Penny Wong says religion is blocking marriage equality
PENNY Wong has slammed religious groups for standing in the way of marriage equality, the has reported.
Speaking in the Frank Walker Memorial Lecture yesterday, Wong said the fight for equality is not over in Australia. She called for action in a nation that considers itself secular.
鈥淢any Australians are still asking: are we there yet?鈥� Wong said. 鈥淎nd sadly the answer is still no.
鈥淎 policy issue that is one of the easiest to resolve politically languishes in the too-hard basket because of the intransigence of those who see it as their right to impose their personal views on the community as a whole.
鈥淭he journey towards equality has been long and arduous, and it is not yet over.鈥�
Wong used the speech to talk about tradition and religion, saying these factors still affect secular debate around marriage equality.
鈥淎t the centre of the opposition to equality of marriage rights for gay and lesbian members of the community is the conflation of religious concepts of marriage with secular concepts of marriage,鈥� she said.
鈥淩eligious attitudes to marriage continue to impact on much of the political debate that has delayed the recognition of the marriage equality rights of the gay and lesbian community.
鈥淭he problem with this, of course, is the application of religious belief to the framing of law in a secular society, and in societies where church and state are constitutionally separate.鈥�
Wong stated that Labor is 鈥渇undamentally opposed to the oppression of anyone on the grounds of their sexual orientation or their religious beliefs鈥�.
鈥淩eligious freedom means being free to worship and to follow your faith without suffering persecution or discrimination for your beliefs,鈥� she said.
鈥淚t does not mean imposing your beliefs on everyone else.鈥�
Being able to marry your partner should be available for same sex couples like opposite sex couples in australia. If NZ, UK, USA, Canada etc can do it why cant australia?
I don’t agree. It is the Politicians who are standing in the way of Marriage Equality. The Australian Marriage Act is a Secular Act of the Federal Parliament. Only the Federal parliament can change it.
The ALP, with Penny as a very senior minister, were in Power for 6 years. It had an 18-seat majority in the House of Representatives between 2007-2010. It had the Full Support of the Greens in the Senate. It did NOTHING.
Why not, Penny? Why did you do nothing? You had the numbers.
Even after the 2010 Federal Election you had the numbers to change Howard’s discriminatory Australian Marriage Act. You did NOTHING.
Even when the Australian Marriage Act is changed to allow Same Gender Marriage no religious business will be required to perform any Same Gender Marriages.
Because of the massive amount of money they make out of Mixed Gender Marriages eventually their Greed will take over and they will find some little phrase in those two Volumes of Myths – the Old & New Testaments – to justify their change of heart!.
Just as our politicians and religious businesses have been totally responsible for every war which has, and is, taking place it is our Politicians who have stood, with the support of the three major Mosaic religions: Judaism, Christianity & Islam, in the way of Equality for ALL. The difference is that it is the politicians who pass the Laws which affect us.
Laws passed by Religious Businesses only affect and are required to be observed by those stupid enough to believe in those absurd, unproven myths.
Penny Wong and her mates had the opportunity to pass the legislation which would have granted us Equality. They refused to do so.
An intelligent and reasoned summary, it is a real pity we do not have more politicians the calibre of Penny Wong.
Short memory. Senator Wong towed the party line against gay marriage for as long as it suited her.
I’d rather have fewer career politicians.
I think some people are confused about the difference between natural marriage and sacramental marriage. They are not two different things. It is the principle annunciated by St Thomas Aquinas that grace builds on nature. The Church recognises that natural marriage, along with the obligation to love the person you marry for the rest of your natural lives, is a difficult one requiring hard work from both parties. Accordingly, sacramental marriage builds upon natural marriage to provide the sacramental graces necessary to honour this commitment.
Wong’s comments demonstrate her ignorance of the subject. If she wants to criticise religion, that’s her prerogative, but she should at least research what she’s criticising first before issuing condemnation from ignorance. This is the kind of thing that makes Christians fearful – the idea that everything they know can be changed because a powerful person doesn’t understand them or what motivates them. If Wong wanted to provoke and stimulate homophobia, she’s going about it the right way.
The issue is simple: the Catholic Church principally (and other churches secondarily) wants its view of marriage, as so eloquently re-stated by you, to be society’s view of marriage, and it is encouraging a secular state to make it so.
The churches do not have that right in a secular democracy, and so should accordingly butt out and leave the matter to the State. However they refuse to do so; instead, they are engaging in hostile propaganda against the gay community and against the concept of marriage as a matter for the State to decide and grant equally to all.
Accordingly, the churches need to be slapped down, and hard. If they continue to attempt to demand that the State enforce the views of their faiths as law on any subject, then they should be stripped of their tax-free status and be legally banished from all political forums permanently.
Because demanding that someone follow the dictates of your religion when they do not themselves follow that religion is not demanding that they respect your freedom of religion, but rather that they be subservient to the authority of your faith and Church. And that is incompatible with the very concept of a secular democracy.
It’s pretty clearly understood that humans engaged in marriage-like relationships before they engaged in organised religion. Religions don’t have a single definition of marriage, the Christian bible refers to many different marriage models. Religion co-opted marriage (also birth, death, harvest and various other occasions) for its own benefits, it didn’t invent marriage and it has no role in a great many successful marriages.
Obviously, great comments from Penny Wong, I was interested that she touched on ‘religious freedom’ at the end of the article. There’s been a lot of twaddle about religious freedom in the conservative press (eg the letters page of The Australian, why do I read that?) and how gay people will impose themselves on churches which don’t (for religious reasons) recognise same sex marriage. The fact is that churches can refuse to marry any couple – gay or straight – for any reason they want – they’re not bound by anti-discrimination law. It is perfectly legal for a church to say to a mixed-race couple ‘no, we don’t believe in the mixing of races, you can’t marry here’ and there is no recourse. It is common practice for churches to refuse to marry straight couples who don’t plan on being in that religion. Churches have religious freedom, same sex marriage won’t change that a bit, but the so-called Christian crowd perpetuate that lie anyway. Hypocrites. If you don’t believe in same sex marriage then don’t marry someone of the same sex would be my top tip to you, but why lobby the government to deny civil rights to people you don’t even know?