ENGLISH TEXT OF POPE BENEDICT XVI'S SPEECH ON THE FAMILY

[EDITED: The links have changed, but these should work now. --Eve]

part 1
part 2
posted by Eve at 4:33 PM VOTE 0 comments

STRAIGHT TALK: From the Connecticut Post

[Much much more here, if you scroll. --Eve]

Ian Ayres, 46, was a young undergraduate at Yale University in New Haven when he planned a trip to his Kansas City, Mo., home with a girlfriend. Telling his dad of his intentions to bring a female visitor, his dad said in no uncertain terms that the two of them would sleep in separate rooms.

That was OK, but then his dad said that Ayres' sister was also bringing home her girlfriend for the weekend, and that they could sleep in the same room.

When Ayres pointed out the double standard, his father said that his sister was getting this privilege because, as a lesbian, she didn't have the option of marrying her significant other, whereas Ayres had the opportunity to marry his.

"I was blown away by that," he said. "That's the inspiration for what [my wife] Jennifer and I are about." ...

Hoping to galvanize more straight people to stand up for gay rights, Brown and Ayres, a law professor at Yale University Law School, co-wrote, "Straightforward: How to Mobilize Heterosexual Support for Gay Rights" [Princeton University Press, $24.95].

"Straightforward" discusses a number of ways in which heterosexuals can take a stand on such issues as same-sex marriage and employee discrimination based on sexual orientation. Some of the ideas put forward in the book include a "vacation pledge," in which participants would vow to take a vacation in the first state to legalize same-sex marriage by legislation or voter referendum.

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posted by Eve at 4:24 PM VOTE 0 comments

MORE FROM GARANCE FRANKE-RUTA (see below)

...The issue is not whether or not violent video games -- or TV shows, or movies -- have the same kind of impact on youth violence that the crack epidemic did. Just because something doesn't end in murder or assault or other significant physical consequences doesn't mean it can't be a real problem. Perceived cultural problems may not be considered real problems within the materialist framework that still rules within liberal circles, but they are nonetheless powerfully important within the broader framework of how people live their lives. The real question at issue is not, "what are the factually documented consequences of X cultural product?," but, "is this really how we want to live?" The first is an empirical question; the second is one of subjective judgement and values.

A lot of the cultural problems parents worry about are just that -- they are problems of culture. The whole point of having politicians talk about such issues is that culture is the product of human conversation and opinion and thought. It is the expression of our values. Public discussion is how people decide what their social norms are and who they are as a people, and how they reassert their values against those of the corporate culture factories. Just having a conversation about something in public is one way of changing cultural norms, and connecting with people who have concerns about society that are not simply material ones.

Indeed, when it comes to cultural issues, the simple act of acknowledging the concerns and taking people's assessments of the problem seriously can help to address whatever the problem is perceived to be. That may look like lip service from within a framework that assumes every problem must meet a legislative reply, but it's actually pretty significant.

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related discussion here
posted by Eve at 2:11 PM VOTE 0 comments

THE PARENT GAP: Garance Franke-Ruta

Another big gap in voting patterns is the so-called "parent gap," which is actually a marriage and parenthood gap, as single moms tend to be strongly Democratic. Progressive Policy Institute fellow and National Marriage Project co-director Barbara Dafoe Whitehead writes about it in the latest issue of the DLC's magazine, Blueprint, which got some comment when it came out in April but seems worth renewed discussion....

Like white women, married parents (of all races and ethnicities) are a demographic category the Democrats have carried in the recent past. Bill Clinton won them in 1996, though only narrowly, after having lost them in 1992, also narrowly. Whitehead dubs them "life stage conservatives," and that sounds about right.

The conservatism of the married is another reason Democratic-voting younger cohorts evolve into to more conservative-voting ones in their 30s and 40s. ...

But back to Whitehead:

"[L]ife stage conservatism" is rooted in the parental responsibility to teach children right from wrong. This sense of responsibility might explain the response of married parents to a now-famous question in the 2004 exit polls. Asked to name the one issue that mattered the most in their presidential voting decision, 27 percent of married parents chose "moral values" -- as opposed to 20 percent of the rest of the electorate.

Again, this seems intuitively true -- and should be obvious to those with kids. One thing that has changed on both sides of the aisle in recent years is that Congress is increasingly staffed by single people -- it was at 62 percent single on the Senate side by 2001, according to the Congressional Management Foundation -- compared to 57 percent in 1991 -- which means an increasing portion of the people setting national policies are not only childless but unmarried. My observation, based on living in this city for eight years, is that the Democrats get married a bit later than the Republicans, as well -- though that's a purely anecdotal observation -- and that very few prominent bloggers have kids, or, if under the age of 30, wives. That means that a lot of the conversation about families, on both sides of the aisle, is, for many of its most active participants, largely an academic question.

Why can't the Democratic Party bid for the votes of people engaged in the work of reproducing society -- as opposed to reinventing it -- and who are worried about how to do that? And how would or should the Dems do that?

