Why Do Doug Kmiec and Progressive Catholics Support Gay Civil Unions?

Vatican II stated:
"In their patriotism and in their fidelity to their civic duties Catholics will feel themselves bound to promote the true common good; they will make the weight of their convictions so influential that as a result civil authority will be justly exercised and laws will accord with moral precepts and the common good."
Second Vatican Council, Apostolicam actuositatem 14

How far have we come sadly.

Prof Doug Kmiec continues to advocate against basic teachings of the Church in the public forum. In fact his arguments were mentioned in the California Supreme Court just weeks ago This is accounted Time magazine.

Civil Unions for homosexual couples is a non starter according to our Holy Catholic Doctrine. However that has not stopped several posters on a few Catholic blogs of note of now some how endorsing this idea.

I was a tad shocked to see this Kmiec proposal endorsed as a possible plausible idea here at Vox Nova.

This issue has already been addressed in the strongest terms in fact by the Pope himself when he was just a Cardinal speaking on behalf of the Church. See CONSIDERATIONS REGARDING PROPOSALSTO GIVE LEGAL RECOGNITIONTO UNIONSBETWEEN HOMOSEXUAL PERSONS which is quite readable.

One must note that Doug Kmiec and others in his position are not only advocating a wrong , but they are urging Catholic politicians and jurist to advance that wrong. In effect of going against their Church's clear teaching. See above document and section-POSITIONS OF CATHOLIC POLITICIANS WITH REGARD TO LEGISLATION IN FAVOUR OF HOMOSEXUAL UNIONS.

As I stated in the comments a refresher course in why this is a no go for Catholics can be found in several of the helpful links that Vox Nova itself has linked for us.

For instance the COMPENDIUM OF THE SOCIAL DOCTRINE OF THE CHURCH. Yes besides such topics as Unions, the value of work and other social justice issues they talk about marriage in there!!!

Why? Because marriage is a critical part of Social Justice.

I shall return to this later but one commenter said he wished to see the " GOVERNMENT totally removed from the “marriage business.” This is folly really and I would think about 2000 years of recent experience shows the Government cannot get out of the "marriage business" .

In the section Love and the formation of a community of persons the Church states and teaches:
224. Faced with theories that consider gender identity as merely the cultural and social product of the interaction between the community and the individual, independent of personal sexual identity without any reference to the true meaning of sexuality, the Church does not tire of repeating her teaching: “Everyone, man and woman, should acknowledge and accept his sexual identity. Physical, moral and spiritual difference and complementarities are oriented towards the goods of marriage and the flourishing of family life. The harmony of the couple and of society depends in part on the way in which the complementarities, needs and mutual support between the sexes are lived out”[496]. According to this perspective, it is obligatory that positive law be conformed to the natural law, according to which sexual identity is indispensable, because it is the objective condition for forming a couple in marriage.

Please note the term OBLIGATORY

228. Connected with de facto unions is the particular problem concerning demands for the legal recognition of unions between homosexual persons, which is increasingly the topic of public debate. Only an anthropology corresponding to the full truth of the human person can give an appropriate response to this problem with its different aspects on both the societal and ecclesial levels[503]. The light of such anthropology reveals “how incongruous is the demand to accord ‘marital' status to unions between persons of the same sex. It is opposed, first of all, by the objective impossibility of making the partnership fruitful through the transmission of life according to the plan inscribed by God in the very structure of the human being. Another obstacle is the absence of the conditions for that interpersonal complementarity between male and female willed by the Creator at both the physical-biological and the eminently psychological levels. It is only in the union of two sexually different persons that the individual can achieve perfection in a synthesis of unity and mutual psychophysical completion”[504].

Homosexual persons are to be fully respected in their human dignity [505] and encouraged to follow God's plan with particular attention in the exercise of chastity[506]. This duty calling for respect does not justify the legitimization of behaviour that is not consistent with moral law, even less does it justify the recognition of a right to marriage between persons of the same sex and its being considered equivalent to the family[507].

“If, from the legal standpoint, marriage between a man and a woman were to be considered just one possible form of marriage, the concept of marriage would undergo a radical transformation, with grave detriment to the common good. By putting homosexual unions on a legal plane analogous to that of marriage and the family, the State acts arbitrarily and in contradiction with its duties”[508].

It appears the Church is saying something about the State and the "marriage business" here.



Kmiec and other Catholics are found of quoting the Compendium left and right for justification for their political goals.

Question-If this explicit declaration is to be ignored why not junk the rest of it. Why should I feel compelled to make my political life guided with the mind of the Church on the driving social and economic issues of the day as seen in the compendium and elsewhere if those quoting ignore such a explicit command? This so reminds of my old college retreats. We would have quite radical nuns teaching impressionable young minds to ignore the Church on issue X but they would treat a United States Bishop's statements on welfare like it was Holy Writ. I can recall one nun at Maryhill retreat house ranting against the Church's teaching on homosexuality but then reading and endorsing the Louisiana Bishop's statement against racism. She never saw the problem.

You can't have it both ways. That is a message that Catholics of any political flavor should think about as to this issue.

The Pope has become even more explicit. Even if it appears some Catholics commenters on blogs and Prof Kmiec were not listening , Pope Benedict weighed in on the issue just days after the California Supreme Court gave the "right" to gay marriage.

He stated "The union of love, based on matrimony between a man and a woman, which makes up the family, represents a good for all society that can not be substituted by, confused with, or compared to other types of unions"

Just months ago the Pope stated in what is commonly called over here in America at the least the State of the Church address. Formally it was ADDRESS OF HIS HOLINESS BENEDICT XVI TO THE MEMBERS OF THE ROMAN CURIA FOR THE TRADITIONAL EXCHANGE OF CHRISTMAS GREETINGS.

