Why I #StandWithRand

Whatever your politics or thoughts on the man, Sen. Rand Paul is correct in opposing a renewal of policies in the USA PATRIOT Act, and filibustering an extension to end NSA spying.

The fourth amendment of the United States Constitution is

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Cornell Law explains:

The Fourth Amendment originally enforced the notion that “each man’s home is his castle”, secure from unreasonable searches and seizures of property by the government.  It protects against arbitrary arrests, and is the basis of the law regarding search warrants, stop-and-frisk, safety inspections, wiretaps, and other forms of surveillance, as well as being central to many other criminal law topics and to privacy law.

Friends, countrymen, lend me your eyes. Our rights and freedoms are as important as our security. We cannot promote freedom abroad when we violate freedom at home.

It would be one thing if the government was procuring a warrant (probable cause to investigate approved by a judge); no, they have the ability to search our privacy and seize intimate information. Even if you have nothing to hide, you have no reason to share what is yours and yours alone.

We are not safer because of these measures. Our liberties are watered down, diluted to the point that defending our rights becomes controversial! This is absurdity.

In 2013, when Paul was filibustering the PATRIOT Act again, The Daily Beast published "Why You Shouldn't #StandWithRand" by David Frum. He wrote,

Paul's filibuster ostensibly dealt only with a very remote hypothetical contingency: targeted killings on American soil of Americans who present no imminent threat to national security. Paul insisted that all the harder questions be taken off the table. He had (he said) no issue with a targeted killing on American soil of an American who did present an imminent threat. He avoided the issue of the targeted killings of Americans outside the United States - i.e., the actual real-world problem at hand. 

Instead, Paul invoked a nightmare out of a dystopian future: an evil future president shooting a missile at an American having coffee in a neighborhood cafe, merely on suspicion, without any due process of law. 

I think we can all agree that such a case would be pretty deplorable. It is also far-fetched.

The same month this was written, this happened. Four Americans killed by drone without due process. Maybe the president wasn't drinking coffee, and I don't think he is personally evil - but the ability to kill a person by drone is evil. We already do this to non-Americans - is it really so far fetched? Does the picture drawn really matter? In the end, liberties - put into place to protect us against government infringement.

This overstep on our liberties is nothing new. John Otis, a lawyer, is said to have inspired the idea of the American Revolution from a three-hour speech he gave against illegal searches and seizures. In February 1761, John Adams explained the power of James Otis and his oration:

But Otis was a flame of fire!—with a promptitude of classical allusions, a depth of research, a rapid summary of historical events and dates, a profusion of legal authorities, a prophetic glance of his eye into futurity, and a torrent of impetuous eloquence, he hurried away every thing before him. American independence was then and there born; the seeds of patriots and heroes were then and there sown, to defend the vigorous youth, the non sine Diis animosus infans.* Every man of a crowded audience appeared to me to go away, as I did, ready to take arms against writs of assistance**. Then and there was the first scene of the first act of opposition to the arbitrary claims of Great Britain. Then and there the child Independence was born. In fifteen years, namely in 1776, he grew up to manhood, and declared himself free.

If you value your rights; if you believe in due process; if you're against warrantless spying and arrests, #StandwithRand.

* translated from Horace, "Not without the gods is the infant courageous."
** the writs of assistance were court orders that authorized customs officers to conduct general (non-specific) searches of premises for contraband. The exact nature of the materials being sought did not have to be detailed, nor did their locations.

We Few, We Happy Few

Happy St. Crispin's Day!



H/T Why I Am Catholic

Then, the famous speech of course:



[The text of the speech]

A New Center for Natural Law by Hadley Arkes

SlutWalkers, Occupiers, and Idiots by Tim Mulroon

Under the weather, which makes no sense today because the sun is shining outside. Still, sleeping, drinking water and off to get some applesauce and more medicine too.

Happy Tuesday!

