Left2Right

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Posted by: Bernard

It seems to me that the Catholic church, as a voluntary organisation, can urge people to do whatever it pleases. The key issue here is that if it does exceed itself and alienate its followers by urging them to act against their other cultural reference points then people will opt out (as many have in light of other issues where it's been perceived out of touch).

It seems to me that these things regulate themselves.

Posted by: Bernard | May 10, 2005 7:22:45 AM

Posted by: D.A. Ridgely

I’m surprised by such inquisitiveness about Spanish church / state affairs! Then again, nobody expects the Spanish Inquisi… Oh, never mind.

Posted by: D.A. Ridgely | May 10, 2005 8:18:36 AM

Posted by: Dan Kervick

I don't think I understand what you mean by "jurisdiction" here. The Catholic Church is not a constitutionally established institution with a legally defined sphere of authority. It is a religious organization that claims for itself a universal teaching authority and a unique, global apostolic mission to carry forth the Gospel and do Christ's work on earth. For its most faithful adherents, The Church's authority is mainly defined by whatever the Church says it is.

Catholic teaching has always been that authority is exercised legitimately only when it it is exercised morally, and that people are not bound by conscience to obey immoral laws. Here is an area, then, in which it holds Spain has enacted what the Catholic Church regards as an immoral law. We shouldn't avoid taking on the moral teachings directly, rather than hiding behind wishful thinking, and modern enlightenment conceptions of the Church's "rightful sphere of authority". The church doesn't accept those limits and the philosophy of government that informs them.

Yes, American Catholics have sometimes had to work hard to convince other Americans that they don't take direction from the Catholic Church, and don't regard the church as a higher authority than their own government. Well, that's tough. The best way to convince their fellow-citizens that that is true would be to sever their ties of obedience with an organization that does in fact proclaim itself a higher authority than temporal governments.

But to be fair, it is not just Catholics who have "divided loyalties" here. I suspect most people, Americans particularly, recognize some other authority beyond, and higher than, their own government. Even secular philosophy professors sometimes accept a "moral law" whose authority they believe is supreme, and are willing to accept that people are not bound to obey unjust laws.

So again, the point you might want to argue is that when the Church says gay marriage or civil unions are immoral, the Church is just wrong.

Posted by: Dan Kervick | May 10, 2005 8:28:10 AM

Posted by: Steve

How funny. You remind me of Kerry. Presumably, you approved of civil disobedience before you opposed it?

Steve

Posted by: Steve | May 10, 2005 8:28:51 AM

Posted by: Tom Perkins

Har, Har, D.A.R. Har, Har.

Posted by: Tom Perkins | May 10, 2005 8:38:05 AM

Posted by: Will

How about mel brooks?
The inquisiiiition, what a show! The inquisiiiition, Here we go! ...
We’ve flattened their fingers
We’ve branded their buns
Nothing is working
SEND IN THE NUNS

I agree Don, Spain shouldn't buckle -- though I should take it easy on the conscientious objectors and work a deal wherein they could save face and keep their jobs.

Posted by: Will | May 10, 2005 8:42:04 AM

Posted by: john t

Whew! I'm glad the post isn't about homosexual marriage although such a post might be refreshing,don't recall ever seeing one before. Not for nothing but maybe a way out of this is for gov't officials not to pass laws that flaunt the basic beliefs of many of their citizens,whether Catholic or not. This might help avoid a situation where silly Catholics and others make so bold as to act on their beliefs as opposed to sitting in a corner,shutting up and paying their taxes.

Posted by: john t | May 10, 2005 8:50:10 AM

Posted by: Tom Perkins

The officials of the Church have the absolute duty to obey their consscience in matters of faith, I am glad that here it is unlikely to cost them their lives. The civil servants of Spain have the absolute duty to obey their own consciences as to whether they will obey the edicts of the church, or disobey and accept such ecclesiastic sanctions as the Church may levy, and this certainly includes literal excommunication. It is the absolute duty of the citizens of Spain to decide how the decisions of the civil servants in the jurisdictions within which they live will effect how they vote for those civil servants or the officials who oversee them in the future.