He said in part:
Since faith in the Creator is an essential part of the Christian creed, the Church cannot and must not limit herself to passing on to the faithful the message of salvation alone. She has a responsibility towards creation, and must also publicly assert this responsibility. In so doing, she must not only defend earth, water and air as gifts of creation belonging to all. She must also protect man from self-destruction. What is needed is something like a human ecology, correctly understood.

If the Church speaks of the nature of the human being as man and woman, and demands that this order of creation be respected, this is not some antiquated metaphysics. What is involved here is faith in the Creator and a readiness to listen to the “language” of creation. To disregard this would be the self-destruction of man himself, and hence the destruction of God’s own work.

What is often expressed and understood by the term “gender” ultimately ends up being man’s attempt at self-emancipation from creation and the Creator. Man wants to be his own master, and alone – always and exclusively – to determine everything that concerns him. Yet in this way he lives in opposition to the truth, in opposition to the Creator Spirit.

Rain forests deserve indeed to be protected, but no less so does man, as a creature having an innate “message” which does not contradict our freedom, but is instead its very premise.

The great scholastic theologians described marriage, understood as the life-long bond between a man and a woman, as a sacrament of creation, which the Creator himself instituted and which Christ – without modifying the “message” of creation – then made part of the history of his covenant with humanity.

An integral part of the Church proclamation must be a witness to the Creator Spirit present in nature as a whole, and, in a special way, in the human person, created in God’s image.

I just wonder what again is going through people minds. Catholics of good will lecture everyone under the sun about global warming, welfare, health care, etc and cite the Church authority to back them up. But many of these same Catholics seem then to undermine that very authority in pushing for things like civil unions.

You can't have it both ways!!

Before we leave Pope Benedict (who by the way is teaching nothing new on this subject) we should be reminded of what he said are "non-negotiable" for Catholic voters. See ADDRESS OF HIS HOLINESS BENEDICT XVI TO THE MEMBERS OF THE EUROPEAN PEOPLE'S PARTY ON THE OCCASION OF THE STUDY DAYS ON EUROPE.

Those are :
- protection of life in all its stages, from the first moment of conception until natural death;

- recognition and promotion of the natural structure of the family - as a union between a man and a woman based on marriage - and its defence from attempts to make it juridically equivalent to radically different forms of union which in reality harm it and contribute to its destabilization, obscuring its particular character and its irreplaceable social role;
- the protection of the right of parents to educate their children.

Soon the Holy Father will issue a new import Social ENCYCLICAL dealing in no small part with our recent economic troubles. Many Catholics no doubt, as they should, will be demanding our attention and in fact incorporation of that thought into our political life. However many of these same Catholics are ignoring the Church on the above.

You can't have it both ways!!!

The Law is a teacher and it teaches in dramatic ways. A law that would give recognition to civil unions would give it a moral legitimacy in the eyes of the public and society. There would be a new regime of things and thus the Government from schools to its very laws would promulgate these new aims. The question becomes what happens to the Catholics that oppose this new regime? Well they would be punished. We see that happening already. For instance we have seen a employer that gives a hand out to a gay employee on leaving the homosexual life has to attend seminar telling him how wrong he is.

I note that over at Mirrors of Justice this post The Religious Violence of "Defending Marriage". So if one supports the Defense of Marriage Act one is promoting "Violence"? This rhetoric will quickly become public sanction back by real penalty. Are we not seeing an unprecedented violation of the social contract in California right now as people that gave a few bucks to support Prop 8 are being harassed at their very homes. Wait till the discrimination laws backed by the Federal, State and local Government get involved.

Morning Minion in the above linked Vox Nova post states:
So, what do we do? Well, we do all we can to sharpen the distinction between the civil arrangement and the sacrament of marriage. No longer should the privilege of Catholic marriage be available on demand, where nothing is demanded beyond a perfunctory pre-Cana weekend. No, the standards would be much higher. Want your Church wedding? Well, how about actually believing what the Church teaches! This strategy has the added benefit of avoiding any accusations of homophobia – and let’s face it, much of the attack on gay marriage is an attack more the “gay” part than the “marriage” part!.

First I am not sure what these new standards Morning is talking about. I suggest the requirements that Catholic who wish to marry "Actually believe what the Church teaches" is not getting off to a grand start by ignoring such explicit declarations as cited above. Also I am curious why he even goes down this path. Our influence on new worldwide requirements of the Sacrament of Marriage from the pews is not nearly as immediate as our influence with our political leaders as to Civil Unions.

But I see Morning Minion's thought shared by a large number of people. Sort of let them just have Civil Unions and we shall go to the Catacombs on the matter.

The problem is the Church is not exactly saying that is our calling. How can one be a consistent witness and advocate of Catholic Social Justice principles on other issues and not this. As to issues such as a just wage, the rights of workers shall we all just go the catacombs on those?

For instance is it Catholic to say "I shall pay a just wage to my employees and whatever other people do we don't care". Is that Justice? How about "I will not treat other races with disrespect in my "Catholic World" but what my neighbors do is none of my concern". Is that Catholic? Why is this issue different?

If there is a "right" to gay marriage or civil unions then why is there not a "right" for me not to rent apartment space to lets say Asians? If we don't base our rights on the natural and moral law then both can be "rights". That puts the entire Christain Gospel and how it plays in our world quite at risk.

Again we cannot have it both ways.