their history. There is no such thing as the separation of church and state. It was mentioned in a letter from Thomas Jefferson at the time. It is NOT in the constitution. Educate yourselves.
Personally, I don’t recognize gay “marriages” either. and I’m not even catholic.
Tim
That’s OK Russ, I don’t recognize YOUR “marriage” or your “humanity”. I guess we’re pretty much even.
Jaroslaw
Well Russ, you stupid fuckwad, what the hell do you think “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof….” means?
Yes, technically Thomas Jefferson wrote that to the Danbury Baptists in the very early 1800’s – but surely you are aware that there is more than one way to say the same thing?
Peter
Equal is the word; you may not recognize me, but it is illegal to “deny” me my rights. That is not treating me as equal.
“Under God” can mean anything; there are all kinds of “Gods”. Each ‘religion’ has it’s own ‘God’. But a specific religion (such as Christianity) is NOT part of the Constitution.
Therefore Russ, I do not have to recognize your opinion; but I must recognize your right to state what you said. And therefor I can also state that you are completely misinformed if you state that the U S Constitution does not have a separation of church and state.
Charles Merrill
Even though he was a champion and fought for our civil rights, the Vatican evil empire had the last word over Senator Kennedy’s soul and the whole world watched like the priests were sane swinging a pot of incense around his coffin. Kennedy even asked the Pope to forgive him of his sins in a letter hand delivered by President Obama to the Pope. It’s them against us, and they are winning, sad to say. Maine, California, and the story continues.
Kevin F.
Russ, educate yourself. The fist amendment to the Constitution separates government from religion. Read it.
Also, as a Catholic, I’d like to remind you that you will be burning in hell right alongside all the other sinners unless you become a member of the one-true-church. May God bless.
The Artist
They need to redirect this energy to something a bit more positive.
jarvisbearcub
Great.
Attmay
@6 Russ:
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
Stop lying, boy.
Steve
The concept of religious freedom is sometimes difficult. The Catholic clergy clearly don’t understand. We each have freedom to believe what we want. But, that necessarily implies that we must each allow each other that same freedom.
When one religion tries to impose its own beliefs on others by force, they are trying to take away the religious freedom of those other people. Catholics are free to believe whatever they want. But, when they try to write their beliefs into law, to use the force of law to impose their beliefs upon others, they are violating the very freedom of other people that they claim for themselves. If you want to have freedom of religion, you must allow others to have that same freedom.
The proper role of the government is to “register” marriages, so that the registration records will be available to the judge whenever a right or duty that accrues to married people must be decided. To implement freedom of religion, a marriage must be allowed whenever ANY religious belief would allow it.
ms. spears
serious question: Why is the Catholic Church obsessed with the abortion debate? I mean with all the mass genocides that have taken place why don’t they condemn all violence & murder so passionately?
Scot
OK, correct me if I’m wrong, but if gays started a “religion” with MILLONS of members, organized, like cath-o-licks or any other crackpot religion, held gay religious weddings, wouldn’t the government be obligated to reconize those marrages as much as any other religion? I’m just asking!
B
Scot wrote, “OK, correct me if I’m wrong, but if gays started a “religion” with MILLONS of members, organized, like cath-o-licks or any other crackpot religion, held gay religious weddings, wouldn’t the government be obligated to reconize those marrages as much as any other religion?”
The obvious answer is “no” – the Fundamentalist Church of Latter Day Saints (which split off from the Mormons due to the Mormons being too conventional) actively practices polygamy and the state does not recognize such marriages. Members of that “church” sometimes find themselves in jail.
You can’t sacrifice your children to Tláloc either, as was done in certain Aztec rituals.
Mike
@No17
Can we sacrifice the Catholics to Tlaloc then?
Brian NJ
They can make all the declarations they like. They started this fight and we are going to finish it.
Joe Mustich, JP
As Tallulah Bankhead once said to a priest after a church service, “I love your dress darrrrling but your purse is on fire.”
Cheers, Joe Mustich, Justice of the Peace,
Washington, Connecticut, USA.