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posted by Eve at 2:06 PM VOTE 0 comments

WHEN THREE'S A CROWD: "Ms. Behavior"

[Washington Blade advice columnist. --Eve]

Dear Ms. Behavior:
I'm nearing 42 and I'd love to have a child. The timing is not perfect, but I'm not getting any younger.

A close friend has agreed to donate sperm, with a careful legal agreement. He's a great guy who will participate as much as I allow. Money is not a problem, and I have a flexible job.

The issue is that I'm dating a woman I met less than a year ago. Leslie and I have gotten to know each other slowly but our feelings have intensified and I believe that this could be a serious relationship. It's not realistic for us to discuss having a baby together at this point; we don't even live together yet.
But should I wait until Leslie and I could make the baby decision together? Or, should I just do it?

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posted by Eve at 1:46 PM VOTE 0 comments

ABUSE COMMON AMONG DATING TEENS, STUDY FINDS: From Reuters

...According to a study released Thursday, more than half of America's teens know friends who have experienced physical, sexual or verbal abuse in their dating relationships.

Among those surveyed, 13 percent of teenage girls admit to being physically injured or hit and one in four report being pressured to perform oral sex or engage in intercourse, according to the survey by the private research group Teenage Research Unlimited. ...

The study, which used data collected from online surveys among 300,000 registered participants aged 13 to 18, showed only two-thirds of teens, boys and girls, say they would know what to do if a friend asked for help about an abusive relationship.

To help shed some light on the issue, Liz Claiborne, which has been involved in domestic abuse programs since 1991, is sponsoring a new curriculum in schools. The pilot program is a three day course developed by the non-profit Education Development Center (EDC). It will first be offered in nine schools representing a cross-section of the nation's economy.

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posted by Eve at 1:41 PM VOTE 0 comments

THE ROLE OF RELIGION IN FORMING GOOD FATHERS: Event next Monday in DC

This Monday, June 13, in advance of the upcoming celebration of Father's Day, EPPC will host a discussion about the role religion plays in developing or impeding the characteristics of a good father. W. Bradford Wilcox will present findings from his book Soft Patriarchs, New Men: How Christianity Shapes Fathers and Husbands, and syndicated columnist Mona Charen and Washington Monthly editor Amy Sullivan will offer their own insights. This event will begin at 5:30 p.m. Sign up now! Click here for more information and registration details.
posted by Eve at 4:27 PM VOTE 0 comments

CANADIAN JUSTICE MINISTER CAN'T ASSURE RELIGIOUS PROTECTION IN ALL CASES: From Macleans

Liberals will tweak their contentious same-sex marriage bill but can't guarantee ironclad religious protections, admits Justice Minister Irwin Cotler.

Churches won't be forced to perform gay weddings, he says.

But it's beyond his legal reach to protect provincial marriage commissioners or religious organizations who turn away same-sex couples, he conceded Wednesday. ...

A range of conflicts has already emerged.

Human rights challenges are underway in cases where religious groups refused to rent halls for gay celebrations.

Marriage commissioners in several provinces, including Manitoba and B.C., have stepped down after receiving provincial orders to perform same-sex unions against their beliefs.

A couple in Prince Edward Island shut down their bed-breakfast rather than rent a room to a gay couple. ...

Derek Rogusky, spokesman for Focus on the Family Canada, says those who oppose gay weddings are uneasy. ...

Equality protections tend to trump religious freedoms in legal fights over gay rights, he said.

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posted by Eve at 4:25 PM VOTE 0 comments

COMPROMISE?: Anonymous reply to Ramesh and Maggie

As a conservative Canadian hip-deep in the SSM issue on a daily basis, I have to agree that compromise is impossible on this issue. The Canadian experience illustrates the point perfectly.

a) The province of Alberta, the most conservative-minded province in Canada (but still further left, according to public opinion surveys on various issues, than ANY US state) tried something close to the compromise Ramesh suggests. Alberta passed the Adult Inderdependent Relationships Act, which lets ANY two people register as a "interdependent relationship," allowing them the right to government services, health care benefits, etc., while maintaining the traditional definition of the words "marriage" and "spouse." This satisfied all but the most committed social conservatives, but pro-same-sex marriage advocates still calls Albertans a bunch of rednecks and homophobes, and have not let up on their campaign to get same-sex marriages recognized by the government of Alberta.

This site illustrates my point.

b) The Conservative Party of Canada bends over backwards to come up with a compromise position on this issue. Currently, the official policy on SSM of the CPC is nearly identical to Vermont's civil unions. Despite virtually adopting HOWARD DEAN's position on SSM, the CPC continues to be vilified as a bunch of rednecks, homophobes, and bigots.

