CONGREGATION FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITH
CONSIDERATIONS REGARDING PROPOSALS
TO GIVE LEGAL RECOGNITION TO UNIONS
BETWEEN HOMOSEXUAL PERSONS
INTRODUCTION
1. In recent years, various questions
relating to homosexuality have been addressed with some frequency by Pope John
Paul II and by the relevant Dicasteries of the Holy See.(1)
Homosexuality is a troubling moral and social phenomenon, even in those
countries where it does not present significant legal issues. It gives rise to
greater concern in those countries that have granted or intend to grant – legal
recognition to homosexual unions, which may include the possibility of adopting
children. The present Considerations do not contain new doctrinal elements; they
seek rather to reiterate the essential points on this question and provide
arguments drawn from reason which could be used by Bishops in preparing more
specific interventions, appropriate to the different situations throughout the
world, aimed at protecting and promoting the dignity of marriage, the foundation
of the family, and the stability of society, of which this institution is a
constitutive element. The present Considerations are also intended to give
direction to Catholic politicians by indicating the approaches to proposed
legislation in this area which would be consistent with Christian conscience.(2)
Since this question relates to the natural moral law, the arguments that follow
are addressed not only to those who believe in Christ, but to all persons
committed to promoting and defending the common good of society.
I. THE NATURE OF MARRIAGE
AND ITS INALIENABLE CHARACTERISTICS
2. The Church's teaching on marriage and
on the complementarity of the sexes reiterates a truth that is evident to right
reason and recognized as such by all the major cultures of the world. Marriage
is not just any relationship between human beings. It was established by the
Creator with its own nature, essential properties and purpose.(3) No
ideology can erase from the human spirit the certainty that marriage exists
solely between a man and a woman, who by mutual personal gift, proper and
exclusive to themselves, tend toward the communion of their persons. In this
way, they mutually perfect each other, in order to cooperate with God in the
procreation and upbringing of new human lives.
3. The natural truth about marriage was
confirmed by the Revelation contained in the biblical accounts of creation, an
expression also of the original human wisdom, in which the voice of nature
itself is heard. There are three fundamental elements of the Creator's plan for
marriage, as narrated in the Book of Genesis.
In the first place, man, the image of
God, was created “male and female” (Gen 1:27). Men and women are equal as
persons and complementary as male and female. Sexuality is something that
pertains to the physical-biological realm and has also been raised to a new
level – the personal level – where nature and spirit are united.
Marriage is instituted by the Creator as
a form of life in which a communion of persons is realized involving the use of
the sexual faculty. “That is why a man leaves his father and mother and clings
to his wife and they become one flesh” (Gen 2:24).
Third, God has willed to give the union
of man and woman a special participation in his work of creation. Thus, he
blessed the man and the woman with the words “Be fruitful and multiply” (Gen
1:28). Therefore, in the Creator's plan, sexual complementarity and
fruitfulness belong to the very nature of marriage.
Furthermore, the marital union of man
and woman has been elevated by Christ to the dignity of a sacrament. The Church
teaches that Christian marriage is an efficacious sign of the covenant between
Christ and the Church (cf. Eph 5:32). This Christian meaning of marriage,
far from diminishing the profoundly human value of the marital union between man
and woman, confirms and strengthens it (cf. Mt 19:3-12; Mk
10:6-9).
4. There are absolutely no grounds for
considering homosexual unions to be in any way similar or even remotely
analogous to God's plan for marriage and family. Marriage is holy, while
homosexual acts go against the natural moral law. Homosexual acts “close the
sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and
sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved”.(4)
Sacred Scripture condemns homosexual
acts “as a serious depravity... (cf. Rom 1:24-27; 1 Cor 6:10; 1
Tim 1:10). This judgment of Scripture does not of course permit us to
conclude that all those who suffer from this anomaly are personally responsible
for it, but it does attest to the fact that homosexual acts are intrinsically
disordered”.(5) This same moral judgment is found in many Christian
writers of the first centuries(6) and is unanimously accepted by
Catholic Tradition.
