USCCB News Release: Archbishop Cordileone Calls Minnesota's Move to Redefine Marriage Shortly After Mother's Day the "Height of Irony"

USCCB News Release (May 15, 2013)

• Men and women bring different gifts to parenting
• Redefining marriage in law serves no one’s good
• Truth of marriage not going away

“It is the height of irony that the Minnesota legislature decided, and the governor signed into law, the redefinition of marriage just after we celebrated the unique gifts of mothers and women on Mother’s Day,” said Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco. Archbishop Cordileone chairs the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Subcommittee for the Promotion and Defense of Marriage. He said further, “It is all the more so given the fact that in the last election Minnesotans were led to believe that there was no need to define marriage in the constitution, that nothing would change if the marriage amendment didn’t pass.”

“It also renders senseless the very idea of President Obama’s National Fatherhood Initiative, in that a bill now becomes law in Minnesota that effectively claims that a mother and a father together are superfluous and can be replaced by two men or two women,” he added.

Archbishop Cordileone noted that Minnesota is the third state in just over a week to redefine marriage in the law.

“There are many of us Americans, including many Minnesotans, who stand for the natural and true meaning of marriage. They know that men and women are important; their complementary difference matters, their union matters, and it matters to kids. Mothers and fathers are simply irreplaceable,” he said. “Instead of strengthening, the Minnesota legislature’s decision to redefine marriage weakens motherhood and fatherhood, and so strikes a blow to all children who deserve both a mother and father.”

“Some wish to believe that sexual relationships outside of the marital context of husband and wife are innocuous, choosing to ignore the fact that they are actually harmful to individuals and to society as a whole,” he added.

“We know that now is the time to redouble our prayers, efforts and witness. The truth of marriage is not going away,” Archbishop Cordileone said. “We know what it takes to work toward a culture of life even in the midst of laws that work against us. The same is true for rebuilding a culture of marriage. No matter what the horizon may bring, we will continue in charity and truth to stand for justice and for the most vulnerable among us.”

The Minnesota law highlights further implications of marriage redefinition in the law. For example, the law states that terms such as “husband,” “wife,” “mother,” and “father” that denote spousal and familial relationships in Minnesota law are to apply equally to persons in an opposite-sex or same-sex relationship. The law also states that “parentage presumptions based on civil marriage” will also apply, thus allowing for children to have two mothers or two fathers.

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From the Minnesota Catholic Conference:

• Statement on Senate Vote to Redefine Marriage in Minnesota (May 13, 2013)
• Statement on House Vote to Redefine Marriage in Minnesota (May 9, 2013)

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An open letter from Minnesota faith leaders to the Minnesota legislature, urging lawmakers not to redefine marriage (April 18, 2013)

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Read other recent USCCB news releases:

• “Archbishop Cordileone Decries Serious Injustice in Delaware” (May 8, 2013)
• “Archbishop Cordileone Decries Marriage Redefinition in Rhode Island” (May 3, 2013)

Minnesota Faith Leaders to Minnesota Lawmakers: Protect Marriage

Faith leaders in Minnesota, representing hundreds of faith communities, have written an open letter to Minnesota lawmakers urging them to protect marriage as the union of one man and one woman.

“The promotion and protection of marriage is a matter of the common good,” the signers write. “It serves the wellbeing of the man and woman, of children, of civil society, and all people.” The signers call “essential” the continued affirmation of marriage between a man and a woman because redefining it would degrade the cultural understanding of marriage to an emotional bond between any two adults.

Signers include leaders of Muslim, Baptist, Jewish, Evangelical, Lutheran, Catholic, Orthodox, and Buddhist communities.

As religious leaders, the signers caution that the idea that religious freedom is restricted to a house of worship “is wrong and dangerous.” In that light, the idea that religious freedom would be protected as long as ministers were not forced to preside over same-sex “marriages” is misguided. “The real peril,” say the signers, is “if marriage is redefined in civil law, religious individuals and other organizations – regardless of the foundational tenants of their faith – will be required to consider same-sex unions as the equivalent of marriage in their lives, ministries, and operations.”

Read the entire letter here (PDF).

Read the press release from the Minnesota Catholic Conference (April 18, 2013)

Interview with Archbishop Nienstedt on marriage and the situation in Minnesota

This November in Minnesota, voters will be asked whether they approve a constitutional amendment that would define marriage as the union of one man and one woman. The Catholic Church has joined with others in hearty support of this amendment, and a leading voice in this effort has been that of Archbishop Nienstedt of St. Paul and Minneapolis. Previously in 2010, the Archbishop wrote to the faithful in his diocese about marriage and distributed DVDs to Catholics throughout Minnesota explaining the Church’s teaching on marriage and why that teaching matters to public policy.

In a March 1^st interview, Archbishop Nienstedt spoke with Barb Ernster of the National Catholic Registerabout the meaning of marriage, its importance to society, and why the marriage amendment matters.

Highlights:

Why is [the marriage amendment] such an important issue?

The other Minnesota Catholic bishops and I see the erosion of healthy, happy marriages all around us: the high degree of marriages ending in divorce, the rising number of couples cohabitating with no intention to marry, and the spike in the number of children born out of wedlock, many to single mothers living in poverty. The true importance of marriage as a natural and, for us as Catholics, a sacramental reality is being eclipsed throughout our society.Now there is a driving force, with full media support, to redefine or, in truth, “undefine” marriage from a child-centered institution that unites one man and one woman together with any children born from their union into something different altogether: a system of domestic partnerships based on the romantic inclinations of adults. We understand this to be yet another assault against the dignity of marriage that will likely reinforce some of the negative cultural trends I previously mentioned, developments that research clearly shows are having very bad effects on children and, in turn, all of society.

What do you hope will be accomplished within the parishes?

We hope to educate our Catholic people on why our understanding of marriage matters for the good of the couple, for the good of children and for the common good of the society in which we all live. In short, we hope to show to our people that this is not just a “Catholic” or “Christian” issue. This is a question that touches upon the foundational principles of our society.

Some religious groups have come out against the amendment, and some have remained neutral, stating it is up to individuals to vote their consciences.

How would you address this issue with Catholics?First of all, I remind our Catholic people that an understanding of marriage is not something the bishops or the Church made up. Marriage between a man and a woman predates any civil government or even religion, for that matter. The state simply recognizes and supports marriage; it has no power to redefine it.It is unreasonable and, I dare say, unnatural to think that changing the definition of a word has the power to change the reality that underlies that word — it does not; it cannot. And it becomes a pretense to argue differently.

How do you address the claim that the Church is getting too political and detracting from its spiritual mission?

What is more central to the spiritual mission of the Church than fostering good, healthy marriages between husbands and wives and ministering to the varied challenges that they and their children face in their family life?

We have to remember, too, as the Holy Father has been reminding us of late, that the Church’s work in the public square contributes to the New Evangelization. It is not just the Church “doing politics,” but instead, constitutes her perennial task of forming consciences, promoting justice and announcing truths that are written on the human heart. In this way, we also point to the source of those truths — the eternal Word who has written them into the fabric of our human nature.

•  Read the entire interview with Archbishop Nienstedt.
• Find out more about the efforts in Minnesota to defend marriage by visiting the Minnesota Catholic Conference’s Marriage and Family webpage.