Patricia Jung
the human condition.
we are connected to each other and the world thoruhg our bodies yet the bodies are simtaneiously a major source of our vunerability to be violated in those connecitons
sexual desires graceously incline us to draw into relationshiops
christians now generally affirm that passion and exual eroticism is part of god's good handiwork
on the other hand, christians recognize that sexual desire has been distoried by sin .. sexual passion is also the source of lustful relationships
passiosn can seduce as well as serve people .. desire can create relationship that are abusive .. can take pleasure only reather than share it
can draw people into relationships that lack authenticity
this is the human condition. therefor,e we know that sexuality is ambigious. a grace but also dangerous. this is one reason why people across cuturles and the ages have organized sexual activity inot institutions known as marriage. for the most part monogany is the form taht marriage now takes in the west.
there are many ways of declaring love in private .. with gifts, poetry, bodies
but when people marry they do two remarkable things.. they promise to be steadfast and sexually exclusive.
our question: why in the world would anyone in their right mind do such a thing?
why would the church and scoeity encourage people to do this?
the case forxual fideltiy is really quyite simple: it serves love and life
the case for marriage equality for promoting GLBT seuxal fidelity is the same
fidleility serves love and life everywhere
how is it hat fidelity serves love?
sexuality inlcudes people toward passionate attachments and emopowers the nature oft those bonds
throuhg sexual coupling two can become one flesh .. they can become so connected that the desires gigles and hot flashes can beocme their own
the church blesses marriage because congual fidelity serves love.. it enables us to give and to be given a test o;f the love we willl enjoy in the life of the world to gcome.
given the stunning rates of divorce and family voiolence, it's clear that such promise making does not guarantee that marriages will be just loving or even safe havens. and geniune lvoe can exist outside of such promises.
so how tdoes the promise serve love?
sexual desire draws us toward one another and when we are honest withourselves we find that we want to know all about the person to whom we are attrracted .. not just about their body .. and we want to be wanted in return .. and not just physically.. genuninelly great sex is all inclusive...
desire to be known and know physically but also intellectiually and spritiually.. heart mind and body anre designed to speak the same langauge and when they are in sync our relationshipos have great integrity. before our hearts become cautious if not heardend by broken promises and promiscous habits, it's actually difficult to keep sexual relationships superficial
the relatiobnshioal structre of desire sets up the means of reject, etc.
chirstians are very hard nosed about our human capacity for betrayal .. for this reason, the church encourages such a primse to be faithful .. making and keeping such promises enables lovers to have the time and focus to keep it up.
marriage is a school for love.
what it means tob e married ..
- really giving yoru partner what it is they dserve as the child of God
- give them the focus that they deserve
marriage is not about how much the couple loves each other at the time of the wedding .. marriage is promoted because people promise to be true in good times and in bad , etc.
this marriage business is serious business.. to be faithful is to keep learning how to love one another into a future that is unknown.
when we wed each other , we vow to give each other the attention and time it will take to become great lovers.
can promises of love exchanged by same sex partners so serve love ? of course it can!
offial catholic reasoning and where it goes wrong
the chruch teaches that while we are complete as individuals, insofar as we are made to form partnerships, we are incomplete until we partner with someone who complements us. but the bishops teach that only partners of the opposite sex anca be truely complimentary
in contrast, geniune complemntarity requres a partner of the apposite sex .. apt for what? for the task of making love and forming bonds. only in a relationshipo with someone of the apposite sex is it possible to establish the mutual vonerabliltiy and trust to open up to gods gift in our life.
gay and lesbian partnerships evidence the emotional quality similar to long range hetero partnernships. some differences have surfaced ... there is more equity between many relationships in houshold tasks and sometimes evidence greater skill in conflict resolution and more support from friends but they have less support from their respective families of origin
anyway, both kinds of partnerships are clearly complenary and hence are truely loving
how is it that fidelity serves life?
in many ways, lifves of spouces, kin, society @ large
.. good for the life of most spouces most of the time .. associated with reduced rates of drug abuse, longer life expenctancy, lower rates of DV, less criminal activity, at reduced risk of STDs, on average healthier, happier and safer
ofthen help each other cope with lifes ups and downs -- unemp, loss, accidents, diseases, etc
both the state and the church encourage people to be faithful because they streach us to think beyond our indivudal and joint interests .. marriage often connects soposes to other people from ways they cannot walk away
-- expand their concern to society as the whole
serves lifethrough the conception of children but that is one way .. even the bishops have ways that infertil couples can be open to the gift of life
- can adopt couples .. can help other parents that are reearing children
but because committed partnerships last longer .than cohabitation .. it's a better environment to raise children.