Nonetheless, according to the teaching
of the Church, men and women with homosexual tendencies “must be accepted with
respect, compassion and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in
their regard should be avoided”.(7) They are called, like other
Christians, to live the virtue of chastity.(8) The homosexual
inclination is however “objectively disordered”(9) and homosexual
practices are “sins gravely contrary to chastity”.(10)
II. POSITIONS ON THE PROBLEM
OF HOMOSEXUAL UNIONS
5. Faced with the fact of homosexual
unions, civil authorities adopt different positions. At times they simply
tolerate the phenomenon; at other times they advocate legal recognition of such
unions, under the pretext of avoiding, with regard to certain rights,
discrimination against persons who live with someone of the same sex. In other
cases, they favour giving homosexual unions legal equivalence to marriage
properly so-called, along with the legal possibility of adopting children.
Where the government's policy is de
facto tolerance and there is no explicit legal recognition of homosexual
unions, it is necessary to distinguish carefully the various.aspects of the
problem. Moral conscience requires that, in every occasion, Christians give
witness to the whole moral truth, which is contradicted both by approval of
homosexual acts and unjust discrimination against homosexual persons. Therefore,
discreet and prudent actions can be effective; these might involve: unmasking
the way in which such tolerance might be exploited or used in the service of
ideology; stating clearly the immoral nature of these unions; reminding the
government of the need to contain the phenomenon within certain limits so as to
safeguard public morality and, above all, to avoid exposing young people to
erroneous ideas about sexuality and marriage that would deprive them of their
necessary defences and contribute to the spread of the phenomenon. Those who
would move from tolerance to the legitimization of specific rights for
cohabiting homosexual persons need to be reminded that the approval or
legalization of evil is something far different from the toleration of evil.
In those situations where homosexual
unions have been legally recognized or have been given the legal status and
rights belonging to marriage, clear and emphatic opposition is a duty. One must
refrain from any kind of formal cooperation in the enactment or application of
such gravely unjust laws and, as far as possible, from material cooperation on
the level of their application. In this area, everyone can exercise the right to
conscientious objection.
III. ARGUMENTS FROM REASON AGAINST LEGAL
RECOGNITION OF HOMOSEXUAL UNIONS
6. To understand why it is necessary to
oppose legal recognition of homosexual unions, ethical considerations of
different orders need to be taken into consideration.
From the order of right reason
The scope of the civil law is certainly
more limited than that of the moral law,(11) but civil law cannot
contradict right reason without losing its binding force on conscience.(12)
Every humanly-created law is legitimate insofar as it is consistent with the
natural moral law, recognized by right reason, and insofar as it respects the
inalienable rights of every person.(13) Laws in favour of homosexual
unions are contrary to right reason because they confer legal guarantees,
analogous to those granted to marriage, to unions between persons of the same
sex. Given the values at stake in this question, the State could not grant legal
standing to such unions without failing in its duty to promote and defend
marriage as an institution essential to the common good.
It might be asked how a law can be
contrary to the common good if it does not impose any particular kind of
behaviour, but simply gives legal recognition to a de facto reality which
does not seem to cause injustice to anyone. In this area, one needs first to
reflect on the difference between homosexual behaviour as a private phenomenon
and the same behaviour as a relationship in society, foreseen and approved by
the law, to the point where it becomes one of the institutions in the legal
structure. This second phenomenon is not only more serious, but also assumes a
more wide-reaching and profound influence, and would result in changes to the
entire organization of society, contrary to the common good. Civil laws are
structuring principles of man's life in society, for good or for ill. They “play
a very important and sometimes decisive role in influencing patterns of thought
and behaviour”.(14) Lifestyles and the underlying presuppositions these
express not only externally shape the life of society, but also tend to modify
the younger generation's perception and evaluation of forms of behaviour. Legal
recognition of homosexual unions would obscure certain basic moral values and
cause a devaluation of the institution of marriage.
From the biological and anthropological
order
7. Homosexual unions are totally lacking
in the biological and anthropological elements of marriage and family which
would be the basis, on the level of reason, for granting them legal recognition.
Such unions are not able to contribute in a proper way to the procreation and
survival of the human race. The possibility of using recently discovered methods
of artificial reproduction, beyond involv- ing a grave lack of respect for human
dignity,(15) does nothing to alter this inadequacy.