Compromise won't work, because those who want SSM officially recognized will not accept any compromise.
posted by Eve at 12:34 PM VOTE 0 comments

DUTCH, BELGIANS TAKE GAY MARRIAGE IN STRIDE: From the Globe and Mail

...The Netherlands and Belgium are still the only countries where marriage of homosexuals is encased in statutory law. The Dutch did it in 2001, the Belgians in 2003. It happened at the one moment in the modern history of both countries when conservative Christian Democrats -- ironically, Mr. Koopmans' party -- were not part of the governing coalitions. ...

As a possible guide, what emerges from a week of conversations with government officials, academics, human-rights specialists and ordinary citizens in the Netherlands and Belgium is that same-sex marriage has slipped smoothly into national life in the two countries, with one or two hiccups, a question mark over the meaning of marriage and divorce statistics, some difficulties with other countries' laws and a bit of lingering homophobia. ...

Which leaves the issue of marriage statistics and the question of whether marriage is being undermined by allowing homosexuals to wed, an argument made by those who point to the dramatic decline in marriages in both countries.

But, as Dutch demographers point out, the decline is a continuation of a trend that began before both registered partnerships were instituted and same-sex marriage became law.

What is alarming are the numbers of Dutch couples downgrading their marriages to registered partnerships because legally it's so much easier to dissolve a registered partnership than a marriage.

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posted by Eve at 6:13 PM VOTE 0 comments

THE POPE'S DANGEROUS CLIMATE OF INCITING HATRED: Maggie Gallagher

And he needs to be "held accountable":

From the Boston Globe:

But gay rights advocates criticized the pope's remarks, as expected as they might have been.

"The comments by Pope Benedict XVI on gay civil marriage. . . sadly reflect what many had feared would be the continued language of hatred and disrespect that has come from the Vatican for many years towards gays and lesbians," said Charles Martel, a Catholic layman who serves on the board of the Religious Coalition for the Freedom to Marry, a Massachusetts organization. "The pope is creating a dangerous climate of inciting hatred towards gays and lesbians, and needs to be held accountable in attempting to encourage civil societies to perpetuate this prejudice."

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posted by Eve at 6:00 PM VOTE 0 comments

STICKS AND STONES: Elizabeth Marquardt

[Reply to this. --Eve]

Divorced people can critique divorce, people who use birth control can understand and respect the "culture of life," people who shacked up can realize later that maybe it wasn't a great idea, or isn't something they'd want their kids to do--and likewise, people can critique SSM, even if they themselves are not "blameless."

Life is complex, guys. Get used to it.
posted by Eve at 5:53 PM VOTE 0 comments

CANADIAN GOVT LOOKS AT RELIGIOUS EXEMPTIONS IN SSM BILL: From the Globe and Mail

The Liberal government moved yesterday to prevent an internal crisis over its bill to legalize same-sex marriage, saying it is willing to beef up protections for church groups complaining that their religious freedoms will be violated.

Justice Minister Irwin Cotler told reporters he could support amendments that add "further certainty" to the bill's existing religious protections.

The comments were made on the heels of a meeting Monday night of Prime Minister Paul Martin, Mr. Cotler and about a dozen Liberal MPs who oppose the bill, after MP Pat O'Brien announced he was leaving the caucus to sit as an independent. Mr. O'Brien raised the possibility he would vote against the Liberals in future no-confidence motions that would bring down the government. ...

A Justice official said the government will give "serious consideration" to an amendment that would assure churches will not lose their charitable status for refusing to perform gay marriages. However, another bone of contention -- protection for civil officials who refuse to perform same-sex marriages out of religious conviction -- are provincial matters and cannot be addressed through amendments.

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posted by Eve at 2:55 PM VOTE 0 comments

MAINE HOUSE STRONGLY REJECTS MARRIAGE AMENDMENT: From the Portland Press Herald

The House of Representatives crushed a proposed constitutional amendment Tuesday night that would have prohibited same-sex marriage, signaling the issue is dead for this year even though the Senate has yet to vote on the issue. The 88-56 vote against the marriage ban showed supporters could not even muster a majority in the House, let alone the two-thirds vote needed in both the House and Senate to send the proposal to voters.

Activists on both sides of the issue said support for the amendment was so weak in the House that the proposal clearly is going nowhere, no matter what the Senate does when it takes up the issue, possibly this week. ...

The constitutional amendment that the House rejected Tuesday is a watered-down version of Duprey's original proposal, which would have prohibited both same-sex marriage and the legal recognition of unmarried relationships that "approximate the design, qualities, significance or effect of marriage," such as civil unions.

Some opponents testified at a public hearing May 25 that the original proposal was so broad it could undermine existing rights for unmarried couples, including opposite-sex couples, such as inheritance rights, funeral rights and protective orders against abuse.

Supporters tried to defuse those arguments by rewriting the ban to limit it to marriage. The new version, which is what the House rejected Tuesday night, reads: "Only a union between one man and one woman may be a marriage valid in or recognized by this state and its political subdivisions."

But that change not only failed to win over the House, it antagonized some supporters of the original ban who preferred to target both marriage and civil unions. Once the language banning civil unions was stripped from the amendment, support dwindled among social conservatives who saw the revision as too weak.

