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| How many times? I.Am.Not.An.Artisan. Darn it! |
So, words change meaning all the time, right? Calling an artist an artisan would have been fine in the Middle Ages, but they would have been a bit grumpy in the nineteenth century, right?
Apparently, "marriage" has come to mean the public recognition of the love between two people.
Fine.
That's not what Catholic Marriage is.
Catholic Marriage comes with much more, it's a sacrament, it is life-giving, permanent and unitive. As such, it has to be between a man and a woman, it has to be a choice, it has to be life-long, and the spouses have to refrain from separating sex and the creation of new life through the use of artificial birth control.
Marriage has stopped to mean this about a century ago.
We didn't insist on calling Beethoven an artisan, despite the fact that etymology was on our side, so let's have a new word for Catholic Marriage.
We like latin, why not "Matrimonium"?
Maybe that will simplify the discussion with bigot-naming militants?
Actually, "matrimonium" is probably a bad idea, as it was extremely easy to divorce in Roman times.
Suggestions?
I see where you're coming from, but I'm not sure I understand why, when Catholics say "This is what marriage is." the cry from the Left is "But we want to use the same word, even though what we are doing is none of those things!" And it chokes a bit to turn around and say "Well, you go ahead and use our word with your completely new, never-before-heard-of meaning, and we'll just choose a new and different word!" Why don't they find a new word for their new thing, and we'll keep the word that has always meant one woman, one man, committed for life? But I guess we really lost that battle when we lost the battle over no-fault divorce. Once people could divorce for any reason or no reason, it wasn't a huge step to say "well, if that's marriage too, then why can't this be also?" :-(
ReplyDeleteTo be fair, I was mostly thinking of getting the point across to people who will be eager to call us "bigots" as soon as we open our mouths.
DeleteI am pretty sure that if such a word became common use, we would end up having exactly the same conversation, no matter how clearly we defined it: "Gay people should be able to do that!" / "It's not possible, the very definition says..."/ "Change the definition! Don't be a bigot!"
It is all rather depressing. Do you think you'll have something like "La Manif Pour Tous" in America?
Translate it for me, and I'll tell you. :-) Is it short for La Manifestation? (I got the "pour tous" part.) I agree, it is depressing, and the whole "We want everyone to be tolerant, and that means celebrating things that have been viewed as immoral in the past, and if you won't celebrate with us then you're a hateful awful person who ought not to be allowed." The inconsistency and illogic of it makes me crazy, and being called a bigot by people who refuse to even hear out my point of view...blah.
DeleteIt's the name of the movement which appeared in the wake of the gay marriage law in France last year. There were huge demonstrations, and they managed to delay some of the elements of the law, such as tax-paid IVF and surrogate mothers for gay couples. I hear there is a similar movement in Italy at the moment.
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