statistically, children of single, uncommitted, or divorced parents are disadvantaged. the promotion of same sex marriage iwll help (not harm) the chilren already being raised by same sex couples
at least 600,000 households already raising children.
the state promotes marriage by associating it with alrge econ and legal benefits
those benefits for sposes and children canot be accessed in any other way
gay marriage would allow all the children to receive medical, hospital, verans, educaiton, etc. benefits from which they would be elligable from both of their parents.
some of these rights and benfits only occur to those legally recognized as family. workplace benfits, right to make medical decisions.
american medical association joined, APA, etc in their support for marriage equality. marriage will increase access by sposuses and children to the health insureanc eand survior benefits to which they have a right.
when people marry, they toake on each other 's business.
and to their extended kins.
considerable annicdotal care taht many gay couples are engaged in eldercare
the assistance souses offer to one another and extended family is foundational to our common good in society .. stableises lives that otherwise might be shattered
additionally, marriage equality may redoce the stimga and shame associated with being a LGBT person ..
Marriage equailty amy in the long run reduce hate crimes.
when it is legally recognized, ti will be reasonable to expect that both homophobia and heterosexism will begin to wither furhter and therefore start the decline of interanlized hated fromthose views
refuting arguments against marriage equality
bishops said that the public regoznition of same sex marriages harms the institution of marriage, harms childrren and therefore harms religious freedom
- mar. equal. will not harm marriage .. it is true that marriage is undergoing a tranformation and mroe people are getting divorced.
church officials say that same sex marriage will contribute to the further deterioriation .. how so? they bioshops dont say!
one hypothesis is that it will contribute to the divorce rate.
but the CDC noted taht all states that allowed ssm had divorce 20% lower
demographic data globally is equally encouraging.
the sky didn't fall when they legalized gay marriage
divorce rate should have climed, but it didn't happen.
shuld be different trends re the health of marriage where me is refused but the data says taht this is not true
there is no documented evidence that the recognition of ssm will harm herto marriage
mar eq will not harm the dignity of persons
the church rightly argues that marriage promites the dignity of all by teaching that human dignity is god given and not earned.
people deserve respect regardless of their social utility etc.
any policy that would harm marriage would indeed be problematic but there's no evidence that marriage equality would harm marriage and therefore it does not harm human dignity
mar eq will not harm children either. children are at > risk today. More children are born outside of marriage .. statistically more at risk than those born to marriage coup;les. in some countries cohabitation creates stable relationships but not so in the US .. cohabiting couples are twice as likely to split up 2/3 of those with children separate before their child is 10
comparatively marriage is better for children
why does the church teach that it will harm children?
thre is not and never was a shread of evidence to support that gays are more likely to be predators.
currently the church argues taht legal support for gay marriage will prove morally confusing for children
certainly it will be socially transformative but what exactly will marriage equality teach children?
won't it teach themthat all are encouraged to be authentic and faithful and responsible , just and loving
same sex child rearing worries the church so much that the vatican described it as doiing violence, but after more than 20 years of scrutiny, not a single child raised by same sex parents failed to flurish
in fact teens from lesbinan families did better!
a comparative study found that children adopted by gay and lesbian couples are thriving and developing normally, including their gender identity
children from intact two parent same sex homes developed normally
and you have to wonder about children raise by single sex monestaries!!!
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Jamie Manson --- young LGBT issues
need to talk about young adults in general .. because they are all the product of the same culture
grandparents grew up in it didn't matter what man or woman you wanted to marry, the community decided what was important .. or you didn't marry outside the italian world.
in 1950 when mom is born, things start to change .. 60's civil rights movement, women's right smovement and birth control.
suddlenly women have the rightt to decide what to do with their bodies .. seacking equality
and suddenly the whole village model doesn't work anymore .. because it's based on patriarchy
---> leads to culture of individuality
so men and women can do what they want to do .. they do not need one another . and that's the culture that young adults have gown up in .. culture of indivudalism.. what I want -- how I want to express myself.
