Enough disclaimer bs and hand holding on to the good stuff...
The spark:
I woke up this morning and went to church and to my surprise their were multiple signs promoting voting yes on Prop 8, right in front of the doors of the Church. (Voting yes on prop 8 will in a nut shell disallow same sex couples to marry in the state of California.) While I really shouldn't be surprised about how the catholic community feels about gay marriage i was none the less bewildered by all of it. If people want to vote YES on prop 8 i feel that they are entitled to do so. However, when the church gets involved in politics my mental alert goes...WTF! Aside from the whole idea of separation of church and state, i just feel that it is a bit unfair of the church to put these signs up.
How I (emphasis on I) Feel:
Realistically not ALL catholics agree with voting yes, i being one who believes that marriage between same sex couples is all good with me. I sat through mass thinking about this, which in a lot of ways distracts me from what was even going on and what the priest was talking about. I think that for the church to assume that all of its parish believes that gay marriage is wrong is kind of condescending. As if we can't think for ourselves. As i said earlier i am not surprised that the church is in favor of prop 8, but was it so necessary to blatantly put it out there like that. I think that as a catholic i am well aware of what the church views as right and wrong. Why not put up signs of fight the war on terrorism in the name of GOD. Or better yet, abortion related images intended to remind church goers what to believe in. Ok sure Yes on Prop 8 signs aren't that bad, but you get my point. I guess it could be a lot worse, the signs could read vote McCain and Palin. Sorry i had to throw that in there, no offense if you disagree.
Reality:
The church isn't going to change anytime soon and i really don't expect this to happen either. The reality is that marriage is a patriarchal institution that has been analyzed as being oppressive to women. My honest opinion is fuck marriage it is something that is just socially constructed like race and a lot of time sexuality. However it doesn't mean that the issues surrounding marriage, race and sexuality aren't real. I feel as though the "straight" world can't even get marriage right, even heterosexual catholics fuck up marriage. i.e. divorce, domestic violence, infidelity and so on and so on. So if marriage is so sacred between a man and a women why do they keep fucking it up. Oh am i hitting some nerves, i'm sorry but it is the truth. I am not discounting marriages that do work out i am just bringing out the reality that some if not most do not. It isn't to say either that if the gay community has the right to marry they would do marriage any better. But lets stop fronting like marriage is this sacred thing and we need to protect it from "the gays" because a "breeders" we can't even protect it from ourselves.
Apology?:
At first i was going to apologize for being such a debbie downer lately, but fuck that i shouldn't have to. Although i'll apologize if i hurt any feelings, but shit i can't please everyone. This could go two ways this post will either be ignored or it will spark some interesting conversation. I'm rooting for convo. Oh and before you even think about saying anything ignorant/inappropriate/straight fucked up remember to own what you say because nothings worse than someone who can't backup what they say went it really matters.
Either way you look at it love is a beautiful thing...
Apology?:
At first i was going to apologize for being such a debbie downer lately, but fuck that i shouldn't have to. Although i'll apologize if i hurt any feelings, but shit i can't please everyone. This could go two ways this post will either be ignored or it will spark some interesting conversation. I'm rooting for convo. Oh and before you even think about saying anything ignorant/inappropriate/straight fucked up remember to own what you say because nothings worse than someone who can't backup what they say went it really matters.
Either way you look at it love is a beautiful thing...
agreed, but then again im biased on this subject.
ReplyDeletethe thing with prop 8, proponent for it is heavily supported by the Knights of Columbus, check the ending of all the Yes on 8 ends.
& of course we know what the Knights of Columbus are.
i felt the same yesterday when i watched families that i know from church carry "yes on 8" signs back to their cars to put on their front lawn...
ReplyDeletewith all the talk about gay marriage with the election and watching campaign footage in general, i'm still amazed at how much hatred and ignorance is spewed "in the name of God".
I haven't had a chance to respond to this yet but I think I'll try to add my opinion which will hopefully spark some convo. As you all know I too may come from a biased side; I've taken my religion seriously and got deeply involved and developed a strong relationship with it. I've gone beyond just going to mass once a week and connected it to my everyday life in ways beyond my own understanding. As far as the current situation, I'm for gay people having equal opportunity to a marriage through the state. This will still be possible even if Prop 8 does pass. California law says that domestic partnerships have the same rights, protections, and benefits as marriage. Prop 8 will not change that. Everyone will still have an equal opportunity by state for marriage.
ReplyDeleteProp 8 deals with preserving marriage. When it comes to the Catholic Church, allowing gay marriage would be a very difficult thing to do in the church. And it's not because the church hates gay people. Not at all. The main reason for me is that the traditions and religious practices have been passed down through the generations, and have been unchanged since it started. And having a deep relationship with my religion, I want to keep it the way it is. Even with its flaws and mistakes, I've grown to it and still get an overall positive and uplifting experience from it, and changing it will not make it the same. I've grown up with the Catholic Church the way my dad and mom grew up with it, and I would like my future kids and the future generation to grow up with that same opportunity. I want to preserve marriage the way it is, while still equally allowing homosexuals to acknowledge a relationship through the state that is equal to marriage, but separate from the church. Prop 8 will allow this to happen.
