“Some would say, it is not fair or it is unjust to deny same-sex partners the civil “right” to marry. In reality, it is not unjust at all because marriage and same-sex unions are essentially different realities. Justice actually requires society to maintain its long standing definition of marriage. To uphold God’s intent for marriage, in which sexual relations have their proper and exclusive place, is not to offend the dignity of homosexual persons. Of course, a central issue with many same-sex partners are the social benefits that are received through marriage … In trying to think of an analogous situation that could cause a pastor to deny Communion, one might think of an involved Catholic parishioner who was then ordained as a Protestant minister. They would likely be acting according to their sense of conscience and they would probably be a very good person, but they would have broken their communion with the Catholic Church in a very fundamental way,” – Bishop Michael Warfel of Montana, explaining why he stripped an elderly gay couple of their communion after they got a civil marriage license.
My italics. One wonders how a Protestant minister would be able to attend mass regularly at a local Catholic church as well. The hierarchs had better find a better analogy than that – and I wonder if they actually can. Heterosexuals can privately commit sodomy all the time within a public marriage and never arouse any suspicion of scandal; devout gays who simply want to protect themselves in civil marriage – and who are in their sixties and seventies – have no such lee-way.
Which is to say that the church is no longer penalizing heterosexual parishioners for sin; they are uniquely penalizing homosexual parishioners for love. How much longer can this specific discrimination and persecution of a minority be sustained without wider and wider revolt? How many of the next generation will find it possible to belong to a church which singles out a small minority for persecution in this way?
The Dish 