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posted by Eve at 2:53 PM VOTE 0 comments

SHOULD STATES ABOLISH MARRIAGE?: Mary Lyndon Shanley vs Linda McClain

[I posted a link to this debate while it was still in progress. It's completed now; here are some excerpts from the later entries. My concerns here still hold, though. --Eve]

Shanley: ...Some people worry that distinguishing the civil and religious aspects of marriage would undercut people's sense of the seriousness of the marital commitment; I think the opposite is more likely. Marriage is a source of social validation for people who choose to commit themselves to a shared life, and it infuses personal choice with more than idiosyncratic meaning. Rather than diminish the significance of commitment, if we more clearly distinguish civil and religious or ethical dimensions of partnerships those people who choose a commitment or religious ceremony in addition to registering their civil union will do so as a carefully considered and deeply meaningful act.

McClain: Molly, I think we disagree on whether the idea of civil marriage has any real weight. Your distinction between civil and religious marriage seems to robs civil marriage of almost any meaningful content. And when you propose to distinguish the "civil" from "religious or ethical" dimensions of adult partnerships, civil marriage becomes an even emptier category. No doubt, religious beliefs shape people's aspirations for their marriages. But I still maintain that civil marriage--even independent of such religious beliefs--conjures up a set of associations about personal commitment, intimacy, family, emotional and economic interdependency, and (when children are part of the household) parenthood. Family law and judicial opinions discussing marriage bear out these dimensions. At least some of these dimensions of civil marriage--commitment, love, mutual responsibility--are "ethical," whether or not they are mirrored in and reinforced by religious understandings of marriage. ...

Shanley: ...I see no reason to think that universal civil unions will sap committed adult relationships of their meaning. Let the state have its moment; let it enable people to assume and carry out obligations of mutual sustenance and support, and let it work out what consequences or obligations remain (to partners and to children) in the event the relationship ends. Beyond that, let people define and express the meaning of their commitment, as they do now, in a myriad expressions of commitment, intimacy, love and mutual responsibility that go beyond their legal duties to one another. ...

McClain: ...Molly, a final thought: Our debate has dwelled especially on how best to address one form of inequity: the denial of the right of marry to same-sex couples. But we have also agreed that there are other committed adult relationships that warrant governmental recognition and support—whether it be through the idea of "civil unions" or domestic partnerships. I hope that family law and policy will move in this direction.

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posted by Eve at 2:46 PM VOTE 0 comments

THE NEW CONSERVATIVE CASE FOR GAY MARRIAGE: Maggie Gallagher replies to Craig Westover

Andrew Sullivan posted a link to a column responding to our good friend Katherine Kersten's column on gay marriage in the Minnesota Star-Tribune. The response is by a St. Paul Pioneer Press writer named Craig Westover. (He's also interviewed our good friend and gay marriage advocate University Minnesota Law Prof. Dale. Carpenter as well.)

Westover argues what he considers the conservative case for gay marriage, what Andrew Sullivan dubs "midwestern common sense":

The reality is gays exist. Gay couples exist. Gay couples with children exist. That might not be the best environment to raise kids -- two parents of opposite genders is better. No argument. But what are Kersten and Parker proposing?

Should we remove all children from gay households and redistribute them through adoption to opposite-sex families? Should we deny all gay people child custody and guardianship? That's a logically consistent position although incredibly cruel. But if it's "best"?

For a veteran of the marriage wars, it is just remarkable how much the new conservative case for gay marriage looks and sounds like the old dying liberal case against marriage. Family diversity exists. Children live in many situations. Shouldn't we therefore treat all these situations equally, for the sake of the kids? To do otherwise is unfair to single mothers, stepfamilies, cohabiting families, because like it or not these families exist too!

Westover throws in this weird theory that we have two choices: treat these relationships like marriage, or else strip people of their children if they are not married--where did that come from?

Craig Westover seems to think this would be the "logical," coherent, if cruel, position. To me, it's a wild ball from left field whose internal coherence escapes me.

Marriage is about pointing the next generation towards the ideal. The state doesn't have the power to take kids away from parents because they are less than ideal. At least, the state didn't used to have this power. The old rule was: unless the parent is dangerously abusive the state has no power to intervene. Parental rights are not gifts of the state to be reassigned according to ideal circumstances. But having given the state the power to redefine marriage, these people seem to naturally feel that parenthood is similarly at risk for social engineering.

Maybe they are on to something.
posted by Eve at 12:27 PM VOTE 0 comments

KEEPING AN OPTION OPEN: Ramesh Ponnuru replies to Maggie Gallagher

Amazingly, my article on the possibility of a limited compromise in the battles over gay marriage has not received universal or, indeed, any acclaim. I have instead received two reactions. Most of my readers have said that there is no point to seeking compromise of any sort -- the general argument being that gay activists want marriage and will settle for nothing less. As though to confirm this argument, the rest of my correspondents have been advocates of gay marriage who maintained that nothing less than full equality -- which they understood, of course, as gay marriage -- was acceptable.

