Sunday Morning Thought:

There are many arguments against gay marriage, some harder to deal with than others. One that strikes me extremely shallow is gays already have an equal right to marry -- someone of the opposite sex.

If the person making this argument is a non-Catholic (or natural law) believing religious conservative I might ask do you really think it's a good idea for a person fully or predominantly attracted to the same sex to be in a marriage with someone of the opposite sex. Ladies, do you really want to be married to a man who is more attracted to other men than he is to you?

Such marriages do exist and produce offspring. And that leads me to the Roman Catholic (or technically, natural law based on universal principles applicable to everyone) argument.

As I understand this teaching on marriage -- indeed explained to me personally by Robert P. George, about as high an authority on the teaching as it gets -- sex must be both procreative and unitive. Prof. George explained to me that Henry VIII’s marriage where he truly did not seek to unite with his wife, but rather used her in an instrumental sense to sire an heir was not valid under this theory.

Well, all of the homosexual men who are engaged in heterosexual marriages — indeed oft-having kids from those relationships — are the quintessential “instrumental” uses of procreative sexuality and hence are in relations that are no more “marital” than Henry VIII’s was.

Accordingly, homosexuals are not qualified for heterosexual marriages. Therefore they have no equal right -- at least no equal natural right -- to marry someone of the opposite sex.