Gay Marriage: An Equality Too Far Read online



  Gay Marriage: An equality too far

  TERRY R. LYNCH B.SC. ECON.

 

 

  Copyright © 2013 Terry Lynch All rights reserved.

  ISBN: 1482073390

  ISBN-13: 978-1482073393

 

  DEDICATION

  All my love Agnes Retno Utami

  CONTENTS

  1The argument 7

  2An equality too far: ten reasons for the defence of 28

  traditional marriage

  1 THE ARGUMENT

  Marriage is the voluntary union for life of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others. 1 It was raised to the dignity of a sacrament by Our Lord2, and I would argue was considered a sacrament alongside circumcision before this by the ancient patriarchs. There are certain groups who wish to redefine the definition of marriage to include same-sex couples which is against the natural law, the natural ordering of things that is the breeding amongst married men and women respectively to create a family3. This is arguably the biggest persecution of the church since Martin Luther in the 16th Century who created the biggest schism within the church and established the Protestant movement which is still at odds today with the Catholic Church. It in fact wasn’t until the first decade of the 21st Century that diplomatic relations between the United

  1Hyde v Hyde and Woodmansee [1866] LR 1 P & D 130 / XVI Benedict, Pope, “Compendium: Catechism of the Catholic Church” (London, Catholic Truth Society, 2006) 337. p. 105

  2XVI Benedict, Pope, “Compendium: Catechism of the Catholic Church” (London, Catholic Truth Society, 2006) 341. p. 105

  3Matthew 19:6 and Genesis 1:28

  Kingdom and the Holy See were re-established. The schism created much disunity between Christians, harbouring distrust and persecutions of Catholics in the English Reformation with the Tyburn Martyrs near Marble Arch. Only recently was the plaque removed that pointed the finger at Catholics for the Great Fire of London and only recently that there was emancipation of Catholics in the political process. Catholicism is also the only religion

  that bars a member of the royal family from succession if they profess it. 4 And yet, the issue of marriage can unite all

  Christians, in fact the defence of marriage can promote ecumenicalism across the world and the redefinition of marriage has been met with stern opposition from the Abrahamic religions and others.

  I write this book out of love for God, I am writing neither for gay marriage nor against it but upholding the natural law, the natural order that comes from the law of God, our Creator. Upholding traditional marriage should unite not only Christians but those of different faiths and people of good will.

  Out of this same love that is the well-spring of love that comes from God, marriage is about two people who love each other not only a profound friendship as found in civil partnerships but it is unique as it is for the natural conception of children and their upbringing in a stable family environment.

  Marriage is actually bigger than the two individuals

  involved, it is a partnership of freewill but one signed in the presence of God. Marriage has a unique place in our civil society, it is a partnership not only between man and

  woman with the omnipresent creator God but a contract between the unborn too and society itself. As the fabric of

  4The Telegraph, 11 Jan 2013, “Gay marriage could signal return to ‘centuries of persecution’, - say 1,000 Catholic priests”, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/9795680/Gay- marriage-could-signal-return-to-centuries-of-persecution-say- 1000-Catholic-priests.html

  society is the family and the traditional values that are taught within are translated in the commitment to civil engagement. It is a bedrock institution and the most stable environment for raising children, redefining marriage would make marriage adult-centred rather than child- centred and would create all kinds of repercussions to the natural formation of children. It may even physiologically scar children and lead to the decline of marriage in society, more broken families and as a result the decline of the birth rate. In order to counter this declining birth-rate,

  society may deem it acceptable and humane to have even artificial sperm and eggs created for mail-order customised children, taking the natural out of the story of creation.

  St. Augustine says “that the sacrament of marriage is

  common to all nations: but the sanctity of it is only in the City of our God, and in his holy Mountain.” Therefore not only will the redefinition of marriage have incredible repercussions in the common law, it will also impact upon divine law. There will be a deliberate man-made line drawn between the Creature and the Creator, removing the Church from society and further creating divisions and instabilities within the peoples of the realm. The church will effectively be forcibly removed from the national conversation and any rightful preaching of truth will be met with hostility from a militant secular bloc. For example, although the Church of England is banned according to the law from conducting gay marriage, the Church will be silenced when it says that it does not recognise the newly legal redefinition of marriage. Rather than a free, tolerant and equal society it will become totalitarian and ignore the Christian voice and other religious that are opposed. The church will be effectively removed from civil society and its social capital shrunk with Christian orphanages closed because they do not recognise the un-natural law of same-sex couples. Catholic and other faith schools will be persecuted for failing to

  teach what is believed to be contrary to the Gospel, the truth will be silenced. We must watch and pray so that we do not fall into the temptation of idleness and allow this to happen but speak in the defence of truth; to bear witness.

  In a handful of nations that have gone ahead and redefined marriage the status of marriage within those societies has been damaged and as such marriage has a place in our laws to protect and defend it. The word “marriage” appears over 3,000 times in UK legislation; associated words like husband, wife, father, and mother also appear thousands of times and would have to be removed from government documents and the teachings in schools. It is woven into the fabric of our legislation and politicians cannot rewrite it at a stroke without causing huge upheaval and far-reaching consequences alienating the essence of the family. The idea that so-called gay marriage is allowed to take place in anywhere but a church will side line the religious communities and remove us from the national conversation and with it our social capital of schools and hospitals.

  Marriage has a place in our heritage with the oldest recorded English law referencing marriage between husband and wife dating back 800 years – and part of that legislation is still in force today yet marriage is older than that and predates the English language and our nation. It even predates the Christian church with the ancient patriarchs and Gentiles upholding the importance of it.

  Our heritage will be swept aside at future generational expense as marriage has a place in our affection, it will no longer be a privilege to find love but a right and while

  most people hold marriage in very high regard this will eventually degrade into a mere business agreement.

  A majority of our young people aspire to get married one day and seven in ten people agree that. This redefinition or civil engineering is dangerous, and can lead to instability within humanity. With the removal of clear gender roles within the family unit the very respect for

  elders and the clear chain of command will be disrupted with the absence of a father leading to the disintegration of civil obedience and may even lead to anarchy. While death and other circumstances may lead to the absence of a father, the integration of civil society provides a support network for this, with the dis
integration of the family with gay marriage introduction what will happen when society no longer can provide this support and is scared of treading on these issues for fears of bigotry or homophobia.

  Marriage does not belong to politicians they do not own the definition of it and they have no right to redefine it over the heads of the people. In fact, the government has a duty to defend the fabric of marriage and it is in the

  civil interest to do so as it creates a healthy bulwark against the state within civil society handed down by generation and generation. Let us not fail them. The state has no right to interfere in the sacrament of marriage both civil and those sacred and in dissolvable within the church as the in the words of the Pope Pius XI “the family is more sacred than the state”. In fact, Catholic doctrine has always considered Matrimony to be a most holy state of life for those called to the married life.5

  Marriage is not an old-fashioned institution there are around 24 million married people in the UK 6 and most people get married and most marriages last for life7 with

  5XI, Pope Pius, “Casti Connubii”, Papal encyclical, 1930. , Thomas Aquinas, St., “Summa Theologica”, Saint Augustine on the Goods of Marriage.

  6Statistical Bulletin: Population Estimates by Marital Status

  - Mid 2010, ONS, November 2011, table 1; Marital Status Population Estimates, 2008, General Register Office for Scotland, table 1; Census 2001, Key Statistics, NISRA, table KS04, page 14

  7‘Cohabitation and marriage in Britain since the 1970s’, Population Trends, 145, Autumn 2011, ONS, page

  the number of UK marriages in 2010 at 277,740 which was actually a rise of 4 per cent compared with 2009 when there were 267,898 marriages8. The number of civil partnerships formed in the UK by same-sex couples was 6,385 in 2010 with the total number of civil partnerships formed in the UK since the Civil Partnership Act came into force in December 2005, up to the end of 2010, is 46,6229 revealing a slow and undesired want of change.

  Nonetheless, the civil partnership offers the same legal rights and recognition as opposite sex married couples. So

  why change the definition of marriage? Furthermore, as other countries have introduced gay marriage the length of the validity of marriage has been further redefined with fixed-rate marriages. This tinkering with the sacrament is allowing a buying and selling of the ‘parties’ to marriage in the market, turning marriage into a commodity by allowing the state to pick and choose what it considers marriage rather than what is defined as such in not only pre-

  Christianity but even after it being raised (in an official sense) to a sacrament by the Lord. How more clearly

  could its importance is when Jesus’ first miracle was for a marriage and he himself instituted it as a sacrament.

  As the Archbishop of Westminster, Vincent Nichols said “there was no announcement in any party manifesto, no Green Paper, no statement in the Queen's Speech. And yet here we are on the verge of primary legislation.” And yet, a year after the election the Prime Minister announced in his 2011 conservative party speech that he intended to consult a change of marriage, “from a democratic point- of-view, it's a shambles. George Orwell would be proud of

  16; ‘The proportion of marriages ending in divorce’, Population Trends, 131, Spring 2008, ONS, page

  8Statistical Bulletin: Marriages in England and Wales, 2010, ONS, February 2012, page 9

  9Statistical Bulletin: Civil Partnerships in the UK, 2010, ONS, July 2011, page 2

  that manoeuvre, I think the process is shambolic." 10

  The Prime Minister’s personal view is that he wants the law changed11 but as the Archbishop said redefining marriage was not even in the Conservative Party Manifesto, neither was it in the Coalition agreement. Perhaps the move is one of a response to pressure by the

  Liberal Democrats in a shambolic ad-hoc behind-the- scenes policy change Cameron pandered to the Deputy Prime Minister and thus in a move to counter upheaval and lead to greater conservative party unity changed the focus to that of Europe and a referendum promise to secure another few terms. However, this is mere speculation and it perhaps one day the truth will emerge in a political memoir of the Prime Minister. Furthermore, the laws of this land cannot be made by whim on the personal wish of the Prime Minister for we have a democratic

  system based on a living constitution of tradition.

  The Government has no mandate for this monumental change to our culture, which will require 800

  years of legislation to be rewritten and abolish “husband and wife” as legal terms in law. Perhaps, we need a written constitution that protects the institution of marriage alongside our other cherished and long held freedoms and equalities.

  Marriage is going to be redefined over the heads of the

  24 million married people in this country and without

  10BBC News, 25 December 2012, “Archbishop of Westminster attacks gay marriage plan”, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk- 20840531.

  11BBC News, 11 March 2012, “Gay marriage: Roman Catholic archbishops step up fight”, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk- politics-17329902. And David Cameron, Speech to the Conservative Party Autumn Conference, 5 October 2011, see https://www.conservatives.com/News/Speeches/2011/10/Davi d_Cameron_Leadership_for_a_better_Britain.aspx as at 15 March 2012

  saying it is profoundly anti-democratic with the Government running away from this public debate bulldozing ahead without any thought for the consequences. The consultation was a sham, and although a referendum is not legally binding to the government, such an important matter was not raised for the people to vote before being taken to their ill-informed and rushed representatives to pass as legislation.

  The Home Secretary, in meetings with church leaders, has emphasised that the consultation is about “how” not

  “whether” to redefine marriage. This message was repeated by Equalities Minister Lynne Featherstone to the Liberal Democrat Conference.12 On the day the consultation was launched Lynne Featherstone said “the essential question is not whether we are going to introduce same-sex civil marriage but how.”13 The Deputy Prime Minister has underlined this message, saying that the Government intends to legislate before the next election in

  2015. 14 On 3 May 2010, only four days before the last election, the Conservative Party published a document

  called ‘A Contract for Equalities’. Some claim this publication provides some sort of legitimacy but hardly any of the electorate will have been aware of this obscure document that has been sneaked in through the back door. The publication said “we will also consider the case for

  12Lynne Featherstone, Speech to Liberal Democrat Autumn Conference, 17 September 2011, see https:// www.libdems.org.uk/speeches_detail.aspx?title=Lynne_

  Featherstone%E2%80%99s_speech_to_Liberal_

  Democrat_Autumn_Conference&pPK=d8a97358-b9a6- 41fd-aea2-d597ebaff304 as at 15 March 2012

  13The Independent, 15 March 2012

  14Nick Clegg, Speech to the Liberal Democrat Spring

  Conference, 11 March 2012, see https://www.libdems.org. uk/speeches_detail.aspx?title=Nick_Clegg%e2%80%99s_ speech_to_Spring_Conference&pPK=6fee25fc-6153- 47eb-9859-fa9f4a41c532 as at 15 March 2012

  changing the law to allow civil partnerships to be called and classified as marriage.” 15 It is easy to think that the opponents of the change to marriage are scaremongering and that the Government is “considering” the case, and has not already made its mind up ahead of the consultation despite that the entire focus of the consultation is on the mechanics of redefining marriage.

  The current position is that since 2005 same-sex couples can enter into a civil partnership which already

  provides all the legal rights of marriage. The Government wants to go a step further and also legalise same-sex marriage.

  Opinion poll questions that ask about “gay marriage” or “same-sex marriage” have not made the full facts

  available to the British public.16 British Social
Attitudes (BSA) found in 2008 that 63% oppose same-sex marriage when respondents were told about the existence of civil partnerships. This survey remains the largest (n=3,000) and most statistically robust British study to date on same- sex marriage. It asked respondents to choose one of three options – support for civil partnerships, support for same- sex marriage or opposition to both. A ComRes telephone poll for the Coalition for Marriage released on 8 March found a very clear majority support the current definition of marriage (n=1,000). The question asked respondents to choose between whether they supported the status quo

  15A Contract for Equalities, Conservative Party, May 2010, page 14