Autor: Little, Joyce

Buch: The Church and the Culture War

Titel: The Church and the Culture War

Stichwort: Gleichheit - Egalitarismus; Unterschiede: Hautfarbe - Geschlecht - sexuelle Orientierung (akzidentell - theologisch - moralisch relevant)

Kurzinhalt: The civil rights, the feminist movement and the gay rights movements afford us examples of three different types of differences which can be found among human beings. The first type of difference, that of skin color, is genuinely accidental, since it ...

Textausschnitt: TYPES OF DIFFERENCES

86a Egalitarians proceed on the assumption that all types of differences among human beings are fundamentally and equally trivial, like the difference between one skin color and another. If they are wrong about this, we must ask, first, why they are wrong and, second, why they do not believe they are wrong. First, why are they wrong?

86b The civil rights, the feminist movement and the gay rights movements afford us examples of three different types of differences which can be found among human beings. The first type of difference, that of skin color, is genuinely accidental, since it has neither ontological significance (i.e., it has no bearing on whether someone is a human person) nor moral significance (i.e., it has no bearing on whether someone is a good human person). The second type of difference, that of gender, cannot be regarded as genuinely accidental, inasmuch as God not only created this differentiation, but also placed it at the center of our imaging of him. "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them" (Gen 1:27). Gender differentiation therefore has ontological significance, since it enters into the definition of what it means to be a human person. The third type of difference, that of sexual orientation, cannot be regarded as accidental either, and for two reasons. First, as the Church teaches, homosexuality as an orientation is a disorder, inasmuch as God created male and female for each other. ("Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh" [Gen 2:24].) Second, homosexuality as a "lifestyle", as an orientation lived out in sexual acts and relationships, is immoral. Hence, this type of difference has both ontological and moral significance. When people claim, therefore, that all types of differences are equal and insignificant, the Church must beg to differ with them. Only accidental differences are insignificant. Ontological and moral differences are enormously meaningful. (Fs)

86c Are we prepared to claim, then, that ontological and moral differences among human beings automatically create inequalities among them as well? The Church's answer can only be that it depends on what kind of difference we are talking about. If, for example, we are talking about a moral difference, as between good and evil, the answer can only be yes. Good acts are superior to evil acts; moral lives are superior to immoral lives. (Fs)

87a If, on the other hand, we are talking about an ontological difference, we must once again inquire as to what that difference is. If the difference is between that which is ontologically ordered and that which is ontologically disordered, the difference creates inequality, inasmuch as order is good and disorder is a diminishment of that good. Sight is superior to the disorder of blindness. Heterosexuality is superior to the disorder of homosexuality. (Fs)

87b Ontological differences, however, do not necessarily create inequalities. The difference between male and female is ontological and therefore enormously significant. God created this differentiation himself, and did so for the explicit purpose of enabling us to image himself as Trinity. In the words of John Paul II in Mulieris Dignitatem:

The fact that man "created as man and woman" is the image of God means not only that each of them individually is like God, as a rational and free being. It also means that man and woman, created as a "unity of the two" in their common humanity, are called to live in a communion of love, and in this way to mirror in the world the communion of love that is in God, through which the Three Persons love each other in the intimate mystery of the one divine life (7). (Fs)

87c Therefore, male and female persons are not identical to one another, whether we be speaking biologically, psychologically or spiritually. At the same time, however, they are equal to one another since each one equally images God in the union by which the two of them constitute that image. (Fs)

87d What all of this means regarding the issue of human rights is that not everyone can claim exactly the same rights before the law. Those living immoral lives cannot claim all of the rights enjoyed by those riving moral lives. Hence, convicted criminals can justly be deprived of rights enjoyed by those who obey the law, on grounds that by their immoral actions they have forfeited those rights. People whose lives are in some fashion disordered can be deprived of those rights which have a direct bearing on the disorder in question. Thus, no injustice is done when homosexuals are deprived of marriage licenses, any more than an injustice is done when the blind are deprived of driver's licenses. And even in situations where people are equal but significantly different, no injustice is done when rights are distributed in such a way as to take into account the differences. Thus no injustice is done by allowing men but not women to be ordained priests, or by insisting that wives and mothers have the right to stay at home, if they so choose, while at the same time insisting that husbands and fathers have the responsibility to support their families.1 (Fs)

88a The Catholic view of the relationship between differentiation and equality is, as we can see, complex and nuanced. Those who take seriously the faith of the Church are not permitted an easy road, whether it be paved with the view that all differences among human beings are significant or with the view that all differences among human beings are insignificant. Modern American society, however, has taken a definitive turn down the second easy road toward an egalitarianism which would reduce all differences, accidental, ontological and moral, to the level of triviality. Why have we taken this turn?