At the “Catholic Moral Theology” blog, St. Louis University professor Julie Rubio writes about the Call to a New Marriage Conversation. Professor Rubio, who contributed a wonderful paper to our Does the Shape of Families Shape Faith? project, writes about the Call:
…Catholics could sit out this conversation and continue to channel most of their pro-marriage energy into fighting same sex marriage. But we would be missing an opportunity to build coalitions with people who are deeply concerned about the 40% of children born outside of marriage, the problems caused by the trend away from marriage in the working class, and the effects of cohabitation on children. Wouldn’t it better to come to the table and join the most promising pro-marriage movement of our day?
You can read and sign the Call here.
Categories: Faith and Families, Marriage
“Catholics could sit out this conversation and continue to channel most of their pro-marriage energy into fighting same sex marriage.”
Most Catholics support legal same-sex marriage, according to polls.
There is no either/or here. Except for the suggestion that to talk about unwed childbearing requires surrendering the conversation on gay marriage.
The “false dichotomy” leads to a lot of false thinking. I would not sign the call a. because I wasn’t asked but b. on reading it carefully because it does seem to say fairly clearly that the this conversation is better/higher/more important than the discussion over gay marriage.
But by all means let’s keep on talking about divorce, unwedchildbearing and the other marriage equality debate.
Maggie
Why?
I’m glad to see this. Divorce and unwed childbearing affect vastly more children than same-sex marriage does, and it would be great if the Catholic church would be more involved in those more important issues. Yes, it is possible to do both, but sometimes it would be a choice of using resources for one or the other. Also, there could be people on both sides of the same-sex marriage debate who might support reforms of divorce and family law.