CT just celebrated the one year anniversary of its marriage equality law. Kudos to CT!
romeo
Churches should be taxed like any corporation. They can take deductions for legitimate charitable work, but they need to come up with the receipts. Money spent on trying to restrict human rights and harass innocent people because they don’t share their views would not be considered “charitable work.”
romeo
Thanks for bringing up Talullah Joe. Read a great biography of her. When she was getting her usual a little too soused at the Monkey Bar one night, the bartender diplomatically offered to cut her bourbon with a little water. To which she drew herself up in complete disdain and told him, “I never drink water. Fish fuck in it.”
I’m sure she was a handful, but I would have liked to be around to know her.
Seems apropos to the catholic church somehow. LOL
naghanenu
Although a devoted catholic, this manifesto is …well..unnecessary.
Religious groups are allowed to reject anything against their beliefs so why this drama…
Judy DelMar
It is about time that our Catholic Church and at least a few of the other Christian Churches are taking a stand against this Radical, Left Wing Socialistic Government. This Government is attempting to violate our rights as citizens of the United States of America by ignoring the Constituion that we were founded on which was to the people and for the people and founded on the belief in God!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thank you for finally taking a vocal and active stand against this horrific Nonpartison government.
romeo
Oh can it, Judy.
AxelDC
Why are churches allowed to lie? Isn’t that a violation of the 10 Commandments?
Religious leaders know that the 1st Amendment exempts them from performing marriages of ANYONE for ANY reason. The Catholic Church refuses to perform marriages of Catholics all the time, for whatever reason they choose.
That doesn’t stop them from spreading the lie that gay marriage will FORCE them to perform gay marriages in Catholic Cathedrals by Catholic priests.
Anyone with a basic understanding of the US Constitution knows that churches cannot be forced to perform gay marriages, but Catholics want to fear-monger to prevent an form of gay marriage. They know the truth: that once gay marriage is fully legalized, they will be forced by societal pressure to accept gays, and they want to prevent that from happening at all costs.
Kevin F.
“Why are churches allowed to lie?”
When you consider the reality, that there are no goblins, ghosts, spirits, elves, leprechauns, wood-nymphs, or Gods, then it becomes obvious that all churches and religion have is lies — it’s all one big lie — the biggest lie ever told.
1EqualityUSA
This is a young nation, an experiment that worked, a toddler, barely crawling onto the world stage. These fights, though unpleasant, are good to have. The church loses credibility, children of gays lose stabilizing benefits, gays lose pursuit of happiness, but in the long run, years from now, the loss of credibility will still hang around the necks of the church leaders that tossed the Word of God aside, in order to squawk and browbeat and pander to politicians. Children of gays will reach equality, queer communities will attain equality and pursue happiness, but the church will have fewer parishioners due to the lack of credibility. The parishioners that are attracted to the flock, now, are attracted for the wrong reasons. Over the years the symptoms of this will make itself known. So, in all, the bigger loser is the church, due to the poor decisions made by its leaders. Wisdom would have these leaders rely on the Word, not politicians, NOM-skulls, and beauty queens. Credibility is a terrible thing to waste.
Peter J. Gomes, Professor of Christian Morals, Harvard University;Minister, American Baptist Church:
“Religious fundamentalism is dangerous because it cannot accept ambiguity and diversity and is therefore inherently intolerant. Such intolerance, in the name of virtue, is ruthless and uses political power to destroy what it cannot convert. It is dangerous, especially in America, because it is anti-democratic and is suspicious of “the other,” in whatever form that “other” might appear. To maintain itself, fundamentalism must always define “the other” as deviant. But the chief reason that fundamentalism is dangerous is that, at the hands of the Rev. Pat Robertson. the Rev. Jerry Falwell and hundreds of lesser-known but equally worrisome clerics, preachers and pundits, it uses Scripture and the Christian practice to encourage ordinarily good people to act upon their fears rather than their virtues.”
B
No. 27 · AxelDC wrote, “Why are churches allowed to lie? Isn’t that a violation of the 10 Commandments?” Well, there’s the joke about God hiring the devil to do some work on the Pearly Gates, and not being satisfied with the devil’s workmanship. When the devil refuses to make any changes, God says, “I’ll sue.” The devil smiles and says, “but where will you get a lawyer?”
ophu
“In Scripture, the creation of man and woman, and their one-flesh union as husband and wife, is the crowning achievement of God’s creation.”
There they go again, putting limits on God’s creativity.