Maggie Gallagher is one of those who think that I am wrong to suggest that the "fourth option" would reduce the rancor of the marriage debate or even "affect" its course. Before I get to that point, let me address the cautionary note she raises to the fourth option as a policy. She says she has "no very strong objection" to it, but wants eligibility for any new legal arrangement to exclude people who are or could be married to each other. For reasons explained in my article, I do not think this exclusion is necessary. Just as letting people form contracts and limited partnerships for certain purposes has not even arguably undermined marriage, neither would the sort of arrangements I am discussing do so. Also, I suspect that the exclusion would be unworkable.

On to (what I take to be) Gallagher's main point. It may very well be true that pro-gay-marriage activists would not settle for the fourth option. I never suggested that they would and, as Gallagher says, given their sincere convictions it would be surprising if they did. But I was not offering a compromise that would forever settle the issue of marriage. I was suggesting that the contending parties in the debate ought to be able to agree on certain practical steps that would address some of the benefit issues in that debate while continuing to argue over the issue of recognition. Addressing those benefit issues does not concede that existing marriage laws are discriminatory. It acknowledges that those benefit issues can be addressed without changing the marriage laws. I'd think Gallagher would be happy to see that point made.

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posted by Eve at 12:19 PM VOTE 0 comments

JPII ON MARRIAGE AND CHILDREN: From Familiaris Consortio

[As long as we're talking Popes. Whole encyclical is here. --Eve]

Children, the Precious Gift of Marriage

14. According to the plan of God, marriage is the foundation of the wider community of the family, since the very institution of marriage and conjugal love are ordained to the procreation and education of children, in whom they find their crowning.

In its most profound reality, love is essentially a gift; and conjugal love, while leading the spouses to the reciprocal "knowledge" which makes them "one flesh," does not end with the couple, because it makes them capable of the greatest possible gift, the gift by which they become cooperators with God for giving life to a new human person. Thus the couple, while giving themselves to one another, give not just themselves but also the reality of children, who are a living reflection of their love, a permanent sign of conjugal unity and a living and inseparable synthesis of their being a father and a mother.

When they become parents, spouses receive from God the gift of a new responsibility. Their parental love is called to become for the children the visible sign of the very love of God, "from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named."

It must not be forgotten however that, even when procreation is not possible, conjugal life does not for this reason lose its value. Physical sterility in fact can be for spouses the occasion for other important services to the life of the human person, for example, adoption, various forms of educational work, and assistance to other families and to poor or handicapped children.

The Family, a Communion of Persons

15. In matrimony and in the family a complex of interpersonal relationships is set up--married life, fatherhood and motherhood, filiation and fraternity--through which each human person is introduced into the "human family" and into the "family of God," which is the Church.

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posted by Eve at 12:06 PM VOTE 0 comments

STICKS AND STONES: Maggie Gallagher replies to Chuck Muth and Andrew Sullivan

A new argument from Chuck Muth and Andrew Sullivan: "Now that the Pope has spoken, let only those Catholics who are without similar sin cast stones on gay marriage. ...If you're Catholic and relying on the Pope's condemnation of gay marriages to support your own opposition to same-sex nuptials, you had better not be ... divorced, have ever used condoms or birth control pills and never have 'shacked up' with a lover who was not your spouse. If you have, you have NO moral authority, at least based upon your Catholicism, to attack gay marriage without being considered a complete hypocrite. Pretty tough pill to swallow, huh?" - Chuck Muth, in his newsletter.

"He has an important point, made by Dan Savage as well," says Andrew. Let only those who are without sexual sin, cast votes in favor of gay marriage. The penalty for violating the fearsome Muth/Sullivan rule? You're a complete hypocrite.

This is a new twist. It might be one thing to say that Catholics who oppose gay marriage really ought to support all the Pope's teaching on marriage and sexuality. But only people who've never committed a sexual sin are entitled to care about marriage in a democratic society? You don't need special moral authority to argue for the common good. You just need to be a citizen acting in good faith.

I personally am ready to stamp a big Scarlet H right on my forehead, before I stop doing what I can to protect marriage. Let me know what the new Puritans decide. I'll start sewing.
posted by Eve at 11:36 AM VOTE 0 comments

MORE ON THE POPE'S REMARKS: Chuck Muth and Andrew Sullivan

"Now that the Pope has spoken, let only those Catholics who are without similar sin cast stones on gay marriage. If you wish to rely on the Pope's decree with regard to gay marriage, you MUST also support what ELSE the Pope said in the same speech. In addition to condemning gay marriage, the Pope also condemned DIVORCE, ARTIFICIAL BIRTH CONTROL and TRIAL MARRIAGES. If you're Catholic and relying on the Pope's condemnation of gay marriages to support your own opposition to same-sex nuptials, you had better not be ... divorced, have ever used condoms or birth control pills and never have "shacked up" with a lover who was not your spouse. If you have, you have NO moral authority, at least based upon your Catholicism, to attack gay marriage without being considered a complete hypocrite. Pretty tough pill to swallow, huh?" - Chuck Muth, in his newsletter. He has an important point, made by Dan Savage as well. The headlines were all about gay marriage, but the Pope condemned in equal fashion the choices of the vast majority of Americans, from masturbation to IVF. The issue is not homosexuality as such for the Pope. It is any expression of sexuality that isn't always marital and procreative. But somehow, only the gays get the brunt. Why?

