CALGARY, April 18, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Bishop Fred Henry of Calgary has not backed away from his very public stand in defence of traditional marriage even while facing the accusations of discrimination at the Human Rights Tribunal. Public opposition to same-sex marriage is picking up steam across the country -Âon Saturday, 1500 supporters of traditional marriage rallied in Calgary. At the rally, Bishop Henry addressed more of his customarily forthright language to the cause of marriage.
Bishop Henry reminded politicians that the issue transcends the posturing common to political parties. Young Liberals at their party’s convention sported buttons in support of Bill C-38 that read, “It’s the Charter, Stupid” after which, Conservatives at the convention in Montreal responded with buttons that read “It’s the Stupid Charter.” Henry told the crowd in Calgary, “It’s about children, stupid!”
He told the crowd, “Those who seek to promote ‘same sex marriage’ have discovered that ‘same sex marriage’ is a nonstarter, unacceptable to Canadians, an oxymoron. Now, appealing to our sense of tolerance and justice, they have opted for promoting ‘equal marriage.’ However, all the packaging in the world doesn’t alter substance: A marriage is a union of a man and a woman to the exclusion of all others.”
The Bishop of Calgary has still to be publicly supported by his brother bishops in the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops. Only one member of the CCCB, Archbishop Gervais of Ottawa, who said that he stands ‘shoulder to shoulder’ with him.
Henry said that because homosexual partnerings are inherently incapable of producing children they cannot be marriage. “To construe anything else as similar to marriage or even remotely analogous to God’s plan for marriage and the family is to confront an insurmountable biological impossibility.”
“Government,” he said, “has a solemn obligation to protect, not re-engineer, an
institution that is more fundamental to human life than the State.”
Regarding his upcoming tribunal case, the bishop said it is a matter of silencing religious expression. “I will not be silenced. We must not be silenced, we must not be intimidated, but we must speak the truth in charity.”
The bishop concluded his speech to a thunderous standing ovation.