Equal Opportunity
Pretty much all the big companies these days include “sexual orientation” in their employment opportunity statements. In the sense that we should treat all people with human dignity, okay. Jesus is an equal opportunity Redeemer, after all. He died for each one of us. He calls all sinners to repentance.
Active Promotion
The envelope starts to get pushed, however, when a company jumps on the homosexual bandwagon and actually 1) partners with anti-marriage lobby groups to change nature’s laws and 2) promotes its employees marching in so-called “Pride” parades. This is what Apple does, and the company is quite open about it (scroll down the page until you see it).
Note that this page changes from time to time, as does the URL. If the link goes nowhere, Apple may have moved it.
The Question at Hand
This state of affairs brings us to the question at hand:
Can I remain a faithful Catholic and still do business with Apple, Inc?
And (if the answer is ‘yes’) the corollary question:
Even if it is not a sin, should I still do business with Apple, Inc?
Before attempting either question, I want to point out that I am not an Apple-basher. Quite the opposite, in fact. I grew up with Apple Computer. My father wrote his master’s thesis and the drawings for a home on a Fat Mac. I largely taught myself computer programming on the original 1998 iMac (Revision B). My children still use that computer, it turns out, to play Reader Rabbit and other legacy educational games. Not only have I purchased Apple hardware of various ilk, I write iOS apps, including Liber Pro. (Apple gets a 30% commission on all paid iOS apps, in case you didn’t know). To test my apps, I’ve been required to buy a number of Apple mobile devices as well, not to mention hardware capable of running the most recent Xcode IDE. What is more, I like Apple’s products. There is a reason Apple designs are popular.
The Dichotomy
Yet, how can I reconcile the following (note how the propagandist tries to call this a “human rights” issue about “love and equality”):
Standing up for human rights.
We partner with groups like the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), which is the largest LGBT civil rights organization in the United States. We share their mission to protect the civil and workplace rights of all our employees. We’ve also earned a perfect score on their Corporate Equality Index since it started in 2002. The index measures a company’s commitment to equality, and it’s an incredibly high standard. A standard we’re determined to meet for years to come.
Our employees also take action. To celebrate the right of everyone to love whomever they choose, Apple employees march in Pride parades in both San Francisco, California, and Austin, Texas. This year thousands of employees, friends, and family marched in San Francisco spreading a positive message of love and equality. [my emphasis]
with the truth:
Chastity and homosexuality (taken from Catechism of the Catholic Church)
2357 Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity,141 tradition has always declared that “homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.”142 They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved.
2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God’s will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord’s Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.
Further, we have the admonition of the Congregation for Doctrine of the Faith. I’ll post just a snippet, courtesy of Fr. Z. Read this post for the entirety.
In those situations where homosexual unions have been legally recognized or have been given the legal status and rights belonging to marriage, clear and emphatic opposition is a duty [Fr. Z’s emphasis]. One must refrain from any kind of formal cooperation in the enactment or application of such gravely unjust laws and, as far as possible, from material cooperation on the level of their application. In this area, everyone can exercise the right to conscientious objection.
I can’t continue without a brief intermission. Note the wording:
To celebrate the right of everyone to love whomever they choose…
Really? By this logic, everyone has a right to cheat on a spouse simply because he “loves” someone else. How is that just, especially to women? Did I miss something? I could go on, but I won’t.
Considering the First Question
For starters, I think it is clear that formal cooperation is not involved here. Buy purchasing a Mac or an iPhone, one is not participating in an act of perversion, directly enabling another to do so, condoning such acts, etc. If I understand material cooperation, one would only be indirectly cooperating materially (which is not a sin as I understand it) unless one buys Apple products because the company espouses these policies (no pun intended). Thus, I think the answer to the first question is, “Yes, one can be a faithful Catholic and still do business with Apple, Inc.”
Considering the Second Question
The second question is, in my opinion, not so easily answered, and I’d like to know your thoughts. There are probably many factors to consider, such as the following:
- Would dumping Apple make it impossible for me to feed my family? Does my livelihood depend on products that depend on Apple’s platforms? Can I pivot to developing on another platform* without jeopardizing the support of my family or placing an undue burden on my livelihood?
- Are there other products available* that can replace my existing Apple hardware when it breaks? Would replacing one device require others be replaced? Is the cost reasonable?
- When I look back from eternity, will I regret not getting that iPhone? When I look back from eternity, will I regret having gotten that iPhone?
* Note: Microsoft donates to Planned Parenthood, which is worse than what Apple does. The fact that Apple does not–to my knowledge–have ties to population control initiatives was another reason I used to like the company, and I still prefer it to Microsoft.
What do you think? Let me know in the comment box.
About the Featured Image
The featured image is a cut-out of Adam and Eve by Titian, which is a painting in the public domain.