Christians stressed fidelity and marriage, which attracted women to the faith, who then bore Christian babies.The Protestant surge in South Korea has slowed down a bit recently, a development which is variously blamed on changes in school laws and the abuses of some clerical families.
That, he said, is, "Fidelity, fidelity, fidelity".
His personal life is well out of step with Christian teachings on fidelity, honesty, humility and charity.
"The traditional teaching of the church has proven to be the only fail-safe way to prevent the spread of H.I.V./AIDS," Benedict said then, adding his endorsement of "Christian marriage and fidelity" and "chastity".
In light of this historical context, one can appreciate the instinct to insist on granting a community-wide and categorical moral approval to gay relationships, especially those that are committed to the Christian virtue of lifelong fidelity (what I take to be the "open and affirming" position).
To say this would not imply endorsing promiscuity or abandoning the Christian ideals of chastity and fidelity.The church can retort that its concern is with intrinsic right and wrong, not with a mathematical calculus of effects.
"We have with us the silently abiding Europe of many tens of millions, who still insist on national sovereignty and still believe in the Christian virtues of courage, honour, fidelity and mercy, which one day made our continent great.
For Luther, the Church of Ethiopia had more fidelity to the Christian tradition, and the practices mentioned above were marks of this fidelity.
There's just no reasonable room for disagreement about the Christian tradition's insistence that fidelity to Christ means, in part, privileging the poor.
"Now we are being beckoned — by history, by our Holy Father, by the force of our own logic," he said, "to extend those efforts to the dramatic front lines of this battle where Christians are paying for their fidelity with their lives".