This is self evident almost to the point of being a of tautology.

"But a government that looks like it's giving into bullying — even bullying of the most principled sort, from a hugely dignified Church — is in trouble."

It's in a lot of trouble. It is on the verge of losing what Leftists find most valuable in government, which is sovereignty--that mythical presumption that if it kills to enforce the law, that's ok. Of course, the value of that also depends on whether Leftists wrote the laws or not. Its hard to tell people how to live their own lives if you can't hold that big stick over their heads.

I can certainly agree that firing or doing what can be done to remove from office persons who will not execute what the laws they swore to uphold have become is a defensible response of a government to such interference.

But nothing will stay the hand of future valve turners and human carrying cattle car loaders more effectively than that all people are as free from govenrment interference as possible in the exercise of their conscience.

This means less powerful and less centralized government, exactly what Leftists abhor--unless they aren't in charge of it.

John T. I see your point and raise you a ho-hum, this hobby horse again, but now side-saddle.

Yours, TDP, ml, msl, & pfpp

Posted by: Tom Perkins | May 10, 2005 9:42:04 AM

Posted by: Matty

"It is an argument about jurisdiction, driven by my worry that the Church has just exceeded its own rightful sphere of authority."

Like Dan, I don't understand what sort of jurisdiction or "sphere of authority" the Church is supposed to have exceeded. The Church has merely instructed its adherents as to how to behave. Yes, these instructions concern the behavior of public officials, but I fail to see why the Church should limit its proclamations to areas of only private concern.

Consider this (sadly) counterfactual situation. Suppose that the Catholic Church had openly instructed its German followers--even those working in government--to undermine, in any way possible, the Nazi plan to exterminate Jews. Would such an instruction have been another example of the Church exceeding "its own rightful sphere of authority"?

In my view, the Church has not exceeded its authority in either case. The salient difference is that while we all (hopefully) agree with the Church's counterfactual instructions, many of us disagree with the Church's position on same-sex marriage. So--and again I'm siding with Dan here--let's tackle that issue head on. Let's argue that the Church's opposition to same-sex marriage is *wrong*, rather than castigating the Church for daring to have a view as to how its followers should behave.

Posted by: Matty | May 10, 2005 9:42:51 AM

Posted by: Josh Jasper

"It is possible we shall soon be looking at a real epidemic of homosexuality."

Yes, because as you know, you can catch gay. Even over the internet. Just reading me could be infecting you RIGHT NOW.

Posted by: Josh Jasper | May 10, 2005 9:48:09 AM

Posted by: Ted

"One wonders if he actually believes that gay marriage will lure millions out of the closet."

Probably not millions, but certainly some; fear of discrimination/ostracism/hostility/violence keeps many gays in the closet, and if society legitimizes gay marriage this fear should diminish and as a result many people will feel free to publicly acknowledge who they are.

Posted by: Ted | May 10, 2005 10:02:52 AM

Posted by: D.A. Ridgely

Yes, because as you know, you can catch gay. Even over the internet. Just reading me could be infecting you RIGHT NOW.

Well, I suppose there is the possibility of virtual pheromones.

Posted by: D.A. Ridgely | May 10, 2005 10:06:20 AM

Posted by: pedro

Instead of asking public officials to engage in official speech acts against gay marriage, the Church ought to advice them specifically to quit their jobs if forced to participate in what the Church considers immoral. The problem is not with telling its sheep how to act as individuals. The problem is that the Church is telling them how to act as public officials.

Posted by: pedro | May 10, 2005 10:13:34 AM

Posted by: Achillea

I'm sorry, maybe I missed something here. Mayors in Spain are not elected officials? They're immune to the constituent power embodied in 'huge popular support' for something they're trying to balk?

Certainly let them follow their consciences, dictated by Rome or not. And let the voters fire them for not doing the job they were hired to do.

