Scapegoats, again

The Roman Catholic Church in Britain has always been a minority denomination, long persecuted and marginalized even today. In Scotland anti-Catholicism is hidden just below the surface. In England it has changed from the hobby of the Protestant to the fetish of the progressive. The excuse for the latest smash-the- Pope lunacy is — what a surprise — gay marriage. Ersatz Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron is trying to push the policy through, and while he is opposed by the majority of his MPs, most of the country and all of the major faiths, it’s the Catholics who are being most severely reprimanded for daring to oppose the latest craze.

The arguments against redefining marriage are strong, if seldom heard in the mainstream. Marriage is not a right but an institution; gay people are already equal; children need both parents and both genders as role models if at all possible; the procreative norm is at the heart of marriage and marriage is a child and not an adult-centred entity; where gay marriage is introduced, such as in Denmark, traditional marriage declines enormously; gay people may live together already and enjoy full legal protection and rights; and so on.

What must also be emphasized is the seemingly inevitable persecution and prosecution of people and organizations opposed to same-sex marriage once it is introduced. In Canada, for example, we have had journalists fired, colleges penalized, churches taken to human rights commissions and teachers threatened with dismissal. There is none so intolerant as a tolerant liberal.

Which is where the Catholic Church is particularly poignant. There can be no change on teaching around homosexuality and same-sex marriage, any more than on teaching of forgiveness, love, salvation or God. It is what it is. But it’s the “is” that is so troubling and challenging to those who want to reshape culture and morality according to their own needs and feelings.

Whenever this debate arises, someone will speak of their gay child or gay friend as though this somehow wins an argument. Some of my closest friends, and most of my family, are not Catholic. That doesn’t mean that I suddenly abandon Catholicism, but that I try and pray for my relatives and friends to change. The kindness or attractiveness of someone living in error does not forgive the error but makes the need to help the person all the greater.

Trying to explain this to an anti-Catholic and often anti-intellectual media, especially in Britain, is incredibly difficult. One of the first responses we hear concerns the abuse crisis. “How dare you criticize when so many priests were pedophiles?”

In fact, while the crisis was gruesome it concerned very few men, it was seldom pedophilia but homosexual men taking advantage of pubescent boys, and the Church behaved like most institutions — schools, sports teams — and did too little, too late. It’s ironic that in the defence of same-sex marriage people highlight what was essentially a homosexual crisis within Catholicism. Most importantly, it’s a digression. That some men committed terrible crimes says nothing about a pristine moral stance on sexuality.

In Britain the attacks on Catholicism have already begun, and they are enabled and made easier by the sort of Catholics who sort of help enemies of the Church and sort of make life increasingly difficult for serious and devout believers. Tony Blair is one example in the UK, and there are legions of the scoundrels in Canada.

The Cameron government may change its mind on the issue because the Prime Minister governs by polls rather than principles, but if he insists on pleasing his elitist friends rather than the rank-and-file he will likely lose the subsequent election. Yet the doors have been opened now, and the guarantee is that whatever happens, some in Britain will still find a way to blame Catholics.

Being a scapegoat, however, is far better than being a sheep. If the hatred and anger towards us evaporates, we are failing in our mission. We’re not here to be nice, we’re here to be right. We’re not hear to make the road easy, we’re here to point out the road to those who have lost their way.

(Coren’s latest book is Heresy: Ten Lies They Spread About Christianity. His web site is www. michaelcoren.com.)