In the summer of 2003, the Vatican issued a set of Considerations Regarding Proposals to Give Legal Recognition to Unions between Homosexual Persons. In November the American Catholic Bishops followed suit and issued their own declaration, Between Man and Woman: Questions and Answers about Marriage and Same-Sex Unions. Unequivocally these Catholic statements reject unions for gays and lesbians and even call on Catholic legislators and all citizens to oppose any such proposals. The Vatican’s arguments are the same as those used by most people who oppose gay marriage. So a discussion of these arguments is important for anyone concerned about gay marriage. Besides, for Catholics and non-Catholics alike, the voice of the Vatican carries awesome influence, so we must all have concern about the Vatican statements on current moral and political issues.

This Catholic position is so wrong-headed that it merits severe rejection. As a former priest and as a Catholic theologian who is not dependent on church authorities for my monthly paycheck, I am free to make such a rejection, and I do so here. And as a gay man with an insider’s view and as an Associate Professor of Psychology and author of What the Bible Really Says about Homosexuality, as well, I have particular qualifications to do so.

The Identification of Sexuality With its Procreative Function

The Vatican’s core argument against gay marriage or unions can be stated in an equation: marriage = sex = procreation. The Vatican allows sex only in marriage and ultimately for the sake of procreation, so same-sex marriage cannot qualify. Supposedly, the linkage between these three elements is inviolable, and, supposedly, this linkage expresses the nature of sexual relationship itself. The appeal is to a version of “natural law” built on ancient and medieval speculation. Many others who oppose gay marriage unwittingly buy into this same argument.

Contemporary insight into the nature of human sexuality shows that the Vatican equation is wrong. The Vatican emphasizes the basest dimension of sex—the biological production of offspring—while it devalues the distinctively human dimension of sex—the bonding of hearts and minds in interpersonal relationship. In contrast to all other animal species, only humans routinely have sex during infertile periods, only humans routinely have sex face to face, and only human females routinely experience orgasm. These biological facts in themselves point to non-biological facets of human sexuality as the distinctively human ones. In humans, sex is first and foremost about personal bonding and only secondarily, incidentally, about the procreation of offspring.

The official Catholic position on this point needs to be challenged outright. It is disturbing to realize that this skewed understanding governs all Catholic teaching about marriage and intimate human relationships. However, this rejection of the official Catholic conclusion is not a rejection of the Catholic presupposition. Natural law remains the basis of this whole discussion. But on the pivotal question—What is the nature of human sexuality?—the Vatican is wrong.

Since the Second Vatican Council, official Catholicism has weighted the procreative and the interpersonal ("unitive") dimensions of sex equally, but this theoretical equality does not redress the imbalance in the Catholic position in practice. Insistence on procreation defines the Catholic teaching and controls its every practical application, whether to same-sex relationships or any other sexual question. The Vatican champions an understanding of sex as a barnyard-animal affair; and, in fact, as is blatant in the document on gay marriage, the Vatican downplays the interpersonal meaning of human sexuality. This position flies in the face of all that personal experience and the human sciences reveal about sexual intimacy.

The position of the Vatican is lucid and consistent, but it is also glaringly mistaken. Yet only it allows the Vatican and the bishops to reject lesbian and gay relationships out of hand. And only it supports the Vatican’s call to secular society to reject gay unions. The Catholic hierarchy is pushing its sectarian agenda and, in the name of a misconceived “nature,” expecting the rest of society to go along.