Posted by: Achillea | May 10, 2005 10:13:53 AM

Posted by: Terrier

Do and say whatever you like but the special exemptions granted to churches should end. I have said before that I am religious and I do go to church but my church and every church should pay taxes and be subject every other law enforced on any other business. If we do this then I have no problem with preachers doing Pepsi commercials (or political endorsements) every Sunday from the pulpit. My mother left the Baptist Church because they started to enforce doctrine. She was actually raised to believe in soul competency and figured that no man was qualified to judge another man's faith so when the Convention decided to do that, as far as she was concerned, they ceased to be Baptists. Christianity (and other Middle-Eastern religions) was derived from the mentality of the monarchial city-state and thus has always been obsessed about what others are thinking and feeling. That's why there is all this legislate-morality-crap (by both righties and lefties) in the West. There is an implicit assumption that we must all be 'right-with-the-Lord' or we will all suffer. That's what underlies this absurd claim that same-sex-marriage will ruin society. Some people will only feel that they have done their duty when they have done everything they can to coerce others to follow their belief system. Which, by the way, is why I favor secular government giving handouts and not private charities that will feel free to attach the strings of a belief system to their help. Religion should confine itself to teaching people how to fish - not providing free fish-frys. Coercion that affects someone's inner life is far more dangerous to me than any attempt to take just material things from me. To value a few banknotes over my own mind is laughably stupid. Do I support the right of Catholics (or anyone else) to protest and live according to their belief systems? Emphatically yes! (But don't be surprised if you lose your job.)

Posted by: Terrier | May 10, 2005 10:18:34 AM

Posted by: Tom Perkins

"Just reading me could be infecting you RIGHT NOW."

Well Josh:

1) I am put in the mind of the Dilbert strip where Wally had too much testosterone, and it was flying out of his pores and landing on people. Eww.

2) I have good understanding of human nature, some familiarity with the research regarding the influences of biology and upbringing on the prevalence of homosexual behavior--and for now, homosexual encounters with pedophiles around the ages of 7 to 13 or so is by far a stronger correlating factor in the occurence of homosexual behavior in adults than reading material.

3) It seems overwhelmingly likely that a genetic component is present in virtually all homosexual behavior where there is scant or no history of bisexual attraction, so it's not something you catch nearly as much as it's something you're born with.

Of course, all of the above including your post is a distraction from the point of the post, which is that in obeying their conscience and directing all Catholics to refrain from solemnizing gay marriages, the Church officers have somehow overstepped their bounds, which they haven't done, neither would Spanish officials who are Catholically inspired to be conscientious objectors to officiating gay marriages and yet not resign be overstepping their bounds.

Yours, TDP, ml, msl, & pfpp

Posted by: Tom Perkins | May 10, 2005 10:18:35 AM

Posted by: David Velleman

Don has made perfectly clear that he would respect acts of conscientious objection by Spanish officials ("I don't mind if public officials who are legally required to marry gay and lesbian couples balk and resign their posts. I don't much mind if they conscientiously refuse and then try to stay in office.") And he has already noted the possible analogy to historical cases in which conscientious objection was morally obligatory (see the paragraph beginning "Before you reach an absolute view ..."). So conscientious objection is not the issue.[1] The issue, as I understand it, is whether the Church is courting serious trouble by placing its authority in direct opposition to that of a legitimate government.

In this regard, I think that Matty's counterfactual example is not relevant. We naturally believe that the Nazi regime was illegitimate, and hence that the Church should have sought to undermine its authority and power in any way possible. But I assume (and I assume that Don is assuming) that the Spanish government is legitimate, and that the Church concedes its legitimacy. Instructing its members to disobey what it concedes to be a legitimate government is quite different from instructing them to resist an illegitimate regime.

Remember, though, that the question is not whether Spanish officials should disobey, or may legitimately disobey if their consciences so instruct them -- even if their consciences take guidance from Church teaching. All of these possibilities are already granted in Don's post. As I understand Don, he is posing an extremely subtle question. Granting that Catholic (and other) Spanish officials are entitled to conscientiously disobey, perhaps on religious grounds, the question remains whether the Church ought to oppose its institutional authority to the authority exercised by a government that it concedes to be legitimate. And as I understand this question, the "ought" is mainly prudential. Maybe it would be wiser for the Church to state its position on same-sex marriage while avoiding a contest of authority with legitimate governments, leaving its members to follow their consciences as informed by Church teachings. That, I take it, is the hypothesis under discussion.