Also, in regards to keeping church separated from state- marriage was originally created through the church. Why does the state control marriage then?
One really has to consider how society today views marriage as opposed to the institution's origins and history. In ancient times, a "marriage" was based on property distribution, gaining power, or having children. If this is the case, wouldn't it make sense for these arrangements to have existed long before humans even began to record history, before anything that we would recognize now as religion? For many religions today, bringing children into the world and raising them to believe in God is still stressed within marriage - does that mean an infertile man or woman has no reason to marry? Of course not.
ReplyDeleteIn any case, it is obvious that the reasons for "marriage" have evolved as we have. Not everyone views marriage as a religious union, but as a legal and/or social union. It wasn't even until the 1500's when the Council of Trent required the presence of a priest and witnesses in order for a Roman Catholic marriage to be recognized. Before this point, marriage by consent was the norm. Does this invalidate the "marriages" prior to this point?
Long story short, why do (most) people want to get married nowadays? To spend the rest of their life with someone they love, legitimize their relationship in the public eye, whatever have you. What makes 2 men or 2 women wanting this different from a man and a woman? The church has stood the test of time and whoever wants to follow what the church suggests, that's fine. But not everyone wants a religious wedding. Not everyone is religious. The freedom of religion means the freedom to worship whoever you like, however you'd like, but it also means to not pass legislation in our country that would infringe another's freedom of religion or freedom to not adopt religion at all, which includes the right to a marriage defined outside of the church's terms.
Honestly, I don't know why people are so bothered with how others conduct their lives as long as they aren't hurting themselves or the well-being of others. And as for civil unions being compared to marriages, let us remind ourselves how "separate but equal" turned out for us before...
Very solid and valid points Kristine. The thing that is controversial to me and makes everything confusing is that I don't think anyone can recognize whether or not religion did or did not exist at those ancient times you mention before history was recorded. Also, from my learning and understanding, religious marriages are intended to demonstrate the relationship and unconditional love between man and God, and having children is not the only way to demonstrate that relationship of man & God. That is why married couples who are capable of having children still choose to not have children. And to explain non-religious marriages, I think they try to do the same thing- to demonstrate unconditional love.
ReplyDeleteAnd as for the rest of the legit points, the only problem with this whole entire issue is that those same points work both ways for people saying no or yes. The point saying that this would infringe on another person's freedom of religion and discriminate against that person works on both sides. If yes passes, then homosexuals would be discriminated and infringed on. If no passes, religious peoples that are against it would be discriminated and infringed on. And that's where it gets confusing and really depends on the individual person's opinion.
And that's where my own priorities come into play. The issue of marriage really does not matter to me. In fact, the issue could be about changing anything- it does not matter. The thing that matters to me is the preservation of my religion. I choose to not conform to something that will change my religion. Not everyone feels this way, but that's me. Everyone has their own different reasons, and they're all valid in their own way.
And one last thing, I think my point of comparing the different "marriages" was not understood as I meant it. What I meant to say is that the only difference between a marriage through the church and a marriage through the state should be just those words state and church. This way, everyone can make marriage whatever they want it to be. The church can do its own thing, and the state can do its own thing. And as everyone wants, it will remain separate from each other.
To clear up some things, I brought up the existence of marriage before religion/recorded history because many of the most popular and influential religions are codified into a specific doctrine for which its followers must obey - the Bible, the Qu'ran, the Torah, etc. Whether religion existed before recorded history or not does not matter, you really cannot state that marriage was created through the church as we know it, therefore the church has no more right to control marriage than the state does.
ReplyDeleteAs for the personal freedom issue, whether Prop 8 passes or not, heterosexuals are not denied the right to marry. Voting no on Prop 8 really is not infringing on your or my freedom of religion because we will still be able to exercise our right to be married if we pleased. If Prop 8 passes, some of our friends would lose that right. Nothing would change about the church. The church will not recognize same-sex marriage either way, so only the freedom of homosexuals will have a real impact. Just like when Roe vs. Wade was passed - the church's position on abortion remained the same, and those who stood against abortion still had the choice of being pro-life. Legalized abortion was not forced into their ideology.
The entire text of Proposition 8 is less than 10 sentences long, but the only words that matter are: "Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California". This includes marriage through church, marriage through the state, marriage period. Same-sex couple will not be able to marry, even with a separation of church and state. Where is the equality in that? Even if civil unions are supposedly equal to marriage, then why do people still want to get married and not just accept a civil union? Or leave it at cohabitation? What marriage means to you is different from what it means to me, from everyone else in California, and it has changed and evolved since the beginning. There is much more to marriage that transcends sexual orientation.
I'll leave it at that, and we can agree to disagree on this issue.
lol..
ReplyDelete