This is the second half of Part Five in a six-part series. Click on Part One, Part Two, Part Three or Part Four for previous columns. The first half of this essay appeared yesterday.
“And God blessed them,” Genesis continues, describing the first marriage, “and God said to them, 'Be fruitful and multiply " '” (Gn 1:27-28). Adam rejoiced, saying, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh” (Gn 2:23), and he “clung” to her and “became one flesh.”
Man and woman are “created for unity,” writes Pope John Paul II, a unity “through which they become 'one flesh'.”(3) Together they make a permanent commitment to one another “in truth and love,” and heeding God's words, “Be fruitful and multiply,” their love brings forth children.
The very structure of God's gift of sexuality, therefore, has goods intrinsic to it " children, fidelity and indissolubility. God created marriage precisely in order to protect and promote these wonderful human goods.
What, then, of homosexuality, and the seemingly radical same-sex marriage movement?
First, to appreciate just how radical marriage is, recall the rupture brought about by original sin. Adam and Eve realized the way in which the “other” was different, and they shamefully covered their nakedness. Enmity between man and woman arose as lust overshadowed their original harmony and unity.
How different man and woman are, and what a challenge and high calling the husband and wife face! Yet the radical love and grace of God, which calls and equips the spouses to give of themselves through the life-giving and love-giving complementarity of their bodies, heals the rift. Marriage, as we are reminded in a beautiful blessing in the Catholic nuptial Mass, “was not forfeited by original sin or washed away in the flood.” Not only do spouses give freely of their lives to each other and thereby mirror God's love to each other and their communities, but they are open to children, who call forth from them an even greater gift of self!
Homosexuality, on the other hand, is not radical or open enough. It cannot aspire to this life-giving, complementary gift of self to the other. Its very nature is turned against the wondrous bridging of the rift between man and woman, and it is thereby closed to a life-giving union. Homosexuality is closed to the “law of the gift,” to the natural law set in place by God, and to the truth of human sexuality as inscribed in our very bodies.
For this reason, homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity, and can never be approved (cf. Catechism, 2357). While the Church declares such acts sinful, she also firmly reminds us that persons who are homosexual must be treated with respect, compassion and sensitivity (cf. Catechism, 2358).
As Catholics, it is our openness to the truth of sexuality and the human person that requires us to speak up for the truly radical understanding of marriage as a permanent, faithful union between a man and a woman, a union that is open to procreation. Knowing the implications of the “image” which we bear, we cannot help but stand for the truth about marriage.
Our openness furthermore requires us to say clearly that sexuality cannot be disconnected from the well-being of our society. The Fathers of the Second Vatican Council wrote, “The well-being of the individual person and of both human and Christian society is closely bound up with the healthy state of conjugal and family life” (GS, 47). Acknowledging, protecting, and nurturing the “true nature of marriage” is, according to the Council Fathers, a “sacred duty” (GS, 52).
Civil laws cannot help but shape and form the conscience. Many today draw the conclusion that abortion, because it is legally protected, is morally right. The same conclusion is increasingly being drawn with regard to judicial and legislative actions favoring or establishing same-sex unions. The recent Massachusetts Supreme Court decision granting same-sex marriage went so far as to state that marriage is “a wholly secular institution.” As we have seen, however, marriage is a divine institution, established by God as “the primordial sacrament” and furnished by Him with its natural laws and structure.
I invite you to join with me in giving an account for the hope that is within us. With gentleness and reverence, let us speak of what we as Catholics are for " a profound openness to the truth of sexuality. Our beautiful and holistic vision of the human person, marriage, and the family will require courageous stands against proposals that would seek to undermine them, yet only in this way will we give others a glimpse of the truly radical love of which we speak, a love which “makes all things new.”
Notes:
3. Pope John Paul II, General Audience, November 21, 1979.
Next week Bishop Loverde will conclude the series by writing on the virtue of chastity.