(Don? Am I way off?)

-------------------

[1]Don's statement that the government should fire officials who disobey in no way cancels his statement that they are entitled to disobey. Disobedience that is truly conscientious entails accepting the legal consequences.

Posted by: David Velleman | May 10, 2005 10:25:32 AM

Posted by: Josh Jasper

2) I have good understanding of human nature, some familiarity with the research regarding the influences of biology and upbringing on the prevalence of homosexual behavior--and for now, homosexual encounters with pedophiles around the ages of 7 to 13 or so is by far a stronger correlating factor in the occurrence of homosexual behavior in adults than reading material.

Is that Nicolosi or Cameron you're citing?

Of course, all of the above including your post is a distraction

Oh, curses, foiled again. And I would have gotten away with it, if it hadn't been for your rotten kids.

And that dog.

from the point of the post, which is that in obeying their conscience and directing all Catholics to refrain from solemnizing gay marriages, the Church officers have somehow overstepped their bounds, which they haven't done, neither would Spanish officials who are Catholically inspired to be conscientious objectors to officiating gay marriages and yet not resign be overstepping their bounds.

As long as there isn't a real impediment to same sex couples getting married, I say let them go. Don't fire anyone. But were I living in Spain, and had to incur extra costs to get married to another man, I'd expect the officials who messed things up to foot the bill for me.

But anyhow, I doubt many Spanish Catholics also mind using condoms, or selling them, or distributing birth control pills, etc... So I find myself wondering why same sex marriage conducted outside of the church is so much more important than sex by church members.

As for the bit about 'officiating', stamping something and filing it is not officiating. That's done in church, or by a minister. The paperwork is just from the government, which is not the church. As far as the church is concerned, those marriages are not real, so why should they care if they get an official government stamp or not?

Here's an interesting parallel in the US:

Same sex couples often get 'married' in the sense that they have ceremonies. I've been to several. Some in churches, some not. Now, depending on the state, you can also register for domestic partnership laws. But in this hypothetical, let's say we're in Alabama, where there is no DP laws. We've got a gay couple living there (god knows why, I'd move out as fast as I could) and they have a commitment ceremony. They draw up some legal documents to make things as similar to marriage as they can get, and hand over the parcel to a clerk, who, acting as a Catholic on the advice of his church, refuses to approve them.

Can that clerk be fired? Should that clerk be fired?

Posted by: Josh Jasper | May 10, 2005 10:40:09 AM

Posted by: D.A. Ridgely

It would be wildly presumptuous for me to attempt to speak for the Roman Catholic Church in such matters (not that being wildly presumptuous would be unusual for me), but I suspect the question whether it is prudent for Rome to engage in this sort of confrontation depends on whether it believes it is likely to be successful in changing public policy as a result. That’s an interesting question, even in nominally Roman Catholic Spain, but it’s only interesting as a matter of strategy and tactics.

Mr. Herzog states his worry is “that the Church has just exceeded its own rightful sphere of authority.” (Emphasis added.) Okay, then, Mr. Herzog, the questions arise what is that rightful sphere and who gets to decide that?

Posted by: D.A. Ridgely | May 10, 2005 10:51:12 AM

Posted by: Matty

David writes: "The issue, as I understand it, is whether the Church is courting serious trouble by placing its authority in direct opposition to that of a legitimate government."

But what do you mean by "serious trouble"? You suggest that Don's concerns are mainly prudential. His question, then, is whether, for pragmatic reasons, the Church should refrain from "placing its authority in direct opposition to that of a legitimate government"?

