The Catholic Church Embraces Gays

A prominent feature in the Wall Street Journal today (14 Oct. 2014) was entitled “The Vatican Signals More Tolerance on Gays, Divorce.” I would like to take this WST article as a springboard to deal with homosexuality from the Back-to-the-Body Perspective.

Pope Francis Makes His Mark

I will begin by lauding Pope Francis for moving the Catholic Church away from its anachronism of discriminating against people for their life-style choices. Much damage has been done to people’s lives on account of these policies. See, for example, Peter Mullan’s movie The Magdalene Sisters.

In order to move the culture away from such barbarisms, the Back-to-the-Body Perspective can help to clarify matters. I will begin by reviewing some of its basic tenets.

The fundamental tenet of the Back-to-the-Body Perspective is that the human body is the perfect model of truth and contains the key to all mysteries of the universe. As the saying goes, “the truth is within you.”

The body provides a pattern of unity based on the harmonious interactions of its three major components. These components are portrayed by the metonymies “stomach,” “brain,” and “heart.” The postulate is that ANY unity, to be harmonious, needs to include these three major elements of stomach, brain, and heart. Thus, a government has the three powers of legislative (stomach), executive (brain), and judiciary (heart). A nation has people (stomach), government (brain), and culture (heart).

Another tenet of the Back-to-the-Body Perspective is that the BRAIN bifurcates into two directions: the Left and the Right. Thus, we have the left himisphere of the brain and the right himisphere of the brain. In the government, we have the Left wing and the Right wing. The Left tends to partner with the people (workers, unions, the poor), and the Right tends to partner with the culture (wealthier people, bankers, companies, corporations). The key point, though, is that every unity will be formed by the harmonized interactions of the three parts of stomach, brain, and heart.

Gender and Unity

Normally the male gender is associated with the stomach (the creative power); the female gender is associated with the heart (the aesthetic, emotional power); and children are associated with the brain (the incarnation of stomach and heart). This is not always so, however. A business enterprise made up only of women will have a woman playing the role of stomach, a woman playing the role of heart–and the goal of the enterprise will play the role of brain.

In other words, the goal of the enterprise will be the incarnation of the creative power coming from the stomach and the emotional power coming from the heart. In an Apple product, for instance, we can see the physicality of the product, which is the fruit of the stomach; at the same time we have the esthetic appearance and the functionality of the product, which are products of the heart. The material side of the product represents the left side of the brain, and the emotional and esthetic aspects of the product represent the Right side of the brain.

Accordingly, in the creation of a unity, the gender of the constituent parts is not crucial. What is crucial is the ROLE that the parts assume for themselves. Someone needs to play the role of “stomach”; someone needs to play the role of “heart.”

Marriage and Gender

Marriage is a kind of unity. What is essencial in a unity–as we have just seen–is not the gender of the constituent parts but rather the role that they are playing. In marriage, one person will play the role of stomach (the creative power), and another person will play the role of heart (the esthetic/emotional power). Normally, the creative part is played by a male person, and the esthetic/emotional part is played by a female person. We have determined, however, that the gender of the individuals is not the determining factor.

Thus, the ROLES are essential in a relationship, but the GENDERS are not. There is nothing essentially contradictory to having a female person–who normally plays the role of heart–actually playing the role of stomach. And there is nothing contradictory to having a male person–who normally plays the role of stomach–actually playing the role of heart.

In either case, the relationship needs to become incarnate in a specific goal–which can be a child, an adopted child, an organization, a cause, or anything else that binds the two powers (creative and emotional) together. That becomes a perfect union.

I conclude with a quote:

Oh heaven and earth! I cried. This is joy! These are different times! This is not a tone from my childish century; this is not the soil upon which the heart of man gasps under the slave-driver’s whip!
Excerpt From: Friedrich Hölderlin. ‘Hyperion.’ iBooks.

Paulo-Juarez Pereira
Ypsilanti, Michigan, USA
October 14, 2014