Save the Last Dance

from "The Bacchae" by Euripides (translated by William Arrowsmith)

CHORUS:

When shall I dance once more
with bare feet the all-night dances,
tossing my head for joy
in the damp air, in the dew,
as a running fawn might frisk
for the green joy of the wide fields,
from from fear of the hunt,
free from the circling beaters
and the nets of woven mesh
and the hunters hallooing on
their yelping packs? And then, hard pressed,
she sprints with the quickness of wind,
bounding over the marsh, leaping
to frisk, leaping for joy,
gay with the green of the leaves,
to dance for joy in the forest,
to dance where the darkness is deepest, where no man is.

What is wisdom? What gift of the gods
is held in honor like this:
to hold you hand victorious over those you hate?
Honor is precious forever.

Slow but unmistakable
the might of the gods moves on.
It punishes that man,
infatuate of soul
and hardened in his pride,
who disregards the gods.
The gods are crafty:
they lie in ambush
a long step of time
to hunt the unholy.
Beyond the old beliefs,
no thought, no act shall go.
Small, small is the cost
to believe in this:
whatever is god is strong:
whatever long time has sanctioned,
that is law forever;
the law tradition makes
is the law of nature.

What is wisdom? What gift on the gods
is held in honor like this:
to hold your hand victorious
over the heads of those you hate?
Honor is precious forever.

Blessed is he who escapes a storm at sea, who comes home to his harbor.
Blessed is he who emerges from under affliction.
In various ways one man outraces another in the race for wealth and power.
Ten thousand men possess ten thousand hopes.
A few bear fruit in happiness; the others go awry.
But he who garners day by day the good of life, he is the happiest.
Blessed is he.

The Logic of Personhood

Saturday is my Dad's birthday. He'll be 51 years old and he has demanded cherry pie at every meal because it is both his birthday AND the Rapture (supposedly, although Catholics don't believe in that). Cherry pie, the Robison family ambrosia, is divine. Since my cherry pie conversion during childhood, I am wholly convinced pie is the best way to eat fruit.

Dad, about 18 years ago, and one of my younger brothers

My Dad was born 3 months early in 1960, which apparently was not the time to be a preemie. They didn't know if he would live past infancy, but I suppose I just blew the punch line. Dad is still around, and for that, all who know him have richer lives.

But what if they had let him die, because he came too early? What if my grandmother hadn't wanted him? What if Dad had grown up to be a horrible person? What if I despised my father? Could I wish he had never been born, and thus render my own life non-existent? What if my father was a vegetable right now, or had to be changed like a baby every day? He might be that way one day. Would that render him any less of a person? Would he be a lebensunwerten Lebens - a life unworthy of life?

I read a book review this morning by Shelia Liaugminas (from the wonderful MercatorNet) of The Appalling Strangeness of the Mercy of God by Michael Pakaluk. The title of the review is "Pro-choice atheist to pro-life activist" and has been endorsed by both Michael Novak and Peter Kreeft, who knew the couple personally. Besides the gorgeous use of Graham Greene in the title of the book, I was immediately sucked into the "clarity of logic and reason, and the beauty of truth" of Ruth Pakaluk's story, the now deceased wife of Michael. He wrote,

The core of Ruth’s argument about abortion and human rights may be summarized in this way: Human rights are rights that pertain to us simply in virtue of the fact that we are human, not for any reason above and beyond that; the fundamental human right is the right to life, and so, if that right is denied, then all human rights are in effect denied; the thing growing in the mother’s womb is surely alive (otherwise it would not need to be killed by an abortion), and it is human; thus, to deny that the thing growing in the mother’s womb has the right to life is to deny that anyone has any human rights whatsoever. 

Once, an interviewer of a student newspaper at a university where she was debating asked her, “So, it’s not a legal argument you are making but a humanistic argument?” Ruth replied, “It comes from this idea: either you think all human beings are equal, and you don’t kill each other, or you don’t. I have always seen abortion as an issue where you should not need to believe in God in order to be against it. If anyone wants to say human rights exist or that all human beings are equal, those statements are tautologous with ‘Abortion is wrong.’”

The book has been compared to both C.S. Lewis' A Grief Observed and Sheldon Vanauken's A Severe Mercy, and I am beyond interested in reading this book. (For those who remember my New Years' Resolution of purchasing no more than THREE [sob] books a month, I've already decided to buy Christopher Dawson's the Formation and Division of Christendom books, and will add this incredible looking read alongside the pair!)

