True love wins?

Jul 10, 2015

On Friday, June 26, the Supreme Court in the United States of America declared that same-sex couples have a right to marry, anywhere in the United States, with a 5-4 majority.

All over the world, many proponents for freedom celebrated the decision. Social media exploded with the news. Many young people questioned the Church’s objections. “If they are in love and not harming anyone, who are we to judge,” some query. Truelove#Wins has been the slogan for them.

Sexual difference is essential to marriage
“Love is Love,” declares a popular slogan in support of redefining marriage to include persons of the same sex. Its implication is clear: if marriage is about love, then any two adults who love each other should be free to marry … so the claim goes. Such an idea seems to have a certain appeal today, since it attempts to hold up the most universal of human ideals: love and freedom. But love and freedom don’t operate in a vacuum. Like breathing depends upon oxygen, love and freedom … and marriage … depend upon truth. Crucial questions cry out to be answered: Does love have anything to do with the human body, with being a man or a woman? Is there anything unique about married love? What is marriage?

Marriage is about love, but it’s about a unique love that only a man and a woman, as husband and wife, can give to each other. Only through sexual difference can a husband and a wife give themselves completely to one another – so completely that “the two become one flesh” (Gen 2:24). True marital union is not possible without sexual difference.

This is why sexual difference is essential to marriage. Sexual difference is the necessary starting point for understanding why protecting and promoting marriage as the union of one man and one woman isn’t arbitrary or discriminatory. Rather, it’s a matter of justice, truth, love, and real freedom. Only a man and a woman — at every level of their identity: biological, physiological, emotional, social, spiritua l— are capable of authentically speaking the language of married love, that is, the language of total self-gift, open to the gift of the other, and the gift of life.

Marriage welcomes the “supreme gift” of the child
Any honest consideration of marriage must think about children, the hope of our future. For millennia, people of every generation, and of every culture, have understood that the marriage of a man and a woman is the central pro-child social institution, and the rock of the natural family. Marriage has never been about the relationship of just any two adults. Marriage brings together a man and a woman who unite as husband and wife to form a unique relationship, open to welcoming and caring for new life. As the union of husband and wife, marriage is a union open from within, to the blessing of fruitfulness. Children are born “from the very heart” of marriage, from the mutual self-giving between husband and wife (CCC, no. 2366). They are the “supreme gift” of marriage and its “ultimate crown” (GS, nos. 50, 48) Only a man and a woman can authentically speak the language of married love, because only a man and a woman can engage in the act which, by its nature, is designed for bringing new life into the world. This is the awesome call to participate with God in the incredible adventure of creating a new human being, welcoming that child into the world, and forming him or her on the cornerstone of marriage. Sexual difference is vital for the conception of a child, but its importance doesn’t end there. The difference makes a difference throughout a child’s life. There is a consistency to God’s design: just as it is a fact of nature that every child has a father and a mother, so a child needs a father and a mother for the optimal environment for healthy growth in every other way – emotionally, psychologically, intellectually, morally, spiritually. Mothers and fathers are not interchangeable. They each bring unique gifts to the common mission of parenting, that is, fathering and mothering. The presence of a father and a mother – not merely two adults – teaches children about the beauty of sexual difference and what it means to be a boy or girl, a man or woman

Made for the Common Good: Marriage safeguards justice

Are you a bigot if you support preserving the definition of marriage as between one man and one woman in the law? It is no exaggeration to say, that the most common criticism leveled against those who hold to the classic and time-honored definition of marriage, is that they are being “discriminatory.” “Marriage,” goes the argument, “is a human right. It’s unfair to exclude people from marriage simply because they want to marry someone of the same sex.” However, this begs the prior question of marriage. Rights, equality, fairness, and non-discrimination are all important principles and values for the good of society. But an honest consideration of these principles requires an honest consideration of the natural facts of marriage.

Contrary to what is often heard in media and pop-culture venues, and even in some courts and legislatures, protecting marriage as the union of one man and one woman is a matter of justice. Far from being discriminatory, the Church’s teaching on marriage upholds and enhances the dignity of men, women, and children.

There is nothing like marriage, the union of husband and wife. It serves a unique and irreplaceable social role, deserving the protection and privileges of the state. The rights of children to a mother and a father, the rights and responsibilities of husbands and wives, fathers and mothers, to each other and to the children they bring into the world – all of these are safeguarded by promoting and protecting the unique meaning of marriage. -- marriageuniqueforareason.org