So what's wrong with 'gay rights'?

By Matt C. Abbott

The purpose of a man is to love a woman,
And the purpose of a woman is to love a man....

– Wayne Fontana & The Mindbenders, "The Game Of Love" (1965)

It's all very simple. If anything is marriage, then everything is marriage. And if everything is marriage, then nothing is marriage at all. ''Marriage equality' becomes 'marriage elasticity,' with the ultimate goal of 'marriage extinction.''

– J. Matt Barber (March 25, 2013 column)

Besides the issue of same-sex marriage, which we God-fearing persons know is detrimental to the common good, as well as adoption by homosexual unions, which the Vatican asserted "would actually mean doing violence to these children, in the sense that their condition of dependency would be used to place them in an environment that is not conducive to their full human development" (click here for the pertinent document), the realm of "gay rights" has become alarmingly prevalent in recent years, to the point where a small segment of the population – two or three percent, maybe slightly higher – is now a protected and even revered class. We can thank the mainstream media, pop-culture, many of our schools, and even some of our (dissident) clergy and religious for that.

The persecution of those who assent to God's law, who won't concede special rights for those who practice and promote sexual sin under the guise of civil rights, has begun in earnest, and I fear it will only get worse. There is so much for which to pray. So much!

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, the following is what the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches regarding homosexuality (paragraphs 2357 to 2359):

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 that '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 fulfill 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.

As for the U.S. Supreme Court, I have absolutely no confidence that it will do the right thing in regard to same-sex marriage. Maybe it will, but I fear it won't.

Patrick Fagan, writing at Public Discourse, illustrates why I have no confidence in the court (excerpted; click here for his full commentary):

This year, the Supreme Court will render judgment on the institution of marriage. Though most of us don't realize it, the court first did so forty-one years ago in Eisenstadt v. Baird, a decision that gravely wounded marriage and set the nation on a course of gradual debilitation by ruling that states could not restrict the sale of contraceptives to unmarried people....

In Eisenstadt, the court overturned Massachusetts state law and pulled new sexual rights for singles out of a hat – but gave no standing to the child born of pre- or extra-marital sex. The court played God by redefining the purpose of sexuality. In the process it unleashed sex's destructive power detached from marriage. The court could see rights to contraceptives in the 'shadow' of the Constitution but could not see what a blind man could: the right of every child to married parents.

Having set chaos in motion in Eisenstadt, the Supreme Court quickly built the garbage bin for dumping sexual debris in Roe v. Wade, which gave a green light to the killing of 55 million unborn children, the overwhelming majority of whom were conceived by those unmarried singles with new access to contraceptives....

God help us.

© Matt C. Abbott