Homosexual unions are also totally
lacking in the conjugal dimension, which represents the human and ordered form
of sexuality. Sexual relations are human when and insofar as they express and
promote the mutual assistance of the sexes in marriage and are open to the
transmission of new life.
As experience has shown, the absence of
sexual complementarity in these unions creates obstacles in the normal
development of children who would be placed in the care of such persons. They
would be deprived of the experience of either fatherhood or motherhood. Allowing
children to be adopted by persons living in such unions would actually mean
doing violence to these children, in the sense that their condition of
dependency would be used to place them in an environment that is not conducive
to their full human development. This is gravely immoral and in open
contradiction to the principle, recognized also in the United Nations Convention
on the Rights of the Child, that the best interests of the child, as the weaker
and more vulnerable party, are to be the paramount consideration in every case.
From the social order
8. Society owes its continued survival
to the family, founded on marriage. The inevitable consequence of legal
recognition of homosexual unions would be the redefinition of marriage, which
would become, in its legal status, an institution devoid of essential reference
to factors linked to heterosexuality; for example, procreation and raising
children. If, from the legal standpoint, marriage between a man and a woman were
to be considered just one possible form of marriage, the concept of marriage
would undergo a radical transformation, with grave detriment to the common good.
By putting homosexual unions on a legal plane analogous to that of marriage and
the family, the State acts arbitrarily and in contradiction with its duties.
The principles of respect and
non-discrimination cannot be invoked to support legal recognition of homosexual
unions. Differentiating between persons or refusing social recognition or
benefits is unacceptable only when it is contrary to justice.(16) The
denial of the social and legal status of marriage to forms of cohabitation that
are not and cannot be marital is not opposed to justice; on the contrary,
justice requires it.
Nor can the principle of the proper
autonomy of the individual be reasonably invoked. It is one thing to maintain
that individual citizens may freely engage in those activities that interest
them and that this falls within the common civil right to freedom; it is
something quite different to hold that activities which do not represent a
significant or positive contribution to the development of the human person in
society can receive specific and categorical legal recognition by the State. Not
even in a remote analogous sense do homosexual unions fulfil the purpose for
which marriage and family deserve specific categorical recognition. On the
contrary, there are good reasons for holding that such unions are harmful to the
proper development of human society, especially if their impact on society were
to increase.
From the legal order
9. Because married couples ensure the
succession of generations and are therefore eminently within the public
interest, civil law grants them institutional recognition. Homosexual unions, on
the other hand, do not need specific attention from the legal standpoint since
they do not exercise this function for the common good.
Nor is the argument valid according to
which legal recognition of homosexual unions is necessary to avoid situations in
which cohabiting homosexual persons, simply because they live together, might be
deprived of real recognition of their rights as persons and citizens. In
reality, they can always make use of the provisions of law – like all citizens
from the standpoint of their private autonomy – to protect their rights in matters
of common interest. It would be gravely unjust to sacrifice the common good and
just laws on the family in order to protect personal goods that can and must be
guaranteed in ways that do not harm the body of society.(17)
IV. POSITIONS OF CATHOLIC POLITICIANS
WITH REGARD TO LEGISLATION IN FAVOUR
OF HOMOSEXUAL UNIONS
10. If it is true that all Catholics are
obliged to oppose the legal recognition of homosexual unions, Catholic
politicians are obliged to do so in a particular way, in keeping with their
responsibility as politicians. Faced with legislative proposals in favour of
homosexual unions, Catholic politicians are to take account of the following
ethical indications.
When legislation in favour of the
recognition of homosexual unions is proposed for the first time in a legislative
assembly, the Catholic law-maker has a moral duty to express his opposition
clearly and publicly and to vote against it. To vote in favour of a law so
harmful to the common good is gravely immoral.
