FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 24, 2005
Quebec City Cardinal - Primate of Canada - Warns Gay 'Marriage' Will Lead to "Bitter" "Cultural Upheaval"
QUEBEC CITY - Cardinal Marc Ouellet, Archbishop of Québec and Primate of Canada issued an open letter yesterday to all Canadians regarding the need to defend marriage against radical redefinition. "As a Canadian citizen and as the Primate of Canada, I feel it is my duty to express my concern and disagreement and that of a great number of Canadians who have asked me to step forward to give public voice to their opinion about the meaning and the consequences of this proposed change," wrote the Cardinal.
Cardinal Ouellet says in his letter that the proposed legislation to redefine marriage to include gay couples "is offensive to the moral and religious sensibility of a great number of citizens, both Catholic and non-Catholic." The letter states that not only marriage, but also "the union of persons of the same sex", is "morally unacceptable" to "many Christians and adherents of other religious traditions." The Cardinal warns that the legislation "threatens to unleash nothing less than a cultural upheaval whose negative consequences are still impossible to predict."
The Archbishop of Canada's primary diocese expressed hope that the legislation may yet be defeated. "The strong reaction of the Canadian people against the bill is a sign that common sense still has a good chance to prevail and that the right decision for politicians under the circumstances is to confirm the traditional definition of marriage as 'the legitimate union of a man and a woman to the exclusion of any other person,'" he said.
The letter concludes putting the question in a considered light. "The question Canadian society has to face is this: do we wish to discard the universal definition of marriage, which reflects the nature of things, the common sense of the people, the Judeo-Christian tradition, and the wisdom of the great religions?" The letter stresses, "The choice to be made could bring in its wake bitter and unpredictable demographic, social, cultural, and religious consequences."
Source: LifesiteNews.com
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