Earlier this week, I was struck by a comment left on Stacy Trasancos (of Accepting Abundance)'s blog. Stacy holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry and is a convert to Catholicism. I enjoy her blog immensely because of how much she continues to engage science, theology, logic and reason. She has a series called "Defending Personhood." Her latest one is titled "Defending Personhood: The Dangerous Womb."

One of her commenters wrote, "Now, you know that I struggle a bit with whether or not the embryo is a person. I will say that it is a human being, but I am still not entirely sure that it is in fact a person. However, the pro-choice viewpoint seems to be: don't question whether or not it is a person--if you don't want it, make sure you kill it before it definitely is. And that is a viewpoint that I have a really hard time with."

Fabulous sign in Ireland (the Motherland)

I had a hard time with this thought process. What is the difference between an embryo [an unborn human baby, specifically in its first 8 weeks] being human being and a person? Are they not the same thing? And why would that difference matter enough to distinguish?

I'm continually baffled at people's refusal to recognize the sacredness of every life and/ or not take medical facts at face value-- except, of course, with the idea that something could be gained by not admitting personhood. Considering how many babies are miscarried, for example, it seems a miracle in itself that fetuses reach full development and life outside the womb.

I was recently introduced to one of my new favorite pro-life defenses. "The Abortion Debate: A Reasonable, Scientific Pro-Life Argument" by blogger The Humble Libertarian, who states the obvious: nothing is created at birth. He writes,

Thus, it is an error to claim, "It's not a human, it's a fetus." That would be like saying, "It's not a human, it's an infant," or, "It's not a human, it's an adolescent." These are category fallacies. The proper answer to these assertions would be, "Sure it's a fetus, sure it's an infant, and sure it's an adolescent. It's a human fetus, a human infant, and a human adolescent." These are simply stages of development in the human life cycle. 

A human starts as an embryo, becomes a fetus, is born an infant, develops into a child, grows into an adolescent, matures into adulthood, and eventually dies. Scientifically and philosophically, there is no good reason to believe a human being is created at birth, because nothing is created at birth. At birth, a fetus simply changes location and changes its mode of acquiring food and dispensing waste, but at no point does it become something entirely new or different. Life begins at conception and proceeds through its stages until death. From the moment of conception, the unborn are human beings.

When President Obama says defining a person is above his pay grade or shows his support of abortion as a valid option, or when people demand better healthcare, but squirm under the pressure of saying who is a human person worthy of life and then attach a price tag to the care of the young, the sick and the elderly like cattle at the market, I am reminded of the opening of Wendell Berry's essay "Life Is a Miracle," in which he says,

It is clearly bad for the sciences and the arts to divided into "two cultures..." It is bad for both of these cultures to be operating strictly according to "professional standards," without local affection or community responsibility, much less any vision of an eternal order to which we all are subordinate and under obligation. It is even worse that we are actually confronting, not just "two cultures," but a whole ragbag of disciplines and professions, each with its own jargon more or less unintelligible to the others, and all saying of the rest of the world, "That is not my field."

Do we the people no longer have the credentials of existing? Can we no longer claim the higher grounds of humanity? Are we not all encapsulated by the Emily Dickinson poem "I dwell in possibility"? When did we relinquish our dignity as human beings and persons, and what are we left with? How can we want for a better world, or fight for any kind of rights, if humans are disposable goods, with some worth nurturing, some worth not... No! We were made by a merciful and generous God who created us out of Love and for love, who said, "It is necessary that you exist." To say otherwise is hateful, and we humans are better than hate, because we are capable of true love and we have the intellect to not only recognize another's inherent dignity and worth, but respond and appreciate such a gift that is life.
‎
In book XXII of Homer's The Odyssey, it says, ‎"Rejoice in your heart...No cries of triumph now./ It's unholy to glory over the bodies of the dead./ These men the doom of the gods has brought low,/ and their own indecent acts."

I was reminded of this bit when I wrote my TIC piece on 'Of Gods and Men' and Osama bin Laden's death: "Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?"