1EqualityUSA
I hear He was the bomb in pottery class.
geglesias
All the religious mumbo/gumbo in the 2 pages of their “far out” manifesto is fine for the catholics & evangelicals etc. to preach in their church ; But when they try to force it on everybody else that’s when they get into trouble. This country is not run by their religion or anybody elses. Pres.John Adams said quote “This country is in NO WAY founded on the Christian Religion. Further more all you religious Mumbo/jumboers read the First Amendment of the Constitution-it will tell you what you can do with your religion. “and let me give you a hint–“it will tell you in no uncertain terms to “keep your religion to yourself, and do not try to run the country by it.”
Mark
Uh Judy, have you READ the Constitution??
Jaroslaw
#33 for what it is worth, the books I read say George Washington said “in no way this is a Christian nation” and it was in response to a treat with Tripoli (an African Nation I think) 1796-1797.
Jaroslaw
#33 for what it is worth, the books I read say George Washington said “in no way this is a Christian nation” and it was in response to a treaty with Tripoli (an African Nation I think) 1796-1797.
geglesias
The problem with the bishops & the priests & the cardinals, & pope etc. the whole roman catholic shin-dig is; “That they are afraid that they will lose their power.” They have alot of $$$$ & power & they always did. They have easy, plush, jobs & all they do is sit on their ass & get payed alot of MONEY doing it too. But when they try to run the Government with their religion, and try to oppress a whole class of tax paying American Citizens they are crossing the line “BIG TIME”. For example in D.C. Council member Phil Mendelsen, Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, said “the council will not legislate based on treats from the catholic church.” The problem with the individual exemption is anybody could discrimminate based on their asseration of religious principle. There were many people back in the 50’s & 60’s during the civil rights era that said separation of the races was ordained by god. “Which of course as we know now it is NOT!”
Andrew
Thank God the Catholic Church is nothing like actual Catholics.
SeaMex
17.Cutting the head off the snake:
The time has come to cut the head from the snake. We all have friends and relatives who attend churches and organizations who are opposed to LGBT Equality. I think the best way we can combat these groups is to take away the money.
My 90 year old Grandmother has been a practicing Catholic all her life. We have a very good relationship and she is very supportive of my partner and me. She attends Mass every Sunday. I would not dream of asking her stop.
She has decided that she will still attend Mass every Sunday but will no longer financially support the Catholic Church. When the collection plate is passed she now puts in an envelope that contains a message that due to the “church’s” inhumane views regarding LGBT Equality and Civil Rights, that the money she would have contributed to the church has been sent instead to a LGBT Equality organization.
You see, she would not dream of supporting groups like the Klu Klux Klan, the Aryan Brotherhood, or the Westboro Baptist Church run by Fred Phelps. In that regard, I spoke to her that supporting the Catholic Diocese is, in my opinion, similar to providing monetary support to those organizations. I explained that I personally found that the Catholic church, by their intolerance of LGBT Equality and huge donations to groups like the NOM, is essentially similar to providing monetary support to a group that supports the KKK, et al.
Now, I understand that many would say that we don’t have the right to tell friends and family how to live their lives or for that matter what to believe theologically. That said, personally, I believe that THEY neither own the right to tell us whom to love.
I do feel we have the right to ask them not to contribute to Churches and Organizations who would deny us our Civil Rights or Equality. By explaining our position, opening a dialogue, sharing our concerns, do we bring the opportunity to change a mind one person at a time. By explaining in withholding financial support, we find that we can ‘cut the head off the snake.
1EqualityUSA
Becket Fund concerns itself with the defamation of religions. They have bright minds and young lawyers who study, intervene, and speak on issues affecting the religious ideals. The defamation of GLTBs has been nauseating. Social excommunicators have money, church leaders, advertisements, and rhetoric creating an unequal bargaining power. Fear is one of the weapons utilized. A 50 foot wave of fear (No offense, Kristin). Not taking into account that gays are nurses, doctors, clergy, mothers, police officers, artists, and any other positive role model that can be listed; only the darkest, most seedy elements are discussed. That gets annoying. We need a “Becket Fund” to assist us when the attacks become unbearable. We need the Constitution to protect us from these blatant and unwarranted attacks. The talent we have is immense. The queer community has so much to contribute, once this “STORM” is over.
B
No. 35 · Jaroslaw wrote, “#33 for what it is worth, the books I read say George Washington said “in no way this is a Christian nation” and it was in response to a treat with Tripoli (an African Nation I think) 1796-1797.”