my gender does not decide the choices I'm going to make in my life
so a lot more freedom but also the community starts toi erode .. you don't grow up in an extended family
din't necessarily know your neighbors
so you don't have the village model .. and part of the village model is sacrifice for the good of the whole.
many young adults aren't raised as anything ... they decide what they're going to do.
this is a very different thing -- most of the world still doesn't opperate that way
that's had a big impant on the churhc ... ya don't have to go to church anymore .. so now they're there because they want to be
the challenge that this presents for the church is huge
every church is having problems with how to get catholics in to the church
spiritual market place mentality ... anyone can now choose which spiritual path they want to take .. very very competitive market place .. yoga, zen, etc.
all of these different paths competing for your attention.
and the consumerist culture can become your value
the church now for the first time has to voo people into its pews -- has to reach out
dynamics of guilt, spiritual coersion does not work with the new generation
they cannot be guilted into going to church or coerced because they don't think that the fate of their soul depends on whether or not they go
so all churches are in a real bind in a place where they have to draw people in and compete with quite a spectrum of spritualitities
the church culture that young aduls grew up in is also important. young people now in their 20's were in their early adolecence and tennage years when the sex scandols came out
so they see on the news that their church has been absuing young people their age .. you can't discount the impatn that that has had on young adults
how can they every trust a church like that?
no nostalgia for this church .. no necessarily warm memories going to church
young adults already struggle with authority
the culuture of technology and communication has resulted in a very fractured form of communication
.. young people don't want to call.
our technology has given us an extraordinary way of vaoiding intimacy .. and when you avoid intimacy you avoid presence
what can we do to get young adults in ... most of them just want to sit in a cricle and talk
young people don't need all the ritual .. they want it but they need something in addition to the ritual ... Mass and something else .. go to pizza or bowling etc.
they understand the extension of the sacrement .. how it really happens in the engagement
see that Mass is just the beginning of the sacrement ..
so because of the culture that they grew up in, there is such a deprivation that the need is so much deeper and greater for presence but the litergy is not enough for them
young adults also grew up in a culture where they were taought that women were equal and they love their gay and lesbian relatives
so gew up without the culture of shame against lgbt people ... don't udnerstand why women cannot be priests.
terrible clash occurs.
as high as 85% believe in woman ordination
72% believe that LGBT relationshiops should be accepted
catholics lead on these issues . and it says something about our sacremental tehology
all things of nature are capaable of the infinite .. God is in all things and longing to reach out to us and catholics have a dynamic work together realtionship with god.
in evangelicalism you have to die to that old depraved self. in Catholicism we don' have to die, we transform ... there's some innate goodness .. it's not die to the old self and be born anew
and that theology really speaks to young adults .. they don't have that gult or sense of sin.
sacremental theology speaks to yong adults ..
what do you like about catholicism ? we love the social justice tradition and we really like the community they understand that's of value.
the reason that so many catholics are accepting is that they see that nothing is intrisnically evil .. you have just as muchy potential for flurishing and goodness as anyone else.
when young adults say that they love the community and social justice , they're really talking about sacremental theology ... because you see th presence of christ in the poor .. so there's a real opoortunity there for young adults to engague at the deeper truths about catholicism
how do we get young people in the church ... ask them what they need!
how to start to look for the church outside the walls of the church ... the non-hierarchial church will burgeon outside the walls of the church
we have an unprescdented opporunity with young adults tyo see that church flurih. because so many young adults that don't go to church are doing the work of the church .... service, healing, dv shelters, etc.
so many young adults are doing the true work of the church and no one's told them .. no one's given them that theology lesson.
where are we church outside of the walls of the church
we're all being starved by the institution
being cahtolic is so much greater than going to church
where do you find god breaking through to you?
need to realize where you're being church already
>10% of YA catholics are "highly orthodox"
church had a very important service in being a refuge for immagrants
but we don't need a refuge now ... and that's all the church seems to want to provide ... so very very rigit young adults who need a world of balck and white ... the church likes .. for them the church is still an absolute authority that they need .. response to a culture that s in flux and is scary in many ways
so the church has become the opposte of good ssheepard .. rejoices in the one orthodox catholic and lets the 99 go astray
gay and lesbian young adults -- obviously great obstcales for them
fundamental rejection of me for who I love. refusing to witness my love
fundamental obstacle ... the church still says your intrinsically evil
lesbian .. rejcted because you're gay and your body is invalid .. God cannot funciton sacrementally in your body ... cannot have spiritual authority because of your anatimy
sin of sodom by ??