Here is the trailer for 'Of Gods and Men' -- I know it's had limited showings here in the States, but if you have the chance to see it, do:



Have a blessed weekend! I'm glad y'all exist.

The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same

Week Six: Saving Sex for Marriage

"The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same" by Julie Robison
"Cut to the Chaste." by Elizabeth at Startling the Day
"Three Strikes, I'm Out!" by Trista at Not a Minx

This is the sixth post of a Lenten blog post series called "Bright Maidens." We three are from the oft-mentioned, widely-speculated upon demographic of young, twenty-something Catholic women. We're here to dispel the myths and misconceptions- please join us for the discussion!

After my sophomore year of college, I sat on a park bench with three close friends from high school, licking ice cream out of cones and giggling over the stories we told each other. I distinctly remember feeling blissfully happy; the weather was warm and windy, the ice cream was delicious, there were people all around us in the square, and I was reunited with three girls I had been close with since our freshman year of high school.

One of my friends mentioned her boyfriend making pancakes one morning and serving her breakfast in bed. I had the most sheltered college experience of us four-- at my alma mater, boys and girls live in separate dorms and there are visiting hours. Without thinking my question through, I wondered aloud how he got into her room so early. Then it dawned on me: why was he in her room that early? With trepidation, I then asked, trying not to tremble as I said the words: "Wait, have you two had sex?"

She admitted they had, in a low, sheepish voice. But the embarrassment soon wore off, as the other two girls chimed in that they had done it too with their respective boyfriends. I had just survived a semester of awkwardness between one boy because I had turned down his request for me to be his girlfriend, because I knew it would probably get too physical, and I didn't see him respecting me as he should. The rest of the evening was disappointing, as my friends eagerly discussed sex and their various experiences, and I- I could only sit on the bench, and listen.

My three friends are not the only ones; I had many more experiences of home friends coming to me in college to talk about how they did something they thought they would save for marriage. Most of these conversations were them lamenting their disappointment, but most of them also never showed a desire to stop what they had started. I was there to talk them through it, to discuss how things could have gone differently, and how the future is still for the taking. It was a distinct contrast from most of my college friends, who are mostly not sexually active before marriage. I even have friends who did not kiss before they were married, so the contrast I feel, as you can imagine, is sometimes sharp.

Yesterday, MercatorNet published a book review of Premarital Sex in America: How Young Americans Meet, Mate, and Think about Marrying by Mark Regnerus and Jeremy Uecker.

The review began, "It's complicated. More than a Facebook relationship status, “it’s complicated” sums up the ambiguity, fluidity, and contradictions experienced by “emerging adults” in America--at least when it comes to sex and relationships. What’s simple are the numbers: 84 per cent of unmarried, heterosexual, emerging adults (ages 18-23) in America have had sex—a number that cuts a wide swath across religious denominations, political leanings, family backgrounds, education levels, and geographic regions."

Yes, I can think complicated is an apt term for most modern relationships. One of the most interesting parts of the article discussed the very term "premarital sex," which usually happened before a couple got married- opposed to now, where the couple might not even know each other's name, let alone stay in a relationship. I am always intrigued when people say that sex isn't a big deal. Perhaps not to some, but doesn't an inner crevice of one's soul want it to be? Theology of the Body teaches that our bodies are modes of communication in this world and that sex is a form of communicating, from the depths of one's soul. As Catholics, we believe God gave us sex to join two people in a spiritual and bodily communion.

So, of course it is natural to want to have sex! Sex is wonderful and life-giving! Not only potentially to a child, but between the couple. Catholics are certainly not Puritans. We love sex! Which is why we value it so highly and thus, protect it from false forms. The Church says married couples are a visible sign of Christ and his love of his bride, the Church, as are consecrated religious and the chaste single. There is good reason why a Catholic bishops have started to deny communion to cohabiting couples. They are having sex outside the sacrament of marriage, which hurts the sacrament and hurts the sacredness of sex.

