The Malta Gay Rights Movement is concerned by the manner in which the Archbishop’s Curia is mounting pressure on the Maltese government to apply religious rather than secular criteria in order to continue denying a substantial minority in the country of its rights, said MGRM media officer Sandro Mangion yesterday.
In a press release issued on Tuesday, Archbishop Joseph Mercieca once again spoke up against the introduction by governments of same-sex marriage because this “can never be acceptable to the Church”.
“The Church of Rome has every right to impose its doctrine on its faithful but it cannot be imposed on the rest of society. We are citizens of democratic Malta, not of the Vatican City,” Mr Mangion stressed.
The fact that the Archbishop presented the public with statements that are based solely on his own beliefs and convictions, is worrying, he continued.
The Archbishop should explain on what facts he has based his reasoning in order to reach the conclusion that heterosexual marriage is a “fundamental and elementary anthropological truth” or that same-sex marriage would lead to the “destruction of the social fabric” is tantamount to the “disruption of profound aspirations in the people’s most intimate identity” and goes against the Law of Nature, Mr Mangion said.
If human civilisation had to reject traditions according to whether they are natural or not, then even heterosexual marriage would have to be abolished because no animal except man marries, he argued. Using the “natural or not natural” argument to debate such delicate issues is utterly dangerous.
Mr Mangion went on to say that no animal, for instance, practices celibacy by choice or adores a god. Having said that, the argument that homosexuality is unnatural is invalid since it has been proven that it exists in around 450 species other than mankind.
Not even the assertion that same-sex marriages disrupt the heterosexual model of marriage and even “destroy the social fabric” makes logical sense, Mr Mangion added.
A glance at the local situation reveals that, although the State does not yet sanction same-sex marriage, the number of cases of broken heterosexual marriages is rising at an alarming rate. According to a reply to a parliamentary question given by Justice Minister Tonio Borg on 2 May, there are currently around a thousand marriage separation cases pending before the Family Court.
It seems that the heterosexual community needs some “help” from the homosexual part of the population to dismantle this “fundamental and elementary anthropological truth”. It is ironic how, while discussion on the introduction of divorce is intensifying in the heterosexual sphere, the lesbian and gay community is increasing its voice in favour of marriage, he pointed out.
The gay lobby’s campaign to ensure that loving relationships between same-sex couples receive the legal and social validation they deserve, goes to show that these couples want to share in the richness of marriage rather than destroy it. In countries such as The Netherlands – where same-sex marriage has now been sanctioned for some few years – statistics show that the heterosexual marriage rate has not been affected.
The deliberate use, by a person with such a great responsibility, of negative phrases such as “a serious attempt against the family”, “the destruction of the social fabric”, and “the disruption of profound aspirations in the people’s most intimate identity” in association with lesbian and gay persons in a way that portrays these people as though they are the enemies of society, brings great pain to Malta and Gozo’s lesbian and gay community, particularly those who identify themselves as Catholic. There are thousands of lesbian and gay individuals in Malta who are contributing greatly to society in every sector, Mr Mangion said.
The MGRM is hopeful that the Maltese people are not less intelligent than the Spaniards, 62 per cent of whom are now in favour of the new legislation enacted by their parliament to sanction same-sex marriage, he concluded.