Can the world religions save marriage?

ROME: These last three days I have had the good fortune of listening to some of the most powerful voices on marriage, as the permanent union of one man and one woman for the propagation and education of the human race. I am both awed and chastened that these are coming not only from the highest Catholic sources but equally from the other Abrahamic and non-Abrahamic faiths. Until then, I could not imagine the other confessions trying to outdo the Catholics in trying to prevent the lesbian-gay-bisexual-transgender (LGBT) relativization and redefinition of marriage.

Billed as an international interreligious colloquium on the complementarity of man and woman, and attended by religious leaders and scholars from 23 countries, the forum, entitled “Humanum,” was opened by Pope Francis at the Vatican’s Paul VI Audience Hall, and featured 33 witnesses and presentors from various different confessions. This came less than a month after the end of the extraordinary general assembly of the Synod of Bishops, which was marked by widespread media hype on a possible seismic change in Church teaching about homosexuality and marriage.