If we lived in a society where an emperor or king claimed total authority and decided what was best for the people, the controversy about gay marriage wouldn't be worth fighting. Christians, Conservative Jews, and Islamics just wouldn't recognize the marriages, and everyone else would tolerate them.
Thankfully, God has put us in a society where an educated electorate gets to decide the laws and policies. Apparently, the majority of people don't want gays to marry. They don't want to deviate from traditional beliefs about marriage. The people also don't want polygamy, they want a legal process for divorce, they only want certain people with certain authority to conduct marriage.
His comparison to racism is downright wrong. Unlike blacks fifty years ago, gays can vote and travel, and they tend to make more money than everyone else. Forcing them to recognize that society-at-large recognizes same gender sexual relations as immoral by denying them "marriage" status does not hurt their ability to function in life.
He is also wrong to criticize coerced marriage. Please read my recent blog post about this topic. In certain societies, many people are quite happy with this situation.
Everything that he says seems to indicate that individual happiness should be the goal of society. It isn't. There need to be freedoms, but it shouldn't be a free for all. You could use Keith's same line of reasoning to support, polygamy (something that is actually in the Bible), marriage to animals, or marriage to comic book characters (http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20081030/od_afp/japancartoonmarriageoffbeat_081030061822), I'm glad that most people don't.
Your argument is laughable, my friend. Seems to smack of separate but equal to me. Any line of reasoning that goes to the point of marriage to animals is ridiculous and intellectually dishonest, period.
Think about this: last week many states voted to de-prioritize illegal drugs yet they banned loving and stable relationships. What is wrong with this picture?
I would have to agree largely with the words of CNEIL.
(Mikeandmo... which states banned loving and stable relationships? I didn't know there were any referendums to ban certain relationships! This is an incendiary and misleading argument.
The commentary makes a religious appeal for "spreading happiness", but in reality, this is NOT a tenet of Christianity. Rather, we are to spread love, learning, blessing, authenticity, compassion, etc, etc, but there is no right in biblical Christianity (or Judaism) to a certain amount of individual pleasure. The Bible actually says more about spreading reproof and correction, than about spreading "happiness".
And there is nothing laughable about CNEIL's comparison to polygamy. Olbermann could make same exact commentary, with all the same logic, to appeal on behalf of those who believe in group marriage.
One thing I usually like to point out when this discussion comes up: No one is being denied the right to marry. Everyone has the right to marry someone of the opposite sex. The government does not ask you if you are gay or straight. If you, because of your sexual identity, choose not to exercise your right to marry according to the law, then you are free to live some other law-abiding way. A union of two men or two women will never be marriage, even if the government erroneously labels it as such.
Here's a challenge: Name for me one reason why the inability for a gay couple to marry amounts to an inability for them to be happy together.
If the only answer is "recognition", it must be understood that gay couples will always be recognized by some peers, and not by others, no matter which way the laws of the land swing.
Any other ACTUAL obstacles to their happiness that can be reasonably removed, I am for it. I just don't believe that a re-definition of marriage is one of those obstacles.
"Here's a challenge: Name for me one reason why the inability for a gay couple to marry amounts to an inability for them to be happy together."
Suppose it was illegal for a biracial heterosexual couple to marry, and someone asked you, "Name me one reason why the inability of a white man and black woman who love each other to marry amounts to an inability for them to be happy together." What would you say? Why do those same arguments not apply here?
(I recognize that the current civil rights situation for gays is a lot better than it was for African-Americans in the 1950s. That along is not a reason to extend all civil rights to homosexuals.)
Mikeandmo, I did engage in lame slippery slope argumentation at the end of my comment. I'm sorry if you weren't amused.
The other things I said weren't laughable. I was actually quite serious about them.
I wouldn't compare interracial marriage and gay marriage either. With racism there is a large body of literature, dating back to the Bible, that speaks against that particular prejudice. When I look myself in the mirror, I must admit that if it wasn't for this literature and my travels, I would probably reach racist conclusions very similar to Thomas Jefferson (http://www.teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=45). Perhaps this makes you less inclined to listen to me, but I hope that you would respect me for my honesty, for "reaching" if you will.
With homosexual marriage, I don't see any historical, societal, or literary evidence indicating that this is a good idea. In fact, I see the gay marriage debate as a libertine bastardization of civil rights rhetoric. My attitude might actually be moved a little if someone could produce some evidence that any Christian thinker before the twentieth century thought that homosexual marriage was a good idea.
Any philosophy or history or biology I might try to quote seems to me to be missing the point. It really boils down to this: I know of several homosexual couples in my community with children, and they are among the best parents I've ever seen. A lot better than a lot of heterosexual parents I know, actually. I see these people, and I just can't think of any reason why they shouldn't be able to marry and raise children like anybody else. They're not standing in they way of any heterosexual couple getting married or having children, so difference does it make?