Catholics believe that we are masters of our own fate. We are like heat-seeking missals, always seeking truth, beauty and the good. But we have to say yes to choose good. We choose God's way, and follow the teachings of the Church, which are time-proven and guided by the Holy Spirit. People are happiest when they are inter-relational; living in just community with virtuous people, and can self-preserve these good things through the commitment of marriage, sex and children.

My family!

This is not to say sex cannot be treated otherwise. It is true- a person can have sex with whomever they please. But the freedom to do something and the choice to do something are two different commodities. I can have sex; I choose not to, until I am married. In the Old Testament, one book I especially love reading is the Book of Tobit. It is a really beautiful book and testimony to Jewish piety and morality, specifically to the sacredness of marriage and love. I remember hearing this passage at my aunt and uncle's wedding; it follows after Tobit's son Tobiah marries Sarah:

"When the girl's parents left the bedroom and closed the door behind them, Tobiah arose from bed and said to his wife, "My love, get up. Let us pray and beg our Lord to have mercy on us and to grant us deliverance." She got up, and they started to pray and beg that deliverance might be theirs. He began with these words: "Blessed are you, O God of our fathers; praised be your name forever and ever. Let the heavens and all your creation praise you forever. You made Adam and you gave him his wife Eve to be his help and support; and from these two the human race descended. You said, 'It is not good for the man to be alone; let us make him a partner like himself.' Now, Lord, you know that I take this wife of mine not because of lust, but for a noble purpose. Call down your mercy on me and on her, and allow us to live together to a happy old age." They said together, "Amen, amen," and went to bed for the night" (Tobit 8:4-9).

Patheos published a wonderful article yesterday, "Friendship and the Language of Sex" by Tim Muldoon. In using the story of Sarah and Tobiah, he writes,

"Today, our common cultural attitude toward sex is that it is a pleasurable activity to be enjoyed by consenting adults, with proper protection. The story of Tobiah and Sarah, however, suggest a radically different model. Their sex is a duet in a story authored by God, made possible by their free and willing response. It is embedded in a context of familial and clan relationships; it is blessed, as it were, by parents and friends. Perhaps most importantly, though, it is sex that is oriented toward a noble purpose, rooted in prayer, expressing a shared desire to do what is good.

... I want to suggest that what the story offers to us is a way of thinking about sex that is rooted in friendship. According to Aristotle, who was active only a couple of hundred years before the author of Tobit, true friendship is rooted neither in pleasure or utility, but in a shared striving for the good. Even if we grant that the reason why many people choose to have sex is because it's pleasurable, we must ask why people consider pleasure important. The psychoanalyst and holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl observed in his landmark book Man's Search for Meaning that the people in concentration camps who did not survive were those that gave up on meaning, and turned to pleasures shortly before they died. Pleasure, he seems to suggest, is for those who have lost a sense of noble purpose.

What makes Tobiah and Sarah friends is their shared sense of acting in cooperation in the unfolding story of God at work in the world. At the heart of Catholic faith is a profound sense that God reaches out in friendship toward each creature, and that living in cooperation with God enables us to live in cooperation, in friendship, with each other. In the context of friendship, then, sex is to be understood as cooperation with God. It is the shared practice of an intimacy embedded within a larger web of relationships: with parents and siblings, friends, fellow pilgrims. For that reason, the Church has from its earliest days recognized that sex has a social dimension to it. It changes one's relationship to the other, and the changes the couple's relationship to the rest of the world.

It is holy ground."

Saving sex for marriage isn't the cool thing to do (in the heat of the moment), or the easy thing (when you really like a person, etc.). But as we told my baby sister last night, as she was bemoaning the "awkward talk" her teacher was giving the class on chastity, no one regrets saying no and waiting for sex. We told 11 year old Boo how she was worth waiting for, and if a guy wanted her to commit her body to him, he was going to have to step up and offer her his lifetime commitment, not just a good time. The good times will come, as will the bad, and when/ if I have sex, it will be the most self-giving thing I can do for that person; because I'll have to step outside my wants, and become a wife, and then a mother.

