Those crazy Catholics still don’t get it.
Asked what he would say to a gay Catholic couple who approached him for marriage within the Church, the Archbishop said: “I would want to say to them that I understand their desires, that I understand their experience of love is vitally important in their lives, but I would want to say to them that they are called in my view, in the Church’s view, to a very profound friendship in life.
“I would want them to be respected, but I would want them to have a vision in themselves that what they are called to is not marriage but a very profound and lifelong friendship.”
Oh, friendship. Wink wink, nudge nudge, knowwhatImean, right? Like what I’ve got with my wife, a “profound and lifelong friendship”, not at all like those fleeting non-consensual tickle-and-poke sessions with en endless series of altar boys.
Wait a minute…isn’t that exactly what a successful and happy marriage is? A profound and lifelong friendship, a deeper relationship than anything some arrogant celibate social failure like a priest could possibly understand? Why is anyone paying any attention at all to this smug gomer’s advice?
Yeah, there’s a poll.
Should gay couples be allowed to marry?
Yes, anyone regardless of sexual orientation should be allowed to marry 36.35%
Yes, but not in church 10.97%
No, marriage should be kept between a man and a woman 52.67%
Poll pharyngulated – cheers.
Latest figures – still a long way to go :
***
Thank you for voting!
Yes, anyone regardless of sexual orientation should be allowed to marry 36.49% (5,445 votes)
Yes, but not in church 10.97% (1,636 votes)
No, marriage should be kept between a man and a woman 52.54% (7,839 votes)
Total Votes: 14,920
***
Wonder if this is why the preists stay celibate – they really & truly don’t know what sexual relationships are or mean and so just plain can’t tell the difference betwixt lovers and friends?
I don’t know why the whole in the church thing matters one iota. No one can force a church to marry anyone and if there is a church that wants to marry gay people all the better for them. Its just a big non sequitur on the issue of whether governments should make it legal.
Mmm, I love the smell of a homophobic bigot’s poll being pharyngulated in the morning.
Steve,
Well, the practice of celibacy was instituted to so the church would inherit any and all wealth when a priest died.
Anyway. I don’t really give a flying fuck if an individual church decides not to perform a marriage ceremony for a same sex couple– hell, I couldn’t get married in a Catholic church and I’m straight– but they ABSOLUTELY SHOULD NOT be campaigning against marriage equality. Those rat bastards should have absolutely no say in secular laws.
Fuckers.
There is one huge difference between married couples and life-long friends – there is no need for shelters for battered friends.
Agree with michaeld, the whole “in a church” part is irrelevant. It seems to be an unfortunate fact that many same sex couples are religious who would very much like their church to recognize their marriage. Christianity has a habit of not recognizing all sorts of moral, logical, and good things so I don’t see same-sex marriage as anything different than the abolition of slavery or evolution.
I was married in a chapel, the officiant was an atheist, the ceremony/music was of our choosing, the words god/spirit/soul were not mentioned. My marriage is legit in my eyes and more importantly, the eyes of the state. No citizens of our country should be denied the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
When I tried to vote in the Torygraph poll (on an Android phone) I got an error pop-up that said, and I am not joking:
“Poll cannot find nonce.”
They added that to split the yes vote and make their position appear stronger. Dishonest motherfuckers.
I hate it when the correct answer is viewed as a red herring. Certainly same-sex marriage should be recognized, but just as clearly churches should not be required to endorse views or social constructs to which they morally object — no matter how misguided their objections may be.
It isn’t irrelevant to say that ‘gays should be allowed to marry, just not in church’; it’s just a case of vote-splitting on the part of the poll’s promoters. Sure, churches should eventually become irrelevant, but until such a time as that, I’m not about to say that a synagogue must serve bacon at wedding receptions for Muslim participants.
I cannot fault anyone for choosing the unqualified ‘yes’ option, but technically, the qualified ‘yes’ is the correct choice.
Man, the Torygraph’s taken a turn for the nasty these days. It’s as if they’re trying to out-nasty the Daily Mail
scaryduck #10
It’s a close run thing these days. In a blind (figuratively) reading test, it would be hard to tell them apart.
That “priest” would “want to say” all that loving crap but that is not what he would actually say! He would say that in the eyes of the church having sex outside of marriage is a mortal sin, having homosexual relations is a mortal sin and unless you confess your sin, receive absolution and make a good act of contrition you will be damned to eternal torment in hell. If you continue in this relationship with a same sex partner you will be living in sin and should you die before you can confess and receive absolution you will be damned to hell forever.
