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The Vatican�s Condemnation of Gay Marriage: Another Galileo Case in the Making? Rev. Dr. Matthew Fox The present papacy has prided itself on removing the condemnation of Galileo Galilei, which hung in the air for 359 years. In 1992 Pope John Paul II lifted the condemnation of Galileo and said that the case concerned him because it became �the symbol of the church�s supposed rejection of scientific progress, or of �dogmatic� obscurantism opposed to the free search for truth.� At the time of the lifting of his condemnation for heresy and the admission that the earth does indeed revolve around the sun, the pope told the Academy of Sciences that �the underlying problems of this case concern both the nature of science and the message of faith. One day we may find ourselves in a similar situation which will require both sides to have an informed awareness of the field and of the limits of their own competencies.� This �one day� may have arrived. I speak of the pope�s and cardinal Ratzinger�s recent condemnation of homosexual unions. In the twelve page document called �Considerations Regarding Proposals To Give Legal Recognition to Unions Between Homosexual Persons� there is not one reference to any scientific discussion of homosexuality, not a single note of awareness of the fact that thirty years ago the American Psychiatric Association, for example, deleted the issue of homosexuality from its �Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders� in the year 1973. (In 1992, the World Health Organization removed homosexuality from the International Classification of Diseases.) In fact, the papal document calls homosexuality �deviant behavior� and �evil.� What is most telling about this document is that its entire argument is built on an appeal to �natural moral law��so much so that the document claims to speak not just to Roman Catholics but to all people �committed to promoting and defending the common good of society.� And yet�the only arguments given for �natural moral law� are from Scripture. Not a word from science. There are four footnotes to a catechism (!)�not one to any serious study about homosexuality. This is why, using the very Pope�s argument concerning Galileo, we have here a new Galileo case, one that demonstrates the church lacking an �informed awareness of the field and of the limits of its own competencies.� Will we have to wait another 400 years to hear a Pope apologize anew? The only �science� implicit in this condemnation of homosexuality is medieval science. As for the use of Scripture, it should be noted that the historical Jesus said not one recorded word about homosexuality. The three references to Saint Paul in this document should be taken with a heavy dose of salt. Why? Because Paul is the same author who declared that �slaves should obey their masters.� This kind of theology was invoked ad nauseam in the nineteenth century to support slavery. One of the scholarly achievements of our time has been to distinguish the words of the historical Jesus from those of the theologian Paul who is sometimes right on and some times way off the mark. It is scandalous that the Vatican has ignored its Biblical homework as much as its scientific homework. One can of course pick and choose Biblical texts to prove or disprove one�s own bias. A text I would like to put into the discussion is from John�s epistle that says: �God is love.� (Please note it does not say �God is heterosexual love only.� Simply, �God is love.�) Maybe the homosexual debate ought to be framed around that issue: Love. Just as the Vatican came reluctantly and ever so slowly to the truth that the earth does indeed revolve round the sun, so too it ought to listen to science about homosexuality. The facts are these: About 10% of any given human population is going to be homosexual. Furthermore, we now know that at least 64 other species have homosexual populations including dolphins, cranes, many birds and others. So the medieval argument�that homosexuality is �unnatural� or �contrary to natural law� and which is the entire basis for this papal document--is simply medieval science. It is not today�s science. Popes and inquisitors would do well to know the �limits of their own competencies� as the Pope put it while resuscitating Galileo. The fact is that being gay and expressing one�s love for another of the same sex is natural for gay and lesbian people. They are following the �natural law� by so doing. (Heterosexual marriage would be �unnatural� for them and does not work.) Nature has made them gay. A church that wants to teach love ought to be encouraging monogamous and established relationships of love instead of forcing gay people into self-hatred and sometimes into practices of promiscuity that separate love from sexual expression. As for the �common good� it should be noted that the common good is served in various ways by gay and lesbian people and their extraordinary gift in the arts is just one such gift. Does the pope pray in the Sistine Chapel? Does Cardinal Ratzinger visit there? A gay man did it! Michaelangelo and many artistic geniuses through the ages have been gay. Furthermore, this document claims that the purpose of marriage is to have children and that having children is the way the human race is to save itself. Here too the Vatican might do well to read today�s science. There are too many humans on the planet, not too few. Ways of birth control, including homosexual love, are ways to save our species and other species as well. (The idea that sex must be legitimized by having children comes from Saint Augustine, not from Christian Scriptures.) It is interesting that the papal document, which also condemns the adoption of children by gays, appeared at the moment of the Supreme Court decision removing homosexual acts as felonies. And at the time that the Episcopal Church wrestled publicly and courageously with the issue of ordaining an out of the closet gay man as Bishop. God bless the Episcopal Church for its Orthopraxis. God pray for the Vatican and others who think the gay issue is a Scriptural one when it fact it is an issue of nature and creation and our knowing more about both. It was the inability to comprehend a non-literal reading of Scripture and its �inability to disassociate itself from an age-old cosmology�, according to the Papal commission on Galileo, that resulted in his condemnation. Protestant Biblical advocates should take notice. Thomas Aquinas who is referenced in this document, himself wrote 700 years ago that �a mistake about creation results in a mistake about God.� Mistakes about creation happen when we ignore science whose job it is to examine creation. The mistakes about creation that are so plentiful in this document will lead people into mistakes about God. Instead of holding our breath for another 400 years while the Vatican gets its head out of its catechisms and starts learning what science says about homosexuality, it would be wise to put one�s energy into praising the amazing and beautiful diversity that the Creator has put into her creation�a diversity that includes homosexual love along with all the other kinds of love that course through humanity and other earthlings. Instead of condemning the Divine Imagination we might do well to start imitating it. � 2004 Matthew Fox |
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