This sounds old-fashioned, but mankind truly does not change at the evolutionary rate we like to think we do. Aquinas said that reason should be our guide for morality. Natural law, therefore, has very much a relationship to sexual ethics. You shan't be surprised then when I, budding Thomist that I am, heartily declare that "one should act rationally." Not having sex when one is not married seems pretty rational to me since I

A) don't want to be pregnant (yet)
B) don't want to get any funky diseases (ever)
C) don't want to be overly emotionally attached to someone I may not marry
D am, in fact, not married (and have you seen the statistics on single parenthood?)

These are all graspable realities which I contend with in my decision. The wide-spread use and acceptance of birth control and legalized abortion seems to cut at each of those barriers. But they do not take them away. Dr. Janet Smith says, "Natural law depends upon such. It rests upon the claim that things have natures and essences that we can know and correspond our actions to." But I did not need to give you that vocabulary lesson. Somewhere in your mind, you already knew that. I merely put the words there, to remind you. This is the beauty of natural law! It is so natural to the dignity of our very personhood.

CCC 2353: "Fornication is carnal union between an unmarried man and an unmarried woman. It is gravely contrary to the dignity of persons and of human sexuality which is naturally ordered to the good of spouses and the generation and education of children. Moreover, it is a grave scandal when there is corruption of the young."

Catholic young adults are biologically no different than other young adults, but as Christians, we are called towards a higher purpose in all that we do, and that includes sex.

Confessions of a Never-Homeschooler

Extra, Extra! Read all of Volume Ten! I'm still on the phone (fine, on hold) with so-and-so about this-and-that, so let's get this post oot and aboot...

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Confession: I didn't know people ACTUALLY home schooled their children until I went to college. It sounded like a myth, or a kind of educational theory. I rationalized that only people who didn't have schools within a certain number of miles of their home would do that. I grew up in a huge city with tons of schools: public, private, parochial, take your pick! Then I found out Cincinnati is a huge homeschooling city.

I admit: I should have known better.

My father was that parent who made us do extra work when we got home from school. He went to teacher-parent night to complain that we weren't being given enough homework. He always said, "I already know my kids are the best. I want to hear how you're going to make them better."

He also told us to play for fun, climb trees, read books and then write our own. He listened to every single child tell him ridiculous stories, only to have him tell us a better one. Yeah, you want to meet my dad now. Who doesn't?

Hakuna Matata

Week Nine of Ridiculosity:

one

It's called "The Fun Theory":




So fun!

Now Taking Applications to Join the Society for the Restoration of Pluto to Planethood

The Ever-Entertaining Chapter Eight, LIVE from a Level 2 Snow Emergency*:

one

I've decided that I want to become a canon law lawyer. Thanks, Ed Peters. (Oh, and don't worry. I've already e-mailed him and made a new friend! Doubly excited to stay in contact and to learn more.)

In other career news, I'm having an article published by the New England Real Estate Journal next week. I am also applying to take my first graduate-level theology class at the local seminary and for my passport tomorrow. This has been quite the week of plans and planning!

The Rescuers Down Under

I found this wonderful site called MercatorNet, which "offers lively news and articles promoting human dignity." What I like best about this site is that the news comes from Australia; the perspective they offer is invaluable.

I wanted to share this article I found as a whole because it is one of the best defenses of the traditional, normative family unit I have read recently, most likely because I can see natural law theory in her arguments. I also like how she uses the UN to support her arguments. Oh snap!


Please tell me you have all seen this movie...!


"12 things your MP never told you about the family…" by Rita Joseph

As the same-sex marriage issue surfaces again in the Australian Parliament, a seasoned human rights advocate and expert on United Nations texts reminds politicians that they have international obligations relevant to this debate. Here Rita Joseph sets out “12 facts your electorate has a right to know before you consult them on same-sex 'marriage’.”

1. Our Federal Government has a solemn obligation, under international human rights law, to ensure that all domestic marriage laws comply with universal obligations in the International Bill of Rights to protect marriage and the family. Under Article 50 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), the Federal Government has primary responsibility for ensuring that all State and Territory laws comply with universal human rights obligations to protect marriage and the family.

2. Article 23 of the ICCPR guarantees, first, protection by society and the state for the family as "the natural and fundamental group unit of society" and second, "the right of men and women of marriageable age to marry and to found a family".

