BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan, May 31, 2017 (LifeSiteNews) — The leader of Russia’s 150 million Orthodox Christians says homosexual “marriage” is unnatural and contrary to the conscience of every human being, which is why so many people resist its normalization for the same reason that people resisted fascism and apartheid.
In an interview at Kyrgyz-Russian Slavic University, His All-Holiness Kirill was asked about same-sex “marriage.” The Patriarch, who is well known for opposing sodomy, referred to legalized gay unions as false, “so-called” marriages. He then flatly stated that they are a threat to family values because homosexuality is a “complete break with the moral nature of man.”
The Russian government and its people have been under severe criticism from leaders in the West for standing against the normalization of homosexuality. “When laws are detached from morality, they cease being laws people can accept,” Kirill explained.
The Christian leader then said something immediately pounced upon by Western pro-gay mainstream media.
People resist the legalization of same-sex “marriage,” the Patriarch commented, “for the same reason that they resisted both fascist laws and the laws of apartheid — (because) such laws break with morality.”
Hence, the Western headlines:
Russian Orthodox Patriarch Says Gay Marriage is Like Nazism”
Same-Sex Marriage as Immoral as Nazi Laws: Russian Putin Ally Says“
Head of Orthodox Church Compares Homosexual Marriage to Nazism”
Russian Orthodox Leader: Gay Marriage Advocates, like Nazis, Promote Immoral Laws”
Head of Russian Orthodox Church Compares Same-Sex Marriage to Nazism“
“Patriarch Kirill’s statement will probably garner a lot of criticism with the gay pride folks,” Fr. Johannes Jacobse, founder of the American Orthodox Institute, told LifeSiteNews, “but he’s pointing out a fundamental truth: Gay ‘marriage’ is a creation of the state. Natural marriage, on the other hand, conforms to nature.”
“When the state affirms natural marriage, it merely recognizes that which already exists across cultures and time,” Fr. Jacobse explained. “When the state deems that homosexual marriage should exist as part of the social order, however, it declares that the state is source and judge of what qualifies as legitimate human relationships.”
“The state has assumed an authority it legitimately does not have and becomes the enforcer of a new social order,” Fr. Jacobse concluded.
“The moral code reflects the natural law, which is ingrained into our very being,” His Beatitude Metropolitan Jonah of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia explained.
“We have an innate sense of right and wrong, which is the voice of our conscience,” the Metropolitan continued. “Fascist, communist, and apartheid laws violate our fundamental sense of freedom.”
“The validation of gay ‘marriage,’ so-called, distorts the natural mode of relationship between the sexes,” His Beatitude said. “It fundamentally distorts the nature of the family. Thus, many people will reject it as unnatural.”
Kirill was presenting his book, Freedom and Responsibility: A Search for Harmony. The point His All-Holiness wanted to make was that homosexual behavior comes out of “an emphasis on freedom with complete disregard for moral responsibility.”
“The forced imposition of homosexual marriage will be met with resistance just like other contrived orderings enforced by state authority, like fascism and apartheid were,” Fr. Jacobse elaborated. “New social orderings that go against nature universally oppress the human spirit.”
“We see the early stages of this conflict with the state driving people out of business who resist the attempts to define homosexuality as a natural expression of human sexuality,” Jacobse pointed out. “Clear thinkers will discern the totalitarian spirit behind the enforcement and reject it, regardless of the reasoning used to justify it.”
In a 2016 interview, the Patriarch said same-sex “marriage” laws “are at odds with the moral nature of human beings” and are “a significant threat for the existence of the human race.”
In that interview, he compared pressure to normalize sodomy as “very reminiscent of what was happening under Soviet totalitarianism.”
In 2013, His All-Holiness said homosexual “marriage” was “self-destructive” and a “very dangerous and apocalyptic symptom” of the end times.
Last year, Kirill shared his view that many young men are drawn to Islamic radicalization because of the extremist, unnatural liberalization consuming the West. He speculated that some youth who join ISIS are misguided, “honest people” who join out of “truly religious grounds” because of the moral morass the West is sinking in.
“It’s not the same thing, of course, but we could compare this to an extent to the apartheid in Africa or Nazi laws – when the law went against inherent moral values, people rebelled,” he said. “They knew it wasn’t right; it was artificial; it was part of some ideology and not in sync with their moral nature.”
Kirill emphasized, however, that those who have fallen into the pernicious sin of same-sex attraction or homosexual behavior should not be criminally punished.
“The Church can never approve of this, but we don’t condemn people who have homosexual tendencies,” he said at a meeting with Council of Europe Secretary General Thorbjørn Jagland at the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow. “It’s on their conscience and it’s their business, but they shouldn’t be discriminated against or punished, as used to be common practice in some states.”
In 2013, Russia passed a law banning the distribution of gay propaganda to children and teen minors.
“You can sin if you want to, but you will answer to God,” the Patriarch said. “However, if you are trying to propagate your sin by seducing and degrading people, society must oppose it.”
Metropolitan Jonah reasoned that the church opposes the normalization of homosexual behavior out of love for the sinner.
“On a spiritual level, unnatural relationships are profoundly unhealthy,” he explained. “They isolate people rather than build a real community that will last.”