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| Cardinal Keith O'Brien |
I, like many
Catholics and Catholic organisations, am, to say the least, really annoyed at
the fact that a LGBT lobby group has publicly branded Cardinal Keith O'Brien as
a bigot. This occurred when Stonewall awarded their “Bigot of the Year Award” to the Cardinal because of his statements regarding gay marriage.
What is
interesting is that one of Stonewall’s stated objectives on their website is “Promoting fair and representative coverage in the print and broadcast media.” I ask you, what is fair about branding a
person as a bigot just because he holds an opposite view on the subject of gay
marriage? Hopefully this group will,
when evaluating their performance against their stated objectives, record this
as a complete fail.
Ruth Davidson, a
Scottish Tory leader and the first openly gay leader of a major political party
in the UK, was awarded the “Politician of
the Year” award. So unfair and uncalled for was the branding of the Cardinal that even she, an award winner on the day and a favoured politician of the lobby group, stated during her acceptance speech that she found the
branding of Cardinal O’Brien as a bigot completely unacceptable.
Ruth Davidson was
particularly outspoken, stating clearly that it was “simply
wrong” to call people names like ‘bigot’.
She went on to say that the “case
for equality is far better made by demonstrating the sort of generosity,
tolerance and love we would wish to see more of in this world”.
So direct was Ruth
Davidson in her acceptance speech that she actually ended up being booed by the
very LGBT people who had just awarded her the “Politician
of the Year” award.
This behaviour by the members of Stonewall of course just serves to demonstrate what we already know about many of these LGBT groups. They are completely intolerant and small-minded, refusing to engage in any genuine dialogue with anyone who has an opposing view to their own. Even resorting to booing one of their own award winners for expressing a differing opinion to their own.
This behaviour by the members of Stonewall of course just serves to demonstrate what we already know about many of these LGBT groups. They are completely intolerant and small-minded, refusing to engage in any genuine dialogue with anyone who has an opposing view to their own. Even resorting to booing one of their own award winners for expressing a differing opinion to their own.
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It was not only
the Stonewall award winners who were dissatisfied with Stonewall’s
actions. Even their sponsors, Barclays and Coutts, said that they would be rethinking
whether to continue their support because of the groups decision to brand individuals as bigots.
Cardinal O’Brien
has of course never said anything that could possibly lead anyone to classify
him as a bigot. He has spoken the truth
as taught by the Church on the subject of same sex marriage, calling the
government’s plans “for gay marriage ‘madness’ and a ‘grotesque subversion of a universally accepted human right’.”
The Cardinal has simply truthfully and accurately presented
the Church’s teaching as it is contained in the Catechism of the Catholic
Church. Sadly it seems that when we follow our religious beliefs, it leads to us being branded as a bigot!
I end this post
with some extracts from the Catechism on the subject of homosexuality which will help alleviate any doubt that anyone may have about the Church's teaching in this regard.
Chastity
and homosexuality
Homosexuality refers to relations
between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual
attraction toward persons of the same sex.
It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in
different cultures. Its psychological
genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing
itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave
depravity, tradition has always declared, "homosexual acts are
intrinsically disordered.” They are
contrary to the natural law. They
close the sexual act to the gift of life.
They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual
complementarity. Under no circumstances
can they be approved.
The number of men and women who have
deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively
disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect,
compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign
of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfil God's will
in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the
Lord's cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.
Homosexual persons are called to
chastity. By the
virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support
of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and
should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection.
[1]
Then there is
also this clear statement from the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
The marriage covenant, by which a man
and a woman form with each other an intimate communion of life and love,
has been founded and endowed with its own special laws by the Creator. By its very nature it is ordered to the good
of the couple, as well as to the generation and education of children. Christ the Lord raised marriage between the
baptized to the dignity of a sacrament.[2]
One of my deepest concerns that if the Church refuses to “marry” a same sex couple, and rightly so, what will the legal ramifications be on the Church if the couple decide to sue? I understand that such governments have promised to respect the Church’s position and not to force Her to do things against its own rules. But surely that can change and certain loop holes be found within the law?
ReplyDeleteWhat will we do then?