the way the church gets by is by not admitting it .. if you don't say it, it doesn't exist
protect your own spirit first .. make sure you aren't spritually harmed!
am I getting so angry and woudned that I can't even talk to God anyumore?
social media .. make your presence known to people in a safe way
be as present as you can but don't allow yourself to be harmed
we live in such a tribal culture .. we don't listen to each other ... how do we find common ground?
eucharist is a good place to start as long as all can receive
how do you start a gay group -- very eyedropper ... have to be able to trust this thing
i trust this person .. and yet if I don't like it, I can leave it
what can we do about rigid bishops ...
not much
but you can write letters
but find life beyond it
what kept jaime in the church?
authentic calling .. drawn into the sacrement ... holy thursday
attraction to eucharist hound of heaven deeper spiritual calling that I can't get rid of
but doesn't go to a roman catholic parish anymore
goes to dignity and protestant
everybody write a letter to teh bishops!!!
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Fr. Daily .. coming out while staying in
wounded healer -- throught he pain and brokenness were the seeds of who the person came to be
came out in 2004
crs - didn't let him go to africa
the community of the faithful are far ahead of the leadership
(personnel changes have since happened)
changes always comes from the bottom
did not let fear control me
bring in gay catholic -- no one can refute their truth
all politics is local --- all religion really is local
communities of faith that challenge us, feed us
cannot remain in communities that do violence to us
is there anything in my story that might reflect in your life?
how do you stay in the church in this time of transition?
patriarchical structure is crumbling but ti's going to get worse before it gets better
afternoon plenary
bishop gumbleton!! -- introdcued bishop robinson
see paper
1. the constantly repeated orguement of the church is that god created sex for two reasons --- unative aspect and as the means for procreation
... so sex is used within nature only if both conditions are fulllfilled within marriage
so if every single sexual act must be both, then there is no possibility of a sinless homosexual act
if this is the starting point, there's little else to be said ... so there's no possibility of change within this style of teaching
so the basic teaching considering all sexual acts much change
but there is a serious need for change in the churche's teaching on htero acts
the essensce of sexual sin is that it is a direct offense against god irrespective of whether harm is caused against a human being .. violation of the devine and natural order ..
claimed that god inserted into nature itself the demanted that every act be both unative and procreative.
two questions:
nature: should not the church's arguement give a number of examples of other fields where God has given a devine purpose for some thing where it would be a sin against god to use it in any other way or is this the only example.. if there are other examples, then why doesn't the church list them
what's supposedly nature .. why aren't there other examples ... how difficult it is therefore to traw moral consequences from a claim to a devinely intended purpose
in relation to god, the argument was used in the past that striking a king was far more serious than striking a common person ... so against god is most serious
for example, physical violence against obama would be taken very seriously, so there's a certainly truth to what we are talking about here
but ti's taken too far altogether and too far off track
an offense against go is far more serious than an offense against a amere human being
so this applies above all to the sin of blasphemy but it also applies to all sexual sins because they were seen as a direct offense against God this helps to explain why sexual sins were put up there with blasphemy and why there's been such an obsession with sexual sins in the catholic church
when a person takes offense at the littlest remarks we say that's a little person.. person who shruggs off is "big" ... God must by very big when we read the bible.
god shruggs off a lot -- he is not the least offended when a couple who has just lost a baby rages out against God
so will God be offended by any sexual thing before any effect of it happens to human beings .... think of the story of the prodigal son
father brushes aside the offense of the son ... would the God protrayed in this parable condemn a person for sometimes getting unative and procreative
so even thinking about sex for five minutes is a MORTAL sin
no longer discussed butr still on the books
the teaching fostered belief in an incredebly angry god who would condemn someone to hell for a single unrepentant moement of derviing pleassure from sexual desire
so there are serious dangers on basing the morality of sexuality on the direct consequences of God
sex abuse ... this became a most serious problem. for many churches saw the offense primarily as a sexual offense against God .. to be treated according to the criteria for such offenses .. repentance, confession, and return to status quo -- large part of the reason why priests just got moved around. not an adequate response to abuse ... doesn't deal with the harm caused to the victims.