If he thinks anyone believes that is church policy now he is nuts and he is a lying hypocrite and just as guilty as those he condemns.
uncle frogy
When he equates a homosexual relationship to a life-long friendship, it’s probably because he wants to make it obvious that there is to be no sex there.
I bet he deliberately phrased it like that to effectively erase all those who have icky ghey sex from the statement – after all, those don’t deserve respect. Pits of hell and all that is for them.
No the second answer isn’t the right one…that’s a debate about venue of ceramony not rights…don’t conflate the two
The first, unconditional Yes is up to 39%.
Let’s be clear, “very profound and lifelong friendship” and “love” never really played a big role in biblical marriages. Although, handmaidens where also played a pretty big role in biblical marriages…..
For the FSM so loved the world…
Yep. That’s why mine has lasted 33 years.
Got to love the intentional splitting of the YES votes there at the Torygraph. This way you can have 60% support FOR gay marriage and they will still claim the NOs have it.
Yes, anyone regardless of sexual orientation should be allowed to marry 41.01% (6,714 votes)
No, marriage should be kept between a man and a woman 48.67% (7,968 votes)
But, but … what if a gay man and a gay woman want to get married? What to do with my bigotry then?
Very clever of the Telegraphy to split the Yes vote over the question of where the marriages are performed. In fact, the first and third options don’t mention where, only the second. So, the poll looks like Yes is behind No, but in fact the combined Yeses are ahead 51.5% to 48.7%. Now I wonder why the Telegraph did that?…mmm…let me think…mmm
Should Little Timmy have a birthday party
Yes
Yes but not at the Museum of Sex
No
Well Timmy, I’m sorry. Because we implied that it was an option to take you to a place that wouldn’t allow in minors I’m afraid you can’t have a birthday party.
I wish I could claim credit for this one, but here’s a succinct rundown of the laws governing Biblical marriage as defined between a man and a woman – well sort of…
hrm, 2 yes options and 1 no option…They couldn’t be trying to split the yes vote to make the NO! look bigger could they?
/agree the language usage is a bit off. It’d be weird to have a secular gov require a given religion to hold the relevant religious ceremony religiously if that organization didn’t want to. Then again, I’ve never seen anyone ask for that. As to getting married in a physical building that is a church – sure why not? Space is space and many churches are quite beautiful.
Just an aside, can anyone explain to me how to embed a link? My luddite understanding of tags is letting me down here.
I also noted the cunning “divide and conquer” voting buttons on the telegraph site, so I just figured that the “not in a church” option was a deliberate distraction and went with option A.
I don’t understand the Church’s position. They want to define marriage as between men and women (or for that matter, between amoebae and bacteria), all the power to them. Go ahead and get your own dictionary and define it the way you want it. Why do you want the rest of the world to also follow your dictionary?
Ugh. The vote splitting is annoying, though I really do wish people would see through option number two and realize it was irrelevant. I wonder if it was included as they realized it would split the vote or if they were just very ignorant of how to design a poll.
I really just want marriage in a church to become a ceremony done by those that want it. A ceremony that their religion thinks they need. But something with no legal standing at all.
I can’t vote for this poll at all. I believe marriage should be abolished as a legal concept. It is just not necessary; if two (or even more than two) people decide they want to be together they should not need the approval of the church or the state.
But I am weird that way ;-)
http://freethoughtblogs.com/cuttlefish/2012/03/16/what-a-profound-and-lifelong-friend-we-have-in-jesus/
The government has repeatedly said that no religious group will be forced to marry gay couples, so the vote splitting is pretty fucking disingenuous.
‘In church’ isn’t even an option but the “we shall be compelled by law against our will!” meme is just another part of the bizarre (and growing) persecution complex that leads to nonsense like this http://www.notashamed.org.uk/
where Christians congratulate each other for the extraordinary bravery of admitting their religious beliefs in a country with an established church.
If I was one of a gay couple being fed this spoon of pablum by the archbishop, I’d be tempted to respond
“Calling? Y’mean, so that I don’t notice your church dogma exposing its shameful inadequacies, you’re trying to distract me with this imaginary calling voice in the distance. If I’d turned up with a woman, you wouldn’t be guffing on about deep friendships, you’d be asking us when we want to make a booking. Why the difference, compadre?”