I realize that this isn't convincing to you or to most people opposed to gay marriage, and I just really don't know what to say. For me, it feels like arguing with someone trying to persuade them that the sky is blue or lemons are sour. It's just so obvious to me, and I have difficulty comprehending why it's not obvious to everyone (besides fear of the unfamiliar).
I will say this: I sometimes wonder if, as a matter of strategy or compromise, the gay community should give up on gay marriage for the time being. Since the views of anti-gay-marriage people are so unshakable (they have God on Their Side), let them have the word "marriage." Instead, focus on allowing same-sex civil unions or domestic partnerships with all the same legal and financial rights and benefits as marriage. Those here who are opposed to gay marriage, would you go along with that?
I would be in favor of a some type of agreement for people living together to have hospital visitation rights, share power of attourney, grant custody of their children to one another, apply for certain tax breaks, or anything else. This could be granted to anyone that lives together for a certain length of time: roommates, grown brothers and sisters, retired widows, etc.
The problem is that the government should never be in a position to endorse, sanction, or even recognize homosexuality as a legitimate lifestyle.
At best, homosexuals should be treated the same way as naturists and nudists. Yes, it is a "natural" activity. Yes, it makes some people happy. Yes, it is a peaceful pursuit. No, naturists and nudists don't face violent opposition or have problems going about their daily business. However, we don't need nudist sections of state parks. It is an activity that is totally outside of mainstream America. If they are too vocal about it, a nudist would probably have difficulty adopting a child. And if a known nudist tried to join certain churches or civic organizations their morality would be questioned.
What does marriage mean anymore, anyway? I mean, with annulments, with legalized sodomy, with no fault, "any reason" divorces, what can it possibly mean? Legal rights... a certain amount of social capital. After all, it's still "the norm", and people intuitively know it's the right context for a commitment to sexual oneness and child rearing. But it's mocked by pop culture and profaned by immaturity, greed, and careerism. It's gonna take a lot more than saving marriage to save America. There are more deeply rooted and serious issues with the fabric of our society.
As far as the issue of love and supporting gay marriage goes, a lot weighs upon the morality of homosexuality. In fact, the moral argument bears almost all of the weight of the political one. If homosexuality is immoral, then condoning it by sanctioning gay marriage is prima facie immoral. And if homosexuality is immoral, then creating a culture that views it as moral leads to the socialization of future generations who will view it as moral, which is immoral. And if homosexuality is immoral, that means its contrary to the will of God, in which case God's judgment would be upon the gay couple (insofar as they behave homosexually toward one another), which would have obvious negative repercussions for their children should they be allowed to adopt or created them in vitro. So by banning gay marriage, we are protecting children, for the granting of custody rights will necessarily follow if gay marriage is legalized. That is an unloving move for the children's sake.
But again, all of this is predicated on the immorality of homosexuality. If it's not immoral, there's no argument against gay marriage. All others rest on slippery slopes.
No self-respecting legal scholar would accept the premise that we shouldn't sanction anything immoral.
Legal does not equal moral.
But, let's accept the premise for now. Why is homosexuality immoral?
Oh, and by the way, I haven't seen much in these recent comment sections that would attract anyone to Christianity. Of course, maybe that's not the aim.
Lj, it probably does have to be a Christian thinker. Since my understanding of morality is heavily filtered by my understanding of biblical scripture, I would need to find some authoritative person who interprets scripture in a similar way to even be influenced.
Reach, I understand legal does not equal moral. I’m not a legal scholar and I may not be self-respecting, but I thank you for listening and humoring me.
However, I ask if something that you consider immoral is already against the law, why would you vote to change it?
Becoming a Christian requires repentance and belief. If there is no consensus about the definition of sin, preaching and having people believe the gospel becomes much more difficult. Repentance, a vital step to salvation, becomes impossible.
Except for idol worship or praying to false Gods, the things Christians consider immoral would also be considered immoral by most people in the world. The world just has more tolerance for those things. Think about actions like murder, theft, acts of revenge, and drunkenness.
Sometimes the prevailing evil world will try to say that things are okay when they are sinful. The gay marriage debate is one of those situations.
As voting people who are part of a participatory government, Christians should vote, as much as possible, to make sure that society's views of good and evil correspond with the New Testament's ethic of good and evil.
In Asia, I have seen houses torn apart because a Christian in the home wants to give up Buddhist idols, little statues that sit on the shelf, and the other people in the family don't. For a multitude of reasons, some people, even Christians, think it is acceptable to keep these idols. However, like the argument against homosexual relations, every iota of scriptural evidence suggests that idolatry is wrong and the leader in the home has the responsibility to get rid of false gods.
If it becomes legal and acceptable to have a gay marriage partner, you'll find a situation where people can't believe the gospel and become