I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.
Winston Churchill
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A Warning To Francis I: Appeasement of the Licentious Culture Is Not Leadership
I was watching recent Sunday talk soup and there was serious talk about how the Democrats had allegedly turned the tables on the Republicans in the culture wars on "gay marriage", whether the GOP would select a pro-"gay marriage" Presidential nominee in 2016,... Even Fox News Sunday got on my nerves by giving Ted Olson, a notorious GOP "gay marriage" advocate, a platform. I feel the need for me to write a one-off rant on Olson on the topic in the future. I'm vastly outnumbered on the libertarian blogs, but I'm tired of timid responses by hypocritical libertarians who should be championing individual rights. Over the weekend I responded to one pathetic thread which asked whether it was okay for someone to "discriminate", e.g., a Christian baker or photographer to refuse to service a transaction by a gay couple. The moderator reluctantly admits in principle the business should have that option, but went out of his way to mention he personally is against discrimination of any type. One politically correct commenter went on to rant how she would gladly join a boycott to force that baker or photographer out of business. Several libertarians "cheered" her stand, nobody gave an adverse reply, so I gave a blistering response, which resulted in a wolf pack attack on me. But I view things like boycotts and blacklists as a violation of the non-aggression principle and morally equivalent to Statist trumping questions of conscience, to a form of slavery by people allegedly committed to principles of voluntary associations and transactions.
For benefit of those who did not read last Thursday's post, I wrote a good summary of my position:
(Libertarian Catholic). Using the term "marriage equality" is like saying there is no difference between men and women and the unique relationship between the sexes is not unique. It is a lie.
They are basically arguing marriage is a fundamental right and that the traditional definition of marriage enforced by individual states is discriminatory and deprives gay couples of relevant benefits under the law. This is basically a Fourteenth Amendment argument.
Remember the SCOTUS Reynolds decision (re: Utah and the Morrill Anti-Bigamy Law); the argument was that LDS followers practicing polygamy were being denied religious liberty. Among other things, the Court pointed out that any unlawful act could be prescribed by a religion (say, for example, a ritualistic sacrifice of your first-born) and said basically the cognitive aspects, not behavior, of religion were protected and also referenced the concept of traditional marriage back to early English law.
Justice Kennedy didn't go all the way to arguing a constitutional right to marry (which is being argued by Reason, Cato Institute, etc.) and pays lip service to traditional state regulation of marriage, but then some magic happens, and he upholds, on a legal technicality of standing because the state's elected leadership, the governor and the attorney general, refused to defend the proposition, throwing out California Proposition 8 which reinstated the traditional definition of marriage to the state constitution. (The state Supreme Court had thrown out an earlier traditional marriage proposition, arguing it had not been properly drafted beyond its scope of review.)
Keep in mind that California and other states also had provided legally protected domestic partnership/civil unions with marriage-like provisions, e.g., hospital visitation, inheritance, etc. Among other things behind that California court decision was the talking point that partnerships or unions were "second-class marriages" that barred gays from government marriage-conferred goodies, a Brown (education)-like "separate but equal" target.
I do find it paradoxical that libertarian think-tanks, instead of pointing out it's not to the benefit of gays to subject their relationships to Statist meddling, have cheered on judicial tyranny. I oppose State intervention in the social context, of meddling with private-sector social norms, institutions (like marriage and family) and traditions. I'm concerned about meddling with socially-evolved constructs, across cultures and religions, over thousands of years.
As Catholics and Christians, we know that real marriage is in its sacramental nature, not a piece of paper from the State. Whatever mutated construct the State is creating is NOT "marriage". I would prefer for gays not to co-opt a heterosexual construct. As a Catholic libertarian, I accept the right of others to associate in ways inconsistent with moral teachings; this is the essence of free will. I would prefer to see the concept of marriage fully privatized--which I believe is the true libertarian position.Let me briefly point out what I think will emerge on the GOP side; recall the major motivation for DOMA was the fear of activist jurists imposing a liberalized marriage construct on traditional marriage states by states with liberalized marriage constructs through reciprocity agreements. Almost 90% of the states now enabling "gay marriage" did so not at the ballot box. This judicial activism will be an issue--not whether liberal states can freely adopt a convoluted concept of marriage.
The initial reports I'm hearing from the Synod on a more sympathetic stance on divorce and civil unions are disconcerting; the Church is sending mixed signals, and I share the perspective of the Voice of the Family. The "change in tone" is all hat and no cattle; I share some of the concerns of Mark Mallett:
I love the clergy of the Church with all my heart. I believe they are truly alter Christus — “another Christ”. But the silence of the pulpit on moral instruction the past forty years has destroyed vast portions of the Church.
My people perish for lack of knowledge. (Hos 4:6)
It has been forty years since Vatican II. It has been almost forty years since the Spirit was poured forth in the Charismatic Renewal in 1967. It has been almost forty years since Israel took possession of Jerusalem in the same year. God has poured out his Spirit in abundant generosity, but we have squandered these graces like the prodigal son. God has even sent His Mother in extraordinary ways. But we are a stiff-necked people, and thus we have arrived at this hour.
This is the Psalm that the Church prays everyday in the Liturgy of Hours in the Invitatory:
Forty years I endured that generation. I said, “They are a people whose hearts go astray and they do not know my ways.” So I swore in my anger, “They shall not enter my rest.” (Psalm 95)
It grieves me to say, but too many of the shepherds of the Church have abandoned the sheep. And the Lord has heard the cry of the poor. I cannot speak any clearer than the prophet Ezekiel. Here is an abbreviation from this morning’s Mass readings which I did not hear until after this was written:
Woe to the shepherds of Israel who have been pasturing themselves!
You did not strengthen the weak nor heal the sick nor bind up the injured. You did not bring back the strayed nor seek the lost…
So they were scattered for the lack of a shepherd, and became food for all the wild beasts.
Therefore, shepherds, hear the word of the LORD: I swear I am coming against these shepherds…. I will save my sheep, that they may no longer be food for their mouths. (Ezekiel 34:1-11)
The sheep have yearned to eat at the trough of truth. But instead, they have been lured by the wolves, the “voices of reason”, into empty and desolate pastures which bear the name “moral relativism.” There, they have been devoured by the spirit of the world, having fallen into the pit of lies.
But it is the troughs left empty by the shepherds which have stoked the fires of Divine Justice.
On human genetic issues, there is largely silence. There is a major push in the world to redefine marriage, to be followed by a revision of historical and educational texts to indoctrinate kindergarten children on gender alternatives. Silence. Abortion continues with hardly an organized revolt. And within the Church, divorce, promiscuity, and materialism go virtually unaddressed. Silence.
I am increasingly disenchanted with the "leadership" of Francis I. This Church seems far more concerned with accommodating vs. challenging cultural fads.
Facebook Corner
(Being Classically Liberal). Question: Which is more common?
(a) Anti-abortion women who, upon conceiving an unwanted pregnancy, recant and get an abortion.
(b) Pro-abortion women who, upon conceiving an unwanted pregnancy, are too reluctant to actually abort.
Note that there is a gray area I want to avoid--women who are "pro-choice" may not necessarily favor aborting; they just favor the option. What I'm trying to get at is the notion of someone who holds a prior assumption about whether or not she would get an abortion, and then reverses her position when she has to confront the actual circumstance.
Problem is, I'm really curious about this question, but I've thus far been unsuccessful in turning up the right data. Anyone have a good guess for the answer to this, based on anecdotes or data of any sort?
No way would a pro-life woman have an elective abortion, period. It's a principled position.
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| Courtesy of Lisa Benson via IPI |
Linda Ronstadt, "Heat Wave"
