New York's Cardinal Dolan says gay people are 'entitled to friendship' only

[happyslug]

82. How is it indefensible?

Marriage, at least the Western Concept of Marriage, has been between members of different sexes for at least 2000-4000 years. In the Western Tradition of Marriage, the biggest change was the decision of Emperor Justinian to permit love to replace a dowry for a Marriage to be Valid (This is believed to be at the request of his wife Theodora).

A More subtle change has occurred over the last 200 years, replacing the extended family with the nuclear family as the more important element in a marriage (people's support group, their "safety net" was NOT the social safety net of today's welfare state but their extended family, and the rules that required people to provide support for relatives, even distant relatives, such requirements meet also they had to be some limit and thus the purpose of legitimacy, which also affected inheritance law AND support law).

Now, other cultures had other traditions, as mentioned elsewhere, the concept of "marriage" between people of the same sex among some native American Tribes. Prior to the institution of Marriage as a ceremony within the Catholic Church (Around 1200, but NOT a required Sacrament for a Valid Marriage till after the Council of Trent in 1545) most marriages were viewed as a product of local law, NOT a religious sacrament.

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09707a.htm

In many ways, one of the differences between the Catholic Church and the Protestant Church is in regard to Marriage. Both Luther and Calvin viewed it as a Secular institution, the Catholic Church a religious Sacrament. This difference in treatment has lasted to this day, while Protestant hold Marriages within their church, it is viewed as a ceremony required by local law. The Catholic Church position is that local law is irrelevant, it is the decision of two people to become married that is grace of god and thus a sacrament.

Thus Catholic position on Gay Marriage, is based on its view that only a marriage within the Church is truly valid in the eyes of God, anything is invalid on its face. The Catholic Church will recognize the marriages done between people in other churches as valid, if they meet Catholic requirement of Free will of both parties and that they are NOT within certain degree of kinship (as while as being between people of different sexes).

Sorry, once you understand HOW the Catholic Church position on marriage has changed in the last 1000 years and what it had objected to in other changes to marriage within the Western Tradition, the Catholic Position is defensible, for all the Catholic Church is saying is that Marriage is religious sacrament and to be a religious sacrament ALL the requirements of the Sacrament must be meet. Change of what is popular today is NOT sufficient grounds to change the requirements for marriage.

Thus the various proposals by Catholics to extend the LEGAL rights of Homosexuals to be the same as a married heterosexual couple, but to call it some sort of Domestic Relationship not a Marriage. That is Dolan's actual position and the position within the Catholic Church. It is very similar to the situation in many Catholic Countries in Europe, you end up having to get married twice, once in a Civil Action, and then in a Church Wedding. The State recognizes the First, the Catholic Church the second. It preserves the name of "Marriage" to those marriages that can be a marriage within the Catholic Church, while extending all the rights the State confirm on a married couple to everyone who buys a "marriage license".

Side note: One of the reason for the adoption of Marriage as a Sacrament around 1200 and its subsequent adoption in 1546 as the only valid marriage in Catholic Countries was the issue of inheritance. As Western Europe grew more wealthy during the Middle ages and then the Renaissance, who inherited what from whom became more and more an issue (in the Dark ages, you inherited what you could hold, thus if the illegitimate son of the previous Duke can hold onto or take over the Dukedom, he "inherited" the Dukedom (This is how William The Conqueror became Duke of Normandy).

As the Middle ages turned to the Renaissance, it become more and more popular to actually inherit your property instead of taking it. Thus the issue of who shall inherit became an issue of the courts NOT the Army. At the same time you saw a resurgence in Roman Law and its emphasis on legitimacy. Who is legitimate? Someone who is a product of a valid marriage. What is a Valid Marriage? Till the 1200s it appears to be what ever had become the local custom. The problem is some people could contest the validity of such a marriage by claiming it was NOT the custom OR another area's custom over ruled that custom. This lead to confusion and the decision to determine what was a Valid Marriage by the fact if the marriage was that recognized by the Church. Given that many of these local marriages were NEVER written down, how so you determine what was a marriage recognized by the Church.

Now the 1200s saw the wide spread adoption of Linen Paper, a much cheaper paper then the previous parchment paper. This cheaper paper permitted more written records to be kept, so oral tradition became less and less important then the written record. Thus you finally get a time period with extensive written records, not just records of what was the top events in that year (and records of years that said "Nothing happened this year" which is all the written records we have for some years in the 900s for example).

Thus the increase wealth, the need to determine who inherited what (Be determined who was legitimate and who was not) saw an increase need to a ceremony and record keeping of marriages. Given that only the church would keep such records (we are talking 1200-1600 here), it quickly became the norm to have Catholic Marriage Ceremonies and to make such ceremonies a "sacrament" of the Catholic Church (More to encourage the record keeping of such ceremonies then any other reason).

Now, while the Catholic marriage Ceremony became the norm after 1200 for the Upper Classes, it was not exclusive (The history of Richard III accession to the Throne is a good example. When his brother. Edward IV died, Richard was to be regent while his nephew became king in name, then it was found that Edward IV had promise another woman marriage before going to bed with her, under traditional English Common Law that was a Valid Marriage, which made his marriages to the princes' mother illegitimate and the princes illegitimate and opened the way to Richard being the only legitimate climate to the throne).

To avoid such issues in the future, in the Council of Trent the Catholic Church adopted the policy that the only Valid marriage was one within the Church. Notice it took almost 400 years for the Church to embrace its own proposal to solve the problem of who was legitimate.

Dolan's position is fixed, in many ways, by that tradition, He has to accept that marriage, as far as the Catholic Church is concerned, is NOT a State Institution, but a Religious sacrament that is limited to those people who have undergone that sacrament since 1546 (if not 1200). The above fights, over long forgotten theology disputes still affect the Catholic Church. It is NOT something that goes with the latest fad (but it will bend with the wind). The Catholic Church has to remember it still operates in areas where the extended family is still the strongest element in most people's life (most of the third world) AND in areas where that element is very weak (Western and Northern Europe with its extensive welfare state), Thus it must NOT offend people in both groups and that means holding a policy of refusing to extend marriage to homosexual (Where it is viewed as an attack on the extended family and as such an attack on people's safety net), while extending the rights of marriage to homosexuals (Which more and more people living in a "Welfare State" sees as a right).

You may dislike Dolan's position but it is understandable, given the pressure on the Catholic Church from its members in both the First and Third World (and to more limited extent to its members in the old Warsaw pact nations of the old "Second World&quot but it is defensible.