link
posted by Eve at 11:34 AM VOTE 0 comments

AND I... WANNA BE... ANARCHY: Discussion of the Pope's remarks on marriage

[Lots of discussion here. I'm snipping two comments from the same person, "Nancy." --Eve]

#1: ...I am personally acquainted with two "triads" formed in the 1960's. One consists of two women and one man; the other, two men and one woman. Of course both families have been together now for many years, and both groups are grandparents. I've known all these people for many years.

The kids all seem fine to me at least, as fine as anyone else. They don't seem to have an unusual number of "issues" with their parents. The ones who have married have formed conventional families. The one woman in the man/man/woman family is one of my closest friends; I went to law school (and with one of them, undergraduate school) with the two women in the other group. The adults seem unusually happy, but then again, stable marriages are rare these days.

Who has sex with whom? How do they figure it out? Don't go there. It's not our business.

What does this prove? Absolutely nothing, except that making this work is not impossible.

What should society do? Well here, as a lawyer, I do have some opinions.

Society should come down on the side of stability and commitment, for the sake of the children if for no other reason. The inability of homosexuals to marry has spawned any number of weird half-way measures like Domestic Partnership (which then commitment-averse heterosexuals want in on) and the like.

I would like to see the secular society draw a bright line. Either you make a commitment or you don't. A commitment means, you'll stand by each other through thick and thin (divorce should be made a good deal more difficult), you'll support each other financially, all that. Gay or straight, whatever.

If you make a commitment, we'll support you. We'll require health care, we'll give you tax breaks, whatever. If you don't want to make commitments, if you want to just shack up, gay or straight, well then, you're on your own. No health care benefits, no tax benefits, nothing, you can figure it out for yourselves.

The Church, any church? Well, the Church already differs substantially from the secular society in our view of divorce. The Church is under no obligation whatever to follow the secular society in this matter.

But we're supposed to be followers of Christ? Maybe we might try listening to these people, and to their experience?

#2: ...Happily, the "zeitgeist" is ahead of alleged Christians on this one. We're accepting and loving these families, going to PTA meetings with them, having their kids over to play. We're supporting them in fidelity as we support all our friends. When Brad next door freaked out and ran off for 24 hours, the neighborhood reacted protectively of Jeff, and held Brad to account. ("You nut, what do you think you're doing?!?") When Gabriel, Jo-Ann and Karen's kid, needs a ride, we car pool. We go to parties at their house. They come to dinners at ours.

Pope Benedict doesn't like it. It frightens him.

Luckily he lives in the Vatican, and doesn't need to confront the ragged edge of love. Love always has a ragged edge.

lots more here
posted by Eve at 3:07 PM VOTE 0 comments

ANARCHY: Andrew Sullivan replies to Pope Benedict XVI

I'm waiting to read the full context of the Pope's remarks decrying the possibility of a gay couple committing to each other as "anarchy." But at first blush, I would think that "anarchy" would better describe a world in which gay people have no context for their relationships, no social support for connecting sex with love, no chance of being fully a part of their own families. But I'm hardly surprised by the inflammatory rhetoric or the contempt for modernity and for human freedom voiced by this Pope. We knew what we were getting. Is he persuasive? Well, for that he would need an argument, an engagement with the social forces that have propelled gay relationships to the forefront of contemporary debate. Easier to pontificate and condemn. And he sure knows how to do both of those. Meanwhile, Europe continues to ignore him. Close to 60 percent of the Swiss just voted to allow gay couples to have most of the rights and responsibilities of civil marriage. If I'd stayed in Britain, I'd only have to wait a few months for full legal marriage rights. Maybe if the Pope voiced a little more charity and listened a tiny bit more, more people would listen back.

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posted by Eve at 3:02 PM VOTE 0 comments

POPE ON "ANARCHIC FREEDOM" AND THE "BANALIZATION OF THE HUMAN BODY": From Reuters

[If you can read Italian, you can read the Pope's remarks in their entirety here. I'm still looking for an English transcript. --Eve]

Pope Benedict, in his first clear pronouncement on gay marriages since his election, on Monday condemned same-sex unions as fake and expressions of "anarchic freedom" that threatened the future of the family.

The Pope, who was elected in April, also condemned divorce, artificial birth control, trial marriages and free-style unions, saying all of these practices were dangerous for the family.

"Today's various forms of dissolution of marriage, free unions, trial marriages as well as the pseudo-matrimonies between people of the same sex are instead expressions of anarchic freedom which falsely tries to pass itself off as the true liberation of man," he said. ...