I think it would be very helpful to deny the church the right to use the word ‘marriage’ when it comes to their ceremony. What they have, at least in the the Catholic church, is highly specified ceremony officially called a ‘Holy Sacrament of Matrimony’.
The term ‘marriage’ is a secular civil ceremony of long history conferring important civil privileges. That the State has allowed the ceremony of Holy Matrimony to suffice as the civil ceremony is a privilege that the State has granted to churches – not the other way around.
Conflating the two terms ‘marriage’ and ‘Holy Matrimony’ has confused the issue, and is what has led to the unfounded fears of the religious that gay marriage will be coming into their churches by government edict.
It would be a good strategic move to reclaim the term ‘marriage’ for exclusive use in the civic sphere, and insist that ‘Holy Matrimony’ or another appropriate term be used for the church ceremony.
I should point out that this poll is in England/Wales where legal marriage in a religious setting is an issue not only because of the religion’s rules but because of law. Currently an opposite sex couple can be married legally in a religious setting (with differing laws depending on whether it is CoE, Quaker, Jewish, or other) or married by a registrar in a purely civil setting (religious trappings are forbidden). Same sex couples can have a civil union but religious trappings again are forbidden. The government is proposing allowing same-sex marriage but possibly only civil ones so that even if a religion such as the Unitarians, Quakers, or Reformed Jews would like to have a religious ceremony (which these ones have indicated they are fine with) it would have to be separate from the civil legal ceremony (opposite sex couple could have a ceremony that was both legal and religious).
In England btw the Catholic hierarchy and much of the CoE hierarchy are opposed to even civil same sex marriage.
The No’s are still (or again) slightly ahead.
Of course, the problem isn’t whether any church will perform such marriages–they can make their own rules. The problem is that they try to influence secular laws to inject their religious viewpoints into them.
One wonders why the Church should consider it business to deny friends the right to marry.
My same-sex partner and I just got back from the registry office, where we picked up our marriage licence. The woman at the counter was friendly and helpful.
Not one problem, not a nasty look, nothing but a friendly smile.
I’m so glad I live in Canada. I hope your laws change soon…
My step-daughter married the woman of her dreams last year, at their city hall. The marriage officiant pronounced them “partners in marriage,” a term that’s good for any combination of sexes. They are officially and legally married in Canada.
Yuck, a poll where all the answers are demonstrably wrong.
“Anyone, regardless of sexual orientation should be allowed to marry”
I think this viewpoint is too liberal since there should be a lower age boundary on marriage. (As a parenthetical remark I think it’s FUBAR that in the UK any two people over 16 are legally allowed to marry but are not legally allowed to watch a film that has an ’18’ certificate)
“Yes, but not in church”
That option restricts the rights of those unfortunately rare religions that endorse homosexual relationships
“No, marriage should be kept between a man and a woman”
Equipped with a spectacularly stupid naive viewpoint you could view this as correct – heterosexual marriages can be great and we should certainly keep them. Nonetheless knowing the daily telegraph I think it’s reasonable this option implies that marriage should be exclusive to heterosexual relationships – which implies an inherent superiority of heterosexual relationships to homosexual relationships.
I voted for the first option as it was less wrong than the other options. My ideal poll option would be “Any two people who are not already married and are older than 18 should be able to marry each other”
Congratulations, Janice in Toronto!
The officiant at my daughter’s marriage seemed genuinely delighted to be marrying two people who were obviously so much in love.
Congratulations, janiceintoronto. May you and your partner have a happy life together.
You’ve confused being aromantic with being asexual; and while I’m sure both are overrepresented among priests, most priests are neither.
Where I come from, that’s what it already is. Lots of people still do it, traditionally the day after the wedding in front of a bureaucrat (a registrar, in a registry office), but it has no legal standing whatsoever.
Having such an institution makes it easier to determine who is entitled to inherit how much, who is entitled to visit someone in hospital, and so on.
That only works in English.
CongaRats JaniceInToronto. Have a few grogs for you and your spouse.
I watched the whole of that Newsnight debate with that dingleberry archbishop and assorted other fools last night. I really should learn not to watch things I know will make me that angry before bed.