When legislation in favour of the
recognition of homosexual unions is already in force, the Catholic politician
must oppose it in the ways that are possible for him and make his opposition
known; it is his duty to witness to the truth. If it is not possible to repeal
such a law completely, the Catholic politician, recalling the indications
contained in the Encyclical Letter
Evangelium vitae, “could licitly
support proposals aimed at limiting the harm done by such a law and at lessening
its negative consequences at the level of general opinion and public morality”,
on condition that his “absolute personal opposition” to such laws was clear and
well known and that the danger of scandal was avoided.(18) This does
not mean that a more restrictive law in this area could be considered just or
even acceptable; rather, it is a question of the legitimate and dutiful attempt
to obtain at least the partial repeal of an unjust law when its total abrogation
is not possible at the moment.
CONCLUSION
11. The Church teaches that respect for
homosexual persons cannot lead in any way to approval of homosexual behaviour or
to legal recognition of homosexual unions. The common good requires that laws
recognize, promote and protect marriage as the basis of the family, the primary
unit of society. Legal recognition of homosexual unions or placing them on the
same level as marriage would mean not only the approval of deviant behaviour,
with the consequence of making it a model in present-day society, but would also
obscure basic values which belong to the common inheritance of humanity. The
Church cannot fail to defend these values, for the good of men and women and for
the good of society itself.
The Sovereign Pontiff John Paul II,
in the Audience of March 28, 2003, approved the present Considerations, adopted
in the Ordinary Session of this Congregation, and ordered their publication.
Rome, from the Offices of the
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, June 3, 2003, Memorial of Saint
Charles Lwanga and his Companions, Martyrs.
Joseph Card. Ratzinger
Prefect
Angelo Amato, S.D.B.
Titular Archbishop of Sila
Secretary
NOTES
(1) Cf.
John Paul II, Angelus Messages of February 20, 1994, and of June 19,
1994; Address to the Plenary Meeting of the Pontifical Council for the Family
(March 24, 1999); Catechism of the Catholic Church, Nos. 2357-2359, 2396;
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Declaration Persona humana
(December 29, 1975), 8; Letter on the pastoral care of homosexual persons
(October 1, 1986); Some considerations concerning the response to legislative
proposals on the non-discrimination of homosexual persons (July 24, 1992);
Pontifical Council for the Family, Letter to the Presidents of the Bishops'
Conferences of Europe on the resolution of the European Parliament regarding
homosexual couples (March 25, 1994); Family, marriage and “de facto”
unions (July 26, 2000), 23.
(2) Cf.
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Doctrinal Note on some questions
regarding the participation of Catholics in political life (November 24,
2002), 4.
(3) Cf.
Second Vatican Council, Pastoral Constitution Gaudium et spes, 48.
(4) Catechism
of the Catholic Church, No. 2357.
(5) Congregation
for the Doctrine of the Faith, Declaration Persona humana (December 29,
1975), 8.
(6) Cf.,
for example, St. Polycarp, Letter to the Philippians, V, 3; St. Justin
Martyr, First Apology, 27, 1-4; Athenagoras, Supplication for the
Christians, 34.
(7) Catechism
of the Catholic Church, No. 2358; cf. Congregation
for the Doctrine of the Faith, Letter on the pastoral care of homosexual
persons (October 1, 1986), 10.
(8) Cf.
Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 2359; cf. Congregation for the
Doctrine of the Faith, Letter on the pastoral care of homosexual persons
(October 1, 1986), 12.
(9) Catechism
of the Catholic Church, No. 2358.
(10) Ibid., No. 2396.
(11) Cf.
John Paul II, Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae (March 25, 1995), 71.
(12) Cf.
ibid., 72.
(13) Cf.
St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, I-II, q. 95, a. 2.
(14) John
Paul II, Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae (March 25, 1995), 90.
(15) Cf.
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Instruction Donum vitae
(February 22, 1987), II. A. 1-3.
(16) Cf.
St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, II-II, q. 63, a.1, c.
(17) It should not be forgotten that there is always “a danger that legislation which
would make homosexuality a basis for entitlements could actually encourage a
person with a homosexual orientation to declare his homosexuality or even to
seek a partner in order to exploit the provisions of the law” (Congregation for
the Doctrine of the Faith, Some considerations concerning the response to
legislative proposals on the non-discrimination of homosexual persons [July
24, 1992], 14).
(18) John
Paul II, Encyclical Letter Evangelium vitae (March 25, 1995), 73.
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