The Pope, who as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger headed the Vatican's doctrinal department for more than two decades, said "pseudo freedoms" such as gay marriages were based on what he called the "banalisation of the human body" and of man himself.

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posted by Eve at 2:56 PM VOTE 0 comments

PUT ASUNDER: Camassia

[Moving. --Eve]

...My reaction to my parents' separation, when I was 14, was in fact oddly unemotional. This greatly annoyed my sister, who took it very hard. I still don't remember it with a great deal of emotion. But now that I look back on it, it seems that my real expression of distress at the divorce came out through the house. I was unhappy that my father wanted my mother to sell it. By this time I was in college, so I didn't live there, but still it bothered me. ...

That I should feel so much more about a building than about actual people perhaps affirms my sister's view of me as cold-hearted. But, now that I think of it, it's not so strange. My relationships with my family members didn't actually change that much with the divorce; the marriage had long been a dead thing and I was used to relating to my parents separately, and anyway we were introverts who kept to ourselves a lot even when we lived together. And my parents, to their credit, made sure that we spent the rest of our teenage years with minimal disruption. But what I didn't see, in my myopic adolescent way, was that even the corpse of the marriage was holding together something bigger and yet subtler. It was that family homestead, that center of gravity around which the rest of the world seems to arrange itself, and to which one naturally returns at certain times. The house was, I think, the image of us as a unit, the sum greater than the parts, which we never really lived up to but was nonetheless there. Now that it's gone, one place seems much like another to me.

I don't want to overdramatize my situation. I doubt that all this really harmed me. But I can see how, if this is repeated millions of times across the country, it can eat away at something important, something fundamentally human. All along I have often had dreams where my parents were together, not in the foreground or as the point of the dream, but in in the background, as something assumed. There is only one configuration of persons that was burned into my brain as The Family, and that will probably always be so.

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posted by Eve at 11:21 AM VOTE 0 comments

PRIEST HURT IN MOCK GAY MARRIAGE: From News.Com.Au; FWIW

A PRIEST was slightly hurt at Paris's famed Notre-Dame Cathedral when clashes broke out between church security personnel and gay rights activists who performed a mock marriage of two lesbians.

About 20 members of the group Act Up entered the cathedral and proceeded to perform the mock marriage in front of baffled tourists and worshippers, according to an AFP correspondent at the scene. ...

With security officials in pursit, they then fled the cathedral, but clashes broke out outside the Paris landmark, during which Monsignor Patrick Jacquin suffered a minor neck injury. He was treated at the scene.

The demonstration marked the first anniversary of France's first gay wedding, performed last year in the Bordeaux suburb of Begles.

The union of two men has since been declared null and void by the French courts. ...

The president of Act Up Paris, Jerome Martin -- who participated in today's demonstration -- said he had also been hit in the melee, but claimed the priest had exaggerated the actual events.

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posted by Eve at 5:19 PM VOTE 0 comments

AMERICAN FAMILY ASSOC. VS AFL-CIO: Press release

A broad coalition of religious and family values organizations this week went toe to toe with Big Labor, demanding in a letter to national AFL-CIO President John Sweeney that union officials rescind an unreported AFL-CIO executive committee resolution opposing federal and state constitutional amendments to define marriage as only between one man and one woman.

* See attached letter to AFL-CIO President John Sweeney, scheduled for Fed Ex delivery by 10:30 a.m. Friday
* See AFL-CIO resolution at: http://www.aflcio.org/aboutaflcio/ecouncil/ec03032005g.cfm

Dr. Don Wildmon, Chairman of the American Family Association, said the letter's purpose is "to protect one-man, one-woman marriage and defend the precious religious liberties of millions of faithful Americans who belong to an AFL-CIO-affiliated union."

Wildmon was joined on the letter by leaders of over three dozen national and state organizations -- including Catholic Vote, the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, the Coalition of African American Pastors, and Christian television and radio networks, as well as prominent religious and conservative leaders such as Linda Chavez, President George W. Bush's original nominee for Secretary of Labor, Dr. Jerry Falwell, Paul Weyrich, Beverly LaHaye, and Dr. Rick Scarborough. Three Christian legal foundations, seven AFA state affiliates, and half a dozen affiliates of Dr. James Dobson's Focus on the Family also signed the letter, including former AFL-CIO union negotiator Phil Burress of Citizens for Community Values in Cincinnati, whose successful state marriage amendment was widely credited with tipping Ohio into Bush's reelection column last November. ...

The AFL-CIO resolution states that a federal Marriage Protection Amendment to the U.S. Constitution "and its state counterparts threaten the rights of working people by creating an environment across the nation that is hostile to the rights of domestic partners, regardless of their sexual orientation."

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posted by Eve at 4:59 PM VOTE 0 comments

SWISS APPROVE CIVIL UNIONS: From the Associated Press

...Same-sex couples also were granted more rights in the two-issue referendum, marking the first time the issue has been put to a national vote in Europe. ...