the statements of the church seem to be assertiions rather than arguements.
no one deines that sexuality can be a powerful force .. so both uniative and procreative are foundational aspects of marriage ... but are they essentials?
what of a young couple that's told that any child they have would suffer from a serious congenital illness
so is it the statement a poven fact or simply an assertion. if it's a proven fact, what are the proofs? why are the church documents not presentiong any proofs?
is an ideal being confused with a reality?
if it is only an assertion, is there any reason why we should not apply the principle of logic, "what is freely asserted may be freely denied"
where are the arguments in favor of the assertion that would convince an open and honest concience?
the teaching of the church is based far too much on what is seen as the god given nature of the physical acts themselves rather than how they affect human relationship when the entire trend in moral theology is in the opposite direction
natural vs unnature .... vs what's natural to this person
the fact is the catholic church is proposing a teaching that only a minority of catholics accepts. western society as a whole has rejected this teaching and in many ways have gone to a position on the opposite exteme
lets explore the middle ground.
so if we decide to leave behind an ethic aforementioned, where should we go?
to an ethic that firstly sees any offense against god as being brought about not by the sexual act itself but by the harm caused to human beings.
secondly, speaks of persons and relatinships rather than acts,
3 then builds an argument on these two foundations
god cares very deeply about human beings and treats very seriously any harm to them -- "millstone around your neck" passage!
matthew .. just as you did not do it to the least of these, you did not do to me.
so God gets very upset about harm to people but like the prodigal father, not at all upset at direct offenses.
so we should look at sexual morality in terms of the good or harm done to persons rather than the direct harm to God
sexual pleasure then is in itself morally neutral .. its the persons and relationships that make this good or bad
good: couple seeking reconciliation after an arguement
bad: rape
the church is saying that love is the very deepest loning of the human heart and sex is the best expression. sex should not become so trivialized that it loses it's power to express the deepest love
modern society has beocme more and more accepting of casual sexual acitvity.
the church is saying that because love is all important and sex a vital expression, sex is always serious, while society is saying sex is never serious.
on this point, we instictively must have more sympathy for the church's view ... effects on the minors in the sex abuse case demonstrate that sex is serious
because sex is serious, you cannot conclude that all sex is good simply when it does not harm anyone.
jesus said love your neighbor .. and this implies more than the negative fact of not harming ... respect ... wanting the good for the other.
do not harm can put oneself first while love your neighbor must put the other first.
must at least involve anequal value / dignity, concern for the other
respect and seeking the good for the other.
specifically christian ethic?
take the 10 commandments
5678 ... kill, adultry, steal, lie
all four deal with respect for another
don't kill, don't harm relationships, repsect the material posessions, repect their good name
if I put the four together then I respect you -- I can't leave out any of them .. but if I respect all four, have I left out anything that's important or do they cover all serious aspects of human relationships -- they seem to
the greater contains the lesser -- if I must not kill, I must not harm
if I must respect your marriage by not taking your spouse, I must not harm your marriage in any other way.
adultry is at best indrectly about a sexual sin and more about harming relationships
not fundamentally about sex at all .. it's about relationships
the force: relationships in general, family relationshiops in particular, and espcially the relationship with a partner .. tehrefore, if you have any respect for the other, don't harm their relationshiops!
Jesus is the founder of religion that has said the least about sex
he just kept saying LOVE your nieghbor ... if we did that, most things would fall into place
see questions on paper..
simple rule? god never promised that everything would be clear and simple ... knowing the right things but also knowing the right thing to do.
there is a far better chance of meeting the requirements in side a vowed relationship .. but that does not mean everything in = good , everything out = bad
if we apply the aforementioned to homosexual acts,
we can't accept that anything goes here either -- homosexual persons need to be as concious as hetero persons
sexual acts with either homo or hetero are not in and of themselves offensive to god.
rather they are pleasing to god when they help relationshipos and harming when they don't
MUST be based on loving the good of the other.
if you wish to change the church's teaching on homosexual acts, work to bring about change in its teaching on all sexual acts.
Scripture:
cannot simply be brushed aside.
three factors:
- be very careful of language ... homosexuality is an abmination but it's used 138 times and of many different things. so is eating shrimp
- see it as a technical word of the law
- all persons were thought to be heterosexual .. homosexual acts were therefor seen as the deliberate choice by hetero persons