Weddings between gay persons are “a legal falsification of marriage”, declare the Spanish bishops in a statement issued by the Executive Committee of the Spanish Bishops’ Conference. The communiqué, published in recent days, has the title, “Conscientious objection to a radically unjust law that corrupts the institution of marriage”. “It is our duty say the bishops to clearly speak out when there are those in Spain who wish to go into reverse on the road of civilization with a legal provision without precedent and gravely injurious of the fundamental rights of marriage and the family, the young and those who bring them up”. According to the Spanish bishops, the new legal definition that Parliament wishes to give to marriage is “a flagrant negation of fundamental anthropological data and a genuine subversion of the most basic moral principles of the social order”. “In response to the possible imminent approval of an unjust law they declare we must speak once again of the consequences that such a new step would involve”. In their view, this law “corrupts the institution of marriage” and is in reality a “legal falsification of marriage” that will cause enormous damage to the children adopted by these couples. According to the bishops, the law that Parliament wishes to approve “would not have the character of a real law, since it would contradict the moral law” and “the civil law cannot contradict the moral law without losing the power to compel consciences”. The bishops therefore exhort Catholics to “oppose [the new law] in a clear and incisive way”, also by claiming “the right to conscientious objection. The democratic order must respect this fundamental right to freedom of conscience and guarantee its exercise”.
