Discrimination In Catholicism

For two thousand years Catholicism has shaped people’s lives and spread important messages of love and understanding across the globe. Many people have found salvation in Catholicism and turn to the faith for guidance during difficult periods in their lives. My connection to Catholicism is inherited from my grandmother and together with ‘one-seventh of the world’s population’ [1], we practice the teachings of religious conversation. Yet there are certain principles of Catholicism that appear out of place in twenty-first century society. Sexism, for example, homophobia and discrimination. The liturgy and language of Catholicism has in practice remained unchanged for two millennia. As such, various prejudices within Catholicism also remain endemic.

Of course, many Catholic couples are eager to start a family, however, the faith fails to recognise that there are many reasons why some couples do not. Infertility problems, for example, lack of financial resources, mental health and mobility issues or long-term illness. These are just a miniscule sample of factors that may prevent couples from conceiving. Doubtless a larger sample would yield additional factors. But perhaps the most common reason is that some couples simply do not want children.

The Catholic Church states that if a married couple choose to not have children, ‘they are not entering into the relationship that imagines the Trinity and therefore are not entering into a marriage’ [11]. Since they cannot or will not have children. Many devote couples seeking marriage have been turned away by the Catholic church. In an overpopulated planet, Catholicism pushes Catholics into marriages in which they must accept children into their lives because ‘it is God’s will’ [12]. Yet any Catholic will tell you, God gave us a free will and having no option but to raise children, is not a free

As a child born out of wedlock, I am a victim of this bigotry and according to Deuteronomy 23:2, ‘no one born out of wedlock may be included among the Lord’s people’ [16] Here, the Bible states that people like me who are conceived by unmarried parents are damned and may never enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Furthermore, Hebrews 12:8 asserts that ‘if such people are not punished they are not real children, but bastards’ [17]. When I was baptised at the young age of five, the Devil was ‘called out of my soul’. I find this extremely difficult to comprehend. Why is it such a sin to be the offspring of an unmarried relationship? My mother raised me single-handily and I like to believe I am a good person. Well, most of the