RELIGIOUS FREEDOM VERSUS SEXUAL EXPRESSION: A GUIDE

2015 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
pp. 475-495 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helen M. Alvaré
Keyword(s):  
Social Services ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Common Good ◽  
The United States ◽  
Sexual Expression ◽  
Close Link ◽  
Free Exercise ◽  
Cultural Movements ◽  
Free Exercise Of Religion ◽  
The Catholic Church

AbstractClaimed rights to sexual expression unlinked to the creation of children are among the strongest challenges facing the free exercise of religion in the United States today. Such rights gained importance by means of a series of Supreme Court opinions associating consensual sexual expression unlinked to children with human dignity and even personal identity. These were accompanied by legal and cultural movements, led by more privileged Americans, diminishing children's rights in favor of adults', in the context of sex, marriage, and parenting. Laws and regulations protecting and promoting sexual expression detached from children are powerfully affecting religious institutions that operate health care, educational, and social services available to all Americans; the Catholic Church is a particularly prominent supplier of all of these services. Respecting the Catholic Church, it is possible but quite difficult to maintain respect for its free exercise of religion in the current environment, potentially by highlighting its measurable contributions to the common good. It might also be useful to show the close link between Catholic teachings on sex and marriage and the entire Catholic cosmology, such that coercing Catholics to behave otherwise is tantamount to coercing them to practice a different faith.

Pre-conceptual sex selection

2014 ◽  
Vol 155 (46) ◽  
pp. 1815-1819
Author(s):  
Máté Julesz
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
The United States ◽  
Criminal Code ◽  
Sex Selection ◽  
Reproductive Justice ◽  
Medically Assisted Procreation ◽  
Family Balancing ◽  
European Health ◽  
Selection For ◽  
The Catholic Church

According to Article 14 of the Oviedo Convention on Human Rights and Biomedicine of the Council of Europe, the use of techniques of medically assisted procreation shall not be allowed for the purpose of choosing a future child’s sex, unless serious hereditary sex-related disease is to be avoided. In Israel and the United States of America, pre-conceptual sex selection for the purpose of family balancing is legal. The European health culture does not take reproductive justice for part of social justice. From this aspect, the situation is very similar in China and India. Reproductive liberty is opposed by the Catholic Church, too. According to the Catholic Church, medical grounds may not justify pre-conceptual sex selection, though being bioethically less harmful than family balancing for social reasons. In Hungary, according to Section 170 of the Criminal Code, pre-conceptual sex selection for the purpose of family balancing constitutes a crime. At present, the Hungarian legislation is in full harmony with the Oviedo Convention, enacted in Hungary in 2002 (Act No. 6 of 2002). Orv. Hetil., 2014, 155(46), 1815–1819.

scholarly journals The Mission of the Catholic Church for the State in the Discourse of “Gosc Niedzielny” during Poland’s Interwar Period

Religions ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 188
Author(s):  
Rafał Śpiewak ◽  
Wiktor Widera
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Common Good ◽  
The State ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Level Of Involvement ◽  
Historical Reflection ◽  
The Catholic Church

The essence of the Catholic Church implemented in the modern world is of crucial importance for the understanding its mission towards the state, especially when developing appropriate civil attitudes. One sources of cognition is the historical reflection made on an analytical basis of Catholic media content. This article presents the discourse analysis of Gość Niedzielny (i.e., Sunday Guest), which was one of the most important Catholic publications in Poland, during the reconstruction of the Polish statehood. The pro-state mission of the Catholic Church was an expression of responsibility for common good, was nonpartisan and was connected with the promotion of values that condition the social order. It was believed that the condition of the state is determined by the moral form of its citizens and their level of involvement in social life. Christian values were though to secure and protect also the good of non-Catholic citizens. Here, the research and discourse analysis allows us to define the conclusions regarding contemporary relations between Church and the state in Poland. The key thoughts included in the publications of Sunday Guest, have contemporary application and their message is extremely up-to-date.

Afire with the Itinerant Spirit

2020 ◽  
pp. 215-241
Author(s):  
Donna Maria Moses
Keyword(s):  
Social Services ◽  
Catholic Church ◽  
The United States ◽  
Faith Formation ◽  
Paradigm Shifts ◽  
Foreign Missions ◽  
Dominican Order ◽  
The People ◽  
Dominican Sisters ◽  
Mutual Conversion

Before the Maryknoll Sisters were affiliated to the Dominican Order in 1920 for the express purpose of planting the faith in Asia, Dominican Sisters from the United States had already begun to answer that call. After the collapse of colonial empires at the start of the twentieth century, Dominican Sisters were missioned to Germany, Mexico, Puerto Rico, and Cuba to rebuild the Catholic church under duress in the wake of global shakeup. As women of the Dominican Order brought education, health care, social services, and faith formation to places in need around the globe, they were radically transformed by ongoing mutual conversion among the people they were sent to evangelize. The paradigm shifts that occurred in the foreign missions of the Order are described in this chapter.

scholarly journals The Politics of Sex Abuse in Sacred Hierarchies: A Comparative Study of the Catholic Church and the Military in the United States

Religions ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (4) ◽  
pp. 281
Author(s):  
Carolyn M. Warner
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
The United States ◽  
Sex Abuse ◽  
Us Military ◽  
The Us ◽  
Privileged Status ◽  
Child Sex Abuse ◽  
The Military ◽  
Patterns Of Abuse ◽  
The Catholic Church

The paper explores similarities in patterns of abuse and in patterns of how the known abuse cases are handled by the Catholic church and the U.S. military and develops preliminary explanations of why. The paper considers how the two organizations deal with external efforts by civil authorities at oversight and prosecution, and the extent to which they invoke their sacred status authority to evade responsibility and civilian oversight. The paper finds that the handling of sex abuse in each organization has been affected partly by the institutions seeing themselves as sacred, as something apart from the secular state, beholden to alternative authorities. The paper highlights the fact that child sex abuse by religious officials and sexual assault of soldiers by fellow soldiers and officers constitute profound challenges for democracy in the US and elsewhere, as the institutions claim and may be accorded separate and privileged status, beyond the reach of democratic laws and procedures. It is a warning about the costs of public deference to other institutions. The study utilizes documentation of Catholic church clergy child sex abuse cases in the US, and documentation of sex abuse cases in the US military.

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