The Least of These

Jesus:

Truly I say to you, as you did it to the least of these my brethren, you did it to me." (Gospel of St. Matthew: 35.40)

The DC Archdiocese, saying they will end their Charity Organization's work in the District if marriage equality is passed:

Church officials say Catholic Charities would have to suspend its social services work for the city, rather than provide employee benefits to same-sex married couples or allow them to adopt. (Gospel of St. Katherine of Graham, a.k.a., the WaPo).

So, the Church would end it's social programs (helping thousands of kids and the elderly), on the off chance they might have to provide health insurance to a gay employee's spouse? Really?

Has Archbishop Wuerl actually, um, read the Bible?

I'm not one who supports forcing private organizations (like the Boy Scouts, say) to accomodate gay people. And I would oppose efforts to force churches that oppose marriage equality to hold gay weddings in their chapels. But when it comes to employment law, if the church has employees, it has to follow employment law. It's the cost of doing business -- the cost of rendering unto Caesar what is Caesar's. And the church gets something back for being a part of society. Your tax dollars can pay to bus Catholic school students on public school busses. And it pays for their secular textbooks, standardized tests and scoring, and diagnostic and therapeutic services.

Not to mention they get benefits from taxes without having to pay taxes.

I'd say the church gets a pretty good deal from Caesar.

But let's look at this another way.

Spousal employee benefits are primarily health care. So if mariage equality passes in DC, is it counter to Jesus' teachings to provide access to health care to an employee's spouse even if that person is gay? Catholic Charities already provides health care services directly to 3,000 people, according to the WaPo article. Presumably, some numer of those 3,000 people are gay. So Catholic Charities is undoutedly already providing direct services to gay folk in the city. But it can't bring itself to do that for the civil spouse of one of it's own employees? They don't have to bless or recognize the union -- just provide access to health care for another human being. Or, to put it in Jesus' words: "When...I was sick, you visited me."

Or, in the case of adoption, giving a previously unwanted baby a loving home? "I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me..."

But, silly me, there I go again quoting Jesus. I forgot this was about organized religion and has nothing to do with Him.