The Catholic church teaching of homosexuality Research Paper

The Catholic church teaching of homosexuality - Research Paper Example Homosexuality is a troubling moral and that has been addressed with relative frequency by the Catholic Church in recent years. In certain countries, advocated by civil groups in particular, this practice is tolerated in guise of human rights equality and right to chose way of life without interfering with the larger society and in other countries, legal recognition has since been granted to such unions including the legal possibility of such couples adopting children. The Catholic Church stands by the Biblical condemnation of homosexuality stating, â€Å"Basing itself on sacred scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, tradition has always declared that homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered. They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complimentarity. Under no circumstances are they to be approved.† (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2357). Nonetheless, in line with Christian teachings of tolerance, homosexuals, according to the Catholic Church, â€Å"must be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided.† This tolerance however must not be mistaken to imply that the Catholic Church favors homosexuality since the church is openly against such acts. Governments are reminded of the need to control and restrain the phenomenon in order to safeguard public morality and avoid spread of the degeneracy and exposing the society and future generations to such sexual perversions and laws recognizing such unions in certain countries and states must be vehemently opposed as such laws are in opposition to the right reason as they confer legal guarantees, analogous to those granted to marriage, to unions between persons of similar sex. Therefore the states, by granting legal recognition to such unions fails in its sworn duty to defend marriage and family institutions as the foundation and pillar of the society. The society owes its continued survival to the family, founded in marriage and consequently, legal recognition of such unions would mean redefinition of marriage to become an institution without elements as essential as procreation and children. This would result in serious impacts on the societies and the human race at large, to say the least. â€Å"The denial of the social and legal status of marriage to forms of cohabitation that are not and can not be marital is not opposed to justice; on the contrary, justice requires it.† The Catholic Church stands that homosexual unions do not deserve any institutional recognition as they equally do not serve any public interests unlike marriage couples that ensure continuity of the human race. It is the Church’s view that civil laws determine the principles, behavior, thoughts and tendencies of those it governs either positively or negatively as it is, influencing incoming generations’ views and regard of the forms of lifestyle. Legal recognition of homosexuality would thus inevitably water down some essential and basic moral values and degenerate the institution of marriage. The Catholic Church argues that the lack of biological and anthropological elements in homosexual relations mean that they are unable to play role in the God commissioned and mu ch necessary procreation and continued survival of the human race.