3. In the event of the introduction of State or Territory laws that tamper with these protections, the Federal parliament has a constitutional external powers authority (and duty) to enact a general overriding law restoring marriage and family obligations originally promised in Article 23.

4. This article, according to the UN Human Rights Committee (General Comment 19), "implies, in principle, the possibility to procreate". (A General Comment is the most authoritative of all the prescriptions that may be issued by the UN human rights monitoring bodies.)

5. With specific regard to "the right to marry and to found a family", there is, of course, no requirement to procreate but rather a more exacting requirement for the two rights holders of this right to have "in principle, the possibility to procreate" through their marriage. This term, "in principle, the possibility to procreate", rules out definitively any genuine legal right of two persons of the same sex to marry.

6. The "in principle, the possibility to procreate" requirement relates back to the original protective concept of "special care and assistance" for motherhood, childhood and the family in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights Article 25.

7. This obligation to protect motherhood, childhood and the family is codified in the Convention on the Rights of the Child, Article 7 where our Australian government has promised to ensure and protect "as far as possible, a child's right to know and be cared for by his or her parents".

8. There are no credible grounds for claiming that current Australian laws protecting marriage are discriminatory. International human rights instruments have long recognized the concept of a "special protection" that "shall not be considered discriminatory" (e.g. Convention on the Elimination of All Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) Article 4). The significant legal distinction that acquits any Covenant law from the charge of being discriminatory is that it "aims to protect"—the child, the mother, the family...

9. Having ratified CEDAW, Australia is obliged under human rights legal principles codified in this Convention to promote full recognition of "the social significance of maternity and the role of both parents in the family and in the upbringing of children" and to enact laws that acknowledge "that the upbringing of children requires a sharing of responsibility between men and women". The formal human rights language of Article 16 of the Women's Convention links the term "parents" definitively to "men and women" and to "husband and wife".

10. Promoting same-sex "marriage" contravenes international human rights obligations for governments to provide "the widest possible protection and assistance" for the family, "particularly for its establishment" as "the natural and fundamental group unit of society" (International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Article 10).

11. Domestic opinion polls cannot legitimize contravention of the legal protection promised for marriage and children in the foundation human rights instruments. When public opinion is at odds with universal human rights law protecting marriage and children, it is public opinion that must change, not universal human rights law. Public opinion must return to respect for marriage and for every child's right to know and be cared for by his or her parents, in as far as possible.

12. Finally, public opinion, grievously deceived by relentless propaganda, is no basis for changing universal human rights protections for marriage and children solemnly agreed in the Conventions to which Australia is a party. Creative attempts, however popular, to tamper with those protections, are invalid because they contravene the "ordinary meaning" test required by Article 31 (1), General rule of interpretation of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (1969):

A treaty shall be interpreted in good faith in accordance with the ordinary meaning to be given to the terms of the treaty in their context and in the light of its object and purpose.

Rita Joseph is a Canberra-based writer, lecturer and human rights advocate, specializing in philosophy of the language of human rights. As an adviser to various delegations, she has extensive experience in negotiating the texts of numerous United Nations human rights documents. She is author of 'Human Rights and the Unborn Child' (Leiden & Boston, Martinus Nijhoff, 2009)


I suppose one of my few issues with the article, however, is the "possibility to procreate" clause, since in vitro and artificial insemination, while contrary to specific Catholic teaching and Christianity in general regarding human creation and dignity, is becoming increasingly common with married couples, non-married couples (heterosexual and homosexual) and single persons alike. This idea that having children only when one wants one and by any means is, frankly, selfish and disturbing. Children are not pets, nor are they playthings. They are humans, with little bodies and bigger souls, which carries a heavy and awesome responsibility.

For other good articles from MN, I suggest Melinda Selmys' "Reorienting Sexuality" and Tim Cannon's "Marriage to no place for me-too-ism"-- both are wonderful reads.

Also: Friday, Mom and my five siblings went shopping on the secular high holy day that is Black Friday, then came out to the office with Heidi. We had a family lunch at Skyline and then got back to work. Sort of. After all, Heidi was at the office:

Happy first day of Advent!