The Treaty of Tripoli was signed by John Adams and drafted by
Joel Barlow, the U.S. consul-general to Tripoli. Article 11 of the treaty states: “As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of Mussulmen; and, as the said States never entered into any war, or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions, shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.”
Citations: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Tripoli
http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/treaty_tripoli.html
1EqualityUSA
SeaMex, I enjoyed your post. My mother no longer contributes either, due to all of the molestation law suits. The only thing keeping her on the pew is a promise she made long ago, but she thinks the service is bogus. Spiritual anorexia.
1EqualityUSA
Manifesto bragging: Robert P George and all had listed what was being done for the poor and downtrodden. The Bible clearly states in Matthew, “When you do good deeds, don’t try to show off. If you do, you won’t get a reward from your Father in heaven.When you give to the poor, don’t blow a loud horn. That’s what show-offs do in the meeting places and on the street corners, because they are always looking for praise. I can assure you that they already have their reward. When you give to the poor, don’t let anyone know about it. Then your gift will be given in secret. Your Father knows what is done in secret, and he will reward you.”
Read between the lines on this letter (go up to “view”, hit “customized toolbar”…) No, it’s not that easy. In order to do all that they want to do in this manifesto, they have to send in the dogs, slander, bloody up politicians, roll around in the mud, manipulate forcefully, and push their way of life on other Americans that don’t believe as they do. The mere fact that they would hold the needy hostage and then turn around and brag about all that they do for the world tells me that, indeed, they have reduced themselves down to earthly, worldly politics, and not acting out of true love in Christ. True Christians never talk about the good deeds done for the Father in secret, because it isn’t for this world that those good deeds are being done.
Jaroslaw
thanks #41 – I guess my book has the wrong info! But I did google “George Washington + Tripoly” before I posted and two or three links did ties GW and “in no way is the US founded as a Christian nation” so I’m confused. It makes sense it was Adams because as the first president, GW probably didn’t make a whole lot of treaties as the country was brand new.
Still, from recent reports of users tinkering, I don’t know if Wikipedia is exactly an unimpeachable source to be quoting either! (although personally, I’ve found it to be fairly accurate.)
Francis
These Christians scare me. They talk so much about how loving they are and how much good they did. They dismiss the horror of their bloody history by saying they aren’t perfect. No one is perfect but at least people try to learn from their mistakes. These people continue to condemn others, like they have throughout history, only in the past they also tortured, mutilated and murdered millions of people. These Christians are all about amassing more and more power for their agenda of Christian theocracy in America. They are already serving at all levels of government and there have been news stories about how they are trying to take over the military.
They worship a genocidal deity who they say destroyed the world and promises to, again, a deity who seems to have a fondness for condemning and punishing. I believe that if someone worships a deity, they become like that deity. Is it really any wonder why these Christians are so condemning of others and so fond of punishment? These are the folks who are actually looking forward to the end of the world! And they say they are pro-life! They truly scare me.
Schteve
I love how they say “No one should be compelled to embrace any religion against his will” just a few paragraphs after saying everyone should be forced to accept the notion that marriage is a holy institution ordained by their god.
Rainfish
GOD
Loving figment of your imagination
or dangerous delusion?
… you decide.
Now discuss it amongst yourselves
— without guns and knives.
~ E. Lewis Evans (“Beneath the See” page 43)
Russ
God, so many stupid people believing they are right. not “establishing a religion” is totally different than the existance of a “separation of church and state”. Are you all buffoons?
Russ
Kevin F. you will see how much God is a lie. You will have all eternity to think about it while you are burning in hell.
Peter
Russ; only you will burn in hell. People who do not follow your ideas of a religion, are not bound by its rules or ideology, and therefore will never suffer the consequences of its wild claims. A religion ONLY applies to those who follow it. The rest of us are home free. AND that is why there is to be a separation of the church and State. Everyone, now have a good day.
Steve
Many right-wing churches have had “anti-gay” at the top of their priority list for several years. Nothing new there. They have claimed to be victims of intolerance whenever any gay person has criticized their anti-gay actions. And they have objected to every pro-equal-rights action by any government, since before the civil war.
