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WARSAW, February 17, 2014 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A pastoral letter from the Bishops' Conference of Poland warns that the false constructs of gender ideology that are making inroads into Polish society will result in a disintegration of the true meaning of marriage with a consequent harmful impact on society and culture.

“Confronted with increasing attacks against different aspects of family and social life coming from this ideology, we are compelled to speak out clearly in defence of the Christian family and the fundamental values that support it, on the one hand, and, on the other, to warn against threats stemming from propagating new forms of family life,” the Polish bishops write.

The letter states that the Christian vision of marriage is not an arbitrarily imposed norm, but stems from a realistic interpretation of the truth about human nature, the nature of marriage, and the family, and that this truth comes from God, for “God himself is the author of marriage.”

The bishops quote Blessed John Paul II, who will be canonized this April, saying that the truth about marriage “is above the will of individuals, the whims of particular marriages, as well as decisions of social and government bodies.”

“The history of humanity has demonstrated that disregarding the Creator is always perilous and threatens man’s, and the world’s, future happiness. Hence attempts to impose a different definition of marriage and the family on us by supporters of gender ideology must raise the highest concern,” the letter states.

“Gender ideology is the product of many decades of ideological and cultural changes that are deeply rooted in Marxism and neo-Marxism endorsed by some feminist movements and the sexual revolution. This ideology promotes principles that are totally contrary to reality and an integral understanding of human nature,” the bishops explain.

In her book titled “Die globale sexuelle Revolution,” German author and pro-life activist Gabriele Kuby describes in detail how the “deregulation of sexual norms” promoted by gender ideology is “a product of communism, radical feminism and the homosexual movement” spearheaded by “Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Sigmund Freud and Wilhelm Reich, Simone de Beauvoir and the ‘Frankfurter School,’ and John Watson and Alfred Kinsey.”

Gender ideology is now “the global political strategy of the United Nations as spelled out in the Yogyakarta Principles,” and the motivation behind the EU's enforcement of “new ‘values’ on her member-states which undermine marriage and family in the name of newly defined ‘human rights,’” Kuby states.

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Gender ideology, the Polish bishops write, “maintains that biological sex is not socially significant and that cultural sex which humans can freely develop and determine irrespective of biological conditions is most important. According to this ideology, humans can freely determine whether they want to be men or women and freely choose their sexual orientation. This voluntary self-determination, not necessarily life-long, is to make society accept the right to set up new types of families, for instance, families built on homosexual relations,” the bishops assert.

“The danger of gender ideology lies in its very destructive character both for the individual and for human social interaction, and hence for society as a whole,” the bishops warn, adding that people who are unsure of their sexual identity are “not capable of discovering and fulfilling the tasks that they face in their marital, family, social and professional lives. The attempt to form different types of relationships is de facto a serious weakening of marriage as a community created by a man and a woman and the family built on marriage.”

The bishops' letter points out that most people do not know what gender ideology actually promotes, and as a result do not feel threatened by it, while others “seeing the absurdity of this ideology, believe that Poles will reject the utopian visions they are presented with.”

The bishops note that a small group of people, particularly teachers and educators, as well as catechists and pastoral ministers, tries to find constructive ways to counter the inroads made by advocates of gender ideology.

They warn, however, that “without public knowledge or Poles’ consent for many months now the gender ideology has been slowly introduced into different structures of social life: education, health service, cultural and education centres and non-governmental organizations.”

The bishops stress that while research on the impact of culture on sex is appropriate, it is dangerous “to argue, on the basis of ideology, that biological sex has no significance in society.”

“The Church will never agree to debasing persons with a homosexual inclination, but at the same time it strongly underscores that homosexual activity is profoundly disordered, and that homosexual relationships cannot be put on par with the social phenomenon of marriage as a community of a man and a woman,” the bishop's letter states.

The pastoral letter concludes with an appeal to Christian families, representatives of religious movements and Church associations, and to all people of good will, for “courageous engagement in actions that will disseminate the truth about marriage and the family,” and to institutions responsible for Polish education “not to yield under pressure from the few, but very loud, groups with not inconsiderable financial resources, which in the name of modern education carry out experiments on children and young people.”

The full text of the Polish bishops' pastoral letter is available here in the original Polish and here in an English translation.

Gabriele Kuby's treatise on the sexual revolution and gender ideology, titled “Die globale sexuelle Revolution,” is available here.