In the referendum's other issue, a larger majority -- 1.56 million people or 58 percent -- were in favor of granting more rights to same-sex couples.

The vote means that starting in 2007, registered same-sex couples will be receive the same tax and pension status as married couples, but they will not be allowed to adopt children or undergo fertility treatment.

It is the first national vote in Europe on such an issue, although other countries, such as Germany, have passed laws allowing registration of same-sex couples.

The two topics sparked a larger turnout than usual in Switzerland's referendums, which are held three or four times a year. Some 55.9 percent of the 4.82 million eligible voters participated, about 10 percent more than the average turnout over the past 15 years.

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posted by Eve at 4:57 PM VOTE 0 comments

MORALITY AND MARRIAGE: Gabriel Rosenberg

...Marriage is not some sort of seal of approval by the state. It is certainly not a seal of approval on whom one has taken for a spouse. When someone in Vegas gets drunk and marries someone they just met, the state is not saying it approves of such a relationship. When someone marries someone fifty years older merely for his or her money, the state is not approving of that relationship. I do not believe one should marry a person of another faith, but that is their decision to make, not mine and not the state's.

It is possible, though, that for some the moral concern is not that homosexual relationships are wrong per se, but rather that the ideal situation in which to raise a child is with parents of the opposite sex. ...

Again I am reminded of the situation of interfaith couples. I do not believe that is the ideal situation for raising children, but for many reasons I would not support governmental denial of such marriages. In fact, there are many couples that marry when they are clearly not in the ideal situation to raise children. This is okay, though, because marriage does not signal that the couple is in an ideal situation to raise children. What would be the purpose of such a seal anyway? There is a good chance the couple will raise children regardless of the state's opinion about their situation. Rather, I believe marriage itself is something that will generally make the environment itself better for raising children. A cohabiting couple is capable of providing a mom and a dad, but the marriage of said couple would make the environment for raising children significantly better for a number of reasons. Likewise regardless of one's view on the propriety of same-sex couples raising children, I would think most would agree that the situation would be significantly better if the couple had taken on the obligations and protections of marriage.

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posted by Eve at 1:21 PM VOTE 0 comments

IS THERE A FOURTH OPTION?: Maggie Gallagher replies to Ramesh Ponnuru

Ramesh Ponnuru proposes a "Fourth Option" in the gay-marriage debate in the current issue of NR, by which he means a form of civil union or domestic partnership that would be available to non-sexual unions as well as same-sex couples.

As a marriage advocate, I have no strong objection to such a proposal, provided that it is available only to couples who are not otherwise eligible for marriage, and provided that married couples are ineligible to enter such unions. (This is not a theoretical concern: The prestigious American Law Institute has already urged states to permit married people to create a legitimate domestic partnership with a third party under certain rare circumstances, creating a new path to legal polygamy.)

What I can't understand is why Ramesh thinks this is an option that will affect the course of the gay-marriage debate.

Gay-marriage advocates have proposed that they have a right to marry, that separate treatment is grossly unequal, and that there are no differences between same-sex and opposite-sex couples that justify differential treatment under the law. A court in California has just ruled that adopting a civil-union statute constitutes proof of the state's intent to discriminate, calling into jeopardy its marriage laws. Activists in states where civil unions have been proposed have offered the kind of changes Ramesh suggests only to be batted aside by gay-marriage advocates for whom "benefits" are clearly far less significant than affirming the equality of their relationship and families. ...

Elaborate discussions of the kind of civil unions we should endorse are perfectly legitimate, but they do not address the core proposition raised by the gay-marriage debate, and they distract from the actual question at stake, i.e., marriage. They will not affect the "rancor" of the marriage debate, which is rooted in the honest, deeply felt assertion of gay people that they have a right to marry, not a right to nonsexual domestic cohabitations, and that anyone who says otherwise is like a bigot.

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posted by Eve at 10:44 AM VOTE 0 comments

MARRIAGES THAT LAST UNTIL DEATH DO THEM PART: From the Washington Times

Amelia Moir had a one-word answer yesterday when asked why her marriage to Jack, 80, had lasted 61 years.

"Tenacity," said Mrs. Moir, while her husband grinned and nodded his head in agreement.

The couple, now living in Kensington, were married in 1944 in Arlington after Mr. Moir was discharged from the Army in World War II. She, like so many young women during that war, had taken a job with the government.

Now, they have three children and five -- soon to be six -- grandchildren.

"Our grandson just got back from a year in Iraq," Mrs. Moir said, with more than a hint of thankfulness in her voice.

The Moirs were among more than 350 couples jammed into reserved front-section seats yesterday at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception to renew their vows of marriage made 25 to 69 years ago. ...

Others of the more than 1,200 in the shrine, who had been married for less than 25 years, also rose to repeat the vows and hold left hands for the blessing of marriage rings.

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posted by Eve at 10:39 AM VOTE 0 comments