The claim that their religious freedom might be infringed is completely bogus, of course. No clergy person has ever been forced to celebrate a wedding in this country. Their religious freedom is entirely protected, both in law and constitution. The only “right” that is not protected is their “right” to violate the equal rights of other people who do not subscribe to their same religious beliefs.
The reason for the bogus claims and fear mongering is, of course, power and wealth. They use fear of gay people to obtain power and wealth, just as their predecessors used fear of black people to obtain power and wealth.
They should stop to think, “how can we minister to these people?” If they did, they would write an entirely different document.
1EqualityUSA
#49 Dear Russ, I didn’t know it was up to you decide who burns in Hell. Are you usurping God? The Reader of hearts understands the whole person, to depths unfathomable, so until you have this skill, until time has no boundries for you, and until you are capable of knowing a spirit before that spirit enters into these temporal vessels, I would suggest you refrain from grandiose threats of Hell. Your tortured interpretation of a Book that is far beyond your comprehension, does not give you the authority to make statements such as the one in post #49. The ice, on which you are standing, is likely thinner than Kevin’s.
Brian
“Faith” is defined as “the ability to believe something you cannot prove.” Similar to “con.”
1EqualityUSA
Interesting 2005 lecture from Robert P. George:
http://www.heritage.org/Research/LegalIssues/hl871.cfm
Exerpt”
“Some conservative critics of the FMA fault the proposed amendment for not going far enough. They would prefer an amendment that would have the additional feature of banning even legislatively adopted state schemes of civil union and domestic partnership. I myself oppose such schemes, but I do not think it is necessary or politically feasible to attempt to deal with this issue at the federal constitutional level. So long as marriage is protected by an understanding–implicit in the terms of the FMA–that states may not create “faux marriages” by predicating rights, benefits, privileges, and immunities on the existence, recognition, or presumption of sexual conduct or relationships between unmarried persons, I am content to leave the question of civil unions and domestic partnerships to the people of the states acting through the processes of deliberative democracy.
Other conservative critics of the FMA believe that it goes too far by removing from the individual states the authority to define marriage as they see fit. Many of these critics agree that a federal constitutional amendment is needed, but believe that it should do no more than prevent the judicial imposition of same-sex marriage nationwide, whether by judicial action manufacturing a federal constitutional right to same-sex marriage or by a ruling that Massachusetts same-sex marriages must be given “full faith and credit” by other states when same-sex couples from Massachusetts move into those states.”
Rev. Debra Haffner
Neither the Manhattan Declaration, nor the handful of Catholic bishops and evangelical leaders who created it, speak for most Christians, much less people of other faiths. Read another religious viewpoint here: http://www.religiousinstitute.org/news.
1EqualityUSA
Dear Rev. Debra Haffner, “Page Not Found” popped up when the site was clicked.
Steve
I noticed that the link posted by Rev. Debra Haffner this afternoon does not work. There is an extra period at the end of the url. The correct url seems to be:
http://www.religiousinstitute.org/news
B
No. 44 · Jaroslaw wrote, “Still, from recent reports of users tinkering, I don’t know if Wikipedia is exactly an unimpeachable source to be quoting either! (although personally, I’ve found it to be fairly accurate.)”
A study in Nature showed that on technical topics the Wikipedia is about as accurate as the Encyclopedia Britannica. I.e., both contain errors at comparable rates. The “tinkering” was mostly on either “hot button” issues or biographies of politicians or other public figures whose staffs decided to try some resume buffing or rewriting of history. I don’t think a factual discussion of the Treaty of Tripoli would be something anyone would have a reason to sabotage, but both URLs agreed about it and only one was for the Wikipedia.
They’ve been tightening procedures where problems have occurred, but aren’t doing that “just in case”. One of the goals is to try to find the minimum level of QA you need while still providing a high-quality service, and it is easier to fix a problem when something goes wrong than to figure out if something you are doing is not necessary.
1EqualityUSA
B, you must read 50 hours a day.
noclosets
To much time on this one, oppression and repression is a fundamental tool for the Catholic Clergy but they couldn’t dupe Henry VIII hehe.
Jaroslaw
#60 – Dupe Henry 8? You’re kidding of course – he beheaded how many wives? And stole all the money & buildings from the Church?
Russ
@Attmay: just went back and reread these posts. I wish you people would educate yourselves about what the first amendment means. People are so ignorant.