In the long run it may indeed be bad for the Church to take such a position, but I suspect that Don did not have the welfare of the Catholic Church in mind when he wrote his closing paragraph. As Mr. Ridgely has observed, Don focuses on the Church's "rightful sphere of authority," thereby suggesting that the Church has no right to issue the sort of instructions we're seeing in Spain (regardless of how prudent or imprudent those instructions might be).

Perhaps we're both right. If Don's concern is indeed prudential, perhaps his specific worry is that by exceeding its rightful sphere of authority the Church is going to damage itself. But then this conclusion depends on the claim that the Church is actually exceeding its rightful sphere of authority, and that is what I meant to question in the first place.

Posted by: Matty | May 10, 2005 11:24:50 AM

Posted by: J.S.

I say get the government out of the marriage business! They have no place there. Governments for civil unions for everyone- including gays. And then religious ceremonies for those who want them; end of story. Religious groups that want to remain entrenched in their medieval bigotry, I mean, "tradition", could so and those with an eye towards equality and inclusion (I think Jesus said about this, but nevermind) could marry gays and straights.

J.S.

http://voicesofreason.info

Posted by: J.S. | May 10, 2005 11:32:17 AM

Posted by: john t

A problem exists. That problem is that,however guarded the language, some people are shocked,just shocked,that other people and institutions disagree with them. Like smoking it's okay if you do it in the house but not in public. OK,so even smoking isn't alright in the house but I had to use something as an example. The problem has evolved from a bizarre notion that government should be a transformative force in society,interesting in itself given that gov't can't even transform itself,i.e. conduct it's operations and performance in a manner resembling sanity,coherence,and a modicum of efficiency. Does,for example,the INS still keep it's records in cardboard boxes in warehouses it can't locate,the cardboard boxes I mean,not the warehouses. Although I'm not sure about the warehouses either. Somewhere between and including Cleisthenes and F D Roosevelt,and probably before,some people,at least partially deranged,got the notion that government was a giant milk cow whose udders reached into every home. Having gotten used to this idea we have devolved to the point where we expect the circus ringmaster to,excuse the metaphor,juggle the balls of society. Rearrange things,little things like marriage,concerns about gov't power,and whose money it really is. And some people are shocked that thisis questioned and worse yet opposed,allegiance to dissent having it's limitations. Concerns are expressed,worries displayed,questions raised,dead queens and kings discussed,and history dropped to the cutting room floor having been edited to death.

Posted by: john t | May 10, 2005 11:37:04 AM

Posted by: miab

DV writes: "The issue, as I understand it, is whether the Church is courting serious trouble by placing its authority in direct opposition to that of a legitimate government."

I think that's backwards, or at least only gets part of it. Don's main focus is on the consequences to Spain of seeming to bow to church pressure. He says that they should allow conscientious objection if and only if they can come up with a way to allow conscientious objection without seeming like it comes from church pressure: "But a government that looks like it's giving into bullying — even bullying of the most principled sort, from a hugely dignified Church — is in trouble."

It's the repurcussions in the secular sphere that drive this post, combined with the backlash it could generate against the church and its members. E.g., if church pressure is successful, then maybe the view will be that the worries about JFK were right, and he couldn't be trusted to do what's best for the country, or support the constitution, if the pope told him to do otherwise.

Posted by: miab | May 10, 2005 12:19:25 PM

Posted by: Bret

Most of me says fire 'em if they won't execute the laws of the land. However, these particular laws weren't in their job description when they started (or ran for office) so I think they should maybe be given a little time to find a new job.

Posted by: Bret | May 10, 2005 12:23:14 PM

Posted by: Josh Jasper

J.S., I doubt you'll convince many proponents of same sex marriage to 'disarm' and go for civil unions unless they're on a federal scale as well as state based.

I do think that most SSM advocates would accept a 'same in all but name' status if it were really the same, and they really got all the rights granted to married couples, but I doubt that's going to happen. Most proponents of "civil unions" being enough for SSM couples seem to think that SSM couples don't want need or deserve the large scale federal benefits that marriage grants. I have no idea why, other than that they're intentionaly being disengenuous, which they frequently are.

Posted by: Josh Jasper | May 10, 2005 12:35:31 PM

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