When he was challenged about his statement that marriages are about producing children, and asked if this meant he thought infertile couples should not be allowed to marry, he just blathered some vague nonsense about how “sometimes infertility is not permanent”, as if that was an adequate defence. Indeed, all the “anti-” side’s arguments were laughably weak – one MP’s sole objection was that “it wasn’t in the election manifesto”, a point he bleated on about relentlessly throughout. Some woman from one of those deplorable “protecting marriage” organisations insisted that because some gay couples didn’t want to get married, this somehow meant all gay couples shouldn’t be allowed it. And I couldn’t watch that Milo Yiannopoulos chap again, not after his performance on 10 O’Clock Live last week – it was one of the most heartbreaking things I’ve ever seen: a gay Catholic actively campaigning against equal rights, so twisted up in the self-hatred the church planted in his head. Genuinely painful to watch.
Congratulations, janiceintoronto!
The yesses are in the lead now. I wonder how many silly polls you’ve toppled, PZ. Tee hee.
MPG – Totally with you on Milo Yiannopoulos. Where the hell did they dredge him up from?
A few weeks ago I was thinking there was no gay equivalent for the term “Uncle Tom” and then Milo conveniently supplies one.
So mindfucked by his faith that he would willingly throw all his fellow gays under the bus to keep the pope happy.
And on so many news programmes you’d imagine he spoke for 40% of the gay population of the UK rather than about 0.00000001%. Seems like he has enough self loathing for all of us.
When I voted at work a couple of hours ago, the “Yes, anyone”‘s were around 42%. Now, after coming home and voting again (heh heh heh), the results are:
Even with the vote splitting, the yes votes are firmly in the lead.
My hypothesis as to why so many people are against gays marrying, or gays in general, is that as heterosexuals, they view gay sex as not understandable and squicky. It just makes heteros uncomfortable. Personally, I don’t particularly understand it myself and don’t really want to know about what goes on between consenting gays.
But you know something? There are lots of things that I don’t understand about what people like or dislike, that I don’t particularly want to do also. Rap music, vermouth, tats (although I can see the beauty in them), raw oysters, hell, you get the idea. But that’s me. It doesn’t make those things wrong, just different. If doing those things makes people happy, if it’s not harmful to them or anyone else, go for it. I have friends that do all of those things, including “being gay”. It makes them individuals, even though they’re (horrors!) different from me. It’s not going to make me suddenly change who I am, if someone else has different desires. It’s not their problem if their desires are different from mine. It would be MY problem, if anything.
That’s why the whole objection to gay marriage as “threatening” traditional marriage drives me nuts. How can it threaten? Do anti-SSM people really think that suddenly, heterosexual couples are going to break up and become gay if SSM is legalized? For crying out loud, these are the people that want to remove gov’t intrusion in their lives. And yet they want to intrude into who can and can’t be married!
And may I add my congratulations to Janiceintoronto as well.
When I initially read this, I thought: so the priest says it’s a friendship only because they’re of the same sex. Does this mean that my “profound friendships” with members of the opposite sex are in actuality “marriages”? Same logic right?
I think it’s interesting how tilted away from average public opinion those poll was earlier…
flapjack,
One of the regulars (Josh, the Official SpokesGay? Aratina Cage? My brainz have failed me) came up with a good one a while back, but damned if I can remember what it is.
Uncle Mary, maybe?
Does anyone else remember?
Huh? Marriage is about bringing difference together? So all gay people are identical then? Do all black people look the same to you too?
Oh, and sometimes different families? Gay marriage bad, incest good?
Yeah, by royal families using their children as bargaining chips. So arranged marriages between men and women are fine (whether the participants want it or not)?
It’s almost as if they actually have any good arguments.
When they say “not in church” they mean that they want the law to say that same-sex couples can’t have religious marriages even if the religious group in question wants to perform them.
It’s not about Parliament forcing the Catholics to perform same-sex marriages. It’s about the Catholic leadership trying to stop Quakers and Reform Jews and other religious groups from performing same-sex marriages.
@Dr. Audley Z. Darkheart
Twasn’t me. According to a quick search, both MAJeff and Josh, Official Spokesgay have used “Uncle Mary” several times. Me, I’m so mad about it that I called this Vincent Nichols character something that is probably much nastier: a sick fuck. I’m so fed up with these scum sucking priests thinking they can tell LGBT families how to live and how to love that I can’t even find any joy in mocking them anymore.
