Q&A WITH CANADIAN PM's PRIEST: From Macleans

...In the Roman Catholic church that Prime Minister Paul Martin attends -- St. John Brebeuf, in his Montreal riding of LaSalle-Emard -- Father John Walsh, 62, sees his parish rocked by spiritual turbulence. He also has a unique view of the issue's effect on his most prominent congregant.

How do you define marriage?
When I first began to study marriage, its purpose was procreation, education of children, and allowing people to get rid of their sex urge. Then Vatican II [reform council] opened us to new meanings of marriage. We still had procreation and education of children, but now the Church tells couples they're creating a community of love.

So how does that definition apply to same-sex couples?
The Church has always considered the homosexual act as intrinsically evil. A same-sex marriage allows two people to come together in a sinful condition. But my responsibility as a priest is to educate people as to what we see as the values of marriage, not to impose one definition on anybody. ...

In this divide, which side are you on?
I find it difficult to come down on one side. We think of family as being a man, a woman, two children and a gerbil, you know? Well, there are more family models today than there have ever been. We have single-parent families. We have reconstructed and blended families. How does that integrate same-sex marriage? Well, we're new at it. We're scared this is going to turn our culture upside down. But we thought that about divorce. I'd rather be inclusive than exclusive, but there are members of the Church who work from a sense of fear, a difficult attitude.

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posted by Eve at 6:31 PM | link

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