Fr. Paul Schenck on New York's Desperate Effort to Find Meaning in Marriage

Now, a community that was responsible for losing the meaning of marriage senses what it has lost

Marriage is an expression of selfless love and self-donation which includes an openness and even expectation of bringing about a new human being and the concomitant life-long bond the child deserves. The child's rights disappeared as individuals rushed to find 'self-actualization' and fulfillment from an institution designed for the exact opposite.

P>HARRISBURG, PA. (Catholic Online) - Last Sunday's same sex "marriage" registrations are being hailed as a victory for civil rights and what is now widely called "marriage equality" by homosexual equivalency activists, whatever that phrase means.

I see something very different at work in the hundreds of "marriages" of male to male and female to female couples before misguided clergy, politicians and state bureaucrats.

I don't doubt that many, if not most of the couples love one another, at least in a limited understanding of that essential word which lies at the heart of the very meaning of life.

I also do not doubt that some homosexual and lesbian couples sincerely sought public recognition of their mutual commitment. Homosexual "love" is sometimes a genuine attempt to find the comforts of companionship, mutual support and the benefits of being known as a  "family".

One of the root problems with "same sex marriage" as I see it is that it is a fatally flawed attempt to recover meaning in civil marriage within a society that has lost confidence in the ancient human ritual and arrangement which lies at the very foundation of human society.

Civil marriage was in deep trouble long before anyone suggested granting government licenses to two men or to two women. Adultery, divorce, multiple marriages, loveless marriages and marriages of convenience and power have gutted marriage as an institution and natural arrangement between men and women, at least in the civil arena.

The seismic shift that shattered civil marriage was the massive movement by married persons, courts and legislatures to make marriage a mere option for otherwise independent individuals to live as temporarily as they wished.

Marriage as an expression of selfless love and self-donation which unavoidably includes an openness and even expectation of bringing about a new human being and the concomitant life-long bond the child deserves by right nearly disappeared as individuals rushed to find self-actualization and personal fulfillment from an institution created and designed for the exact opposite.

Now, a community that was responsible for losing the meaning of marriage senses what it has lost and is desperately looking to recover it before it is too late. By opening marriage to gays, who have not yet had it and so look for something more from it, "marriage equality" activists and sympathizers hope to restore meaning to marriage, glomming on to gay enthusiasm as a substitute for the missing aspirations of a generation that lost the wonder and joy of getting, or being truly married.

Unfortunately, "marriage equality" also means disappointment equality and divorce equality. As long as self-fulfillment, self-actualization, self-realization, self-seeking and self-assertion remain the hallmark of contemporary life, gay marriages will fracture, fade and fall apart like too many heterosexual marriages. Sadly, the children adopted and artificially conceived by these couples will suffer the most.

The wonder of selfless committed love between two persons who possess the natural power to bring new human life into being and to nurture that life through successive generations will need much more than government certificates. It requires rediscovering who we are as human beings, female and male, mothers and fathers, to children who require selfless love and life-long commitment and care.

It also requires a frank and honest re-examination of the true nature of married love, the distinct types of human relationships and the meaning of human societal relationships. Certificates and celebrations of a purported new "freedom" and claims of a "right to marry" between persons who are ontologically incapable of achieving the true ends of marriage simply won't do it. 

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Fr. Paul Schenck, a Priest of the Diocese of Harrisburg, PA., is the founding Director of the National Pro-Life Center (NPLC) on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC. The Center gives the Justices of the Supreme Court, their high level staff, members of the federal judiciary, members of the US Senate and other public policy makers the information, education and inspiration they need to better form their consciences so they will make better decisions. He is a Champion of the Pro-Life movement.

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