* It wasn’t me that I can remember at least. I’m not saying I never have, though.
if it’s not harmful to them
The question is, of course, who gets to define the harm, and, having decided that homosexuality is harmful, conclude that same-sex couples should not marry.
It’s not about marriage, it’s about fundamental rights for gay people. Any excuse they can dredge up to show that teh gay is bad gets used to justify denying civil rights for gays. Some of the arguments are specifically about marriage, but many of them are the tired old ones I remember from campaigns such as 1992’s Amendment 2 in Colorado. They all boil down to “Some gay people do such-and-so squicky thing, therefore no gay people should be permitted to have this-or-that civil right.”
A common thread that runs through religious arguments is the presumption of universality. Everyone whose religion makes them against gay people says that all members of their religion feel that way. It takes multiple hammerings of counterexamples to show that religious-based anti-gay-marriage arguments actually violate the rights of other religions. Asking, “What about that religion’s rights?” sometimes makes people rethink their position.
The Catholics are the worst, mixing their presumption of universality with their presumption of privilege. To point out, however, that they are not universal or not so privileged, is disrespectful … and ultimately proves, to them, that gays don’t deserve to marry. We can’t convince the priests … but we can try to inoculate their followers.
It’s simple. I’m egocentric, so if I can’t get married, no one else can either!
But seriously folks: if two consenting adults want to marry, the state should not — must not! — stand in the way. Churches, due to their first amendment protection, should not be forced to perform any marriage ceremonies that the church does not agree with. Of course, in my opinion, churches should go the way of buggy whips and slave markets, but that’s a separate issue.
My first poll Pharyngulation. Now 48% to 42%.
@35. janiceintoronto said :
Congratulations and best wishes to both of you. :-)
The county I live in probably has more churches that will do the ceremony than ones that wouldn’t.
@22. flapjack :
Brilliant – I laughed and loved it. Cheers for that.
Just a couple of omissions tho’ :
– What about the Onan law (no, not *that* one) where a man has to marry or at least “provide his seed” [Unspilled is specified with pain of death as penalty for failure – no pressure boys!] his dead brother’s wife?
Plus
– What about the divine sanctification for the same-sex marriage seen here :
http://www.thebricktestament.com/david_vs_saul/jonathan_and_david/1s20_42a.html
of Jonathon and Prince (later king) David?
@ StevoR
– What about the Onan law (no, not *that* one) where a man has to marry or at least “provide his seed” [Unspilled is specified with pain of death as penalty for failure – no pressure boys!] his dead brother’s wife?
Wow, I’m thinking this argument I keep hearing about Biblical marriage being strictly for the purpose of raising children in a secure and healthy family unit might be a bit of a stretch in this instance.
The only time I’ve seen that work is in the movie “Braindead” and it was between two consenting zombies.
But as I’ve said before, whenever I’ve argued the toss about the fast and loose definition of marriage in the Old Testament, fundies tend to come back at me with “ah yes but those were only applicable by Mosaic law”
– You mean a set of archaic laws passed down by Moses and later superseded in the New Testament?
– Nope, I mean Mosaic as in a collage formed from a bunch of old testament clippings we chuck around willy-nilly and selectively edit to create a picture that suits our subjective personal tastes.
(See also decoupage/ montage/ creative handicrafts.)
@ SteveR – Oops! Think I might have misread the bit about inseminating the dead brother’s wife… I somehow got it into my head it was the deceased wife of the brother and not the brother himself who was dead. Though it’s still a bit fucked-up.
And you’re right, the Jonathon and David marriage is conveniently airbrushed out of most fundie bible readings. Must be that crazy Mosaic law again!
Aratina Cage:
Bingo! MAJeff! Gracias!
… He hasn’t been around in a while. I hope everything’s okay. :-/
I can hardly believe the audacity of a cabal of celibate, never-married virgins trying to offer anyone marital advice, or opining on the nature of marriage in any way. How is this okay?
…I had no idea!
http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/1sam/20.html
I just voted and the figures seem to have reversed themselves: 52.75% for and 38.75 against.
If you don’t like gay marriage, don’t have one. That simple.
As far as in a church… it’s tolerable to me if a church isn’t willing to officiate a gay marriage. That’s their business to be bigoted assholes. But those bigots don’t speak for every religious person, a Quaker friend of mine gets furious when NOM and other such groups start moving on “religious freedom” argument.
A very profound friendship?
Like Cardinal Henry Newman? *nudge*nudge*wink*wink*