Earlier today, we showed you a video of Fr. Joseph Palacios making a Catholic case for civil marriage equality independent of religious restraints. Now another Catholic leader will help us make or case, but in a very different way. Have a look:
So why does this, a video with no specific gay mentions, make our case? Well, because listen to all the rules. Pretty strict, right? We all know scores of heterosexual couples who would’ve been shut out by them. And that’s fine. Because the Catholic Church has every right to set parameters for the ceremonial component of marriage that match the Vatican’s desires. They have every right to demand their parishioners follow all.
You’ve heard of Bridezillas? Well they have nothing on the Popezilla’s exacting planning!
But what the Church doesn’t have the right to do? The Church doesn’t have the right to demand every other marriage-seeker follow along, regardless of the individual or couple’s own personal views on faith. Yet this forced submission is EXACTLY what the church leaders and its outreach groups (and unofficial but largely Catholic groups like NOM) are trying to do in the current national conversation. The anti-equality Catholics are ignoring the fact that their own marriage constraints already exclude many, many people for a whole host of canonical reasons, and are instead focusing on the one scriptural-based constraint they wish to place on gays. Gays who, as an organized movement, are seeking only the CIVIL MARRIAGE component, with all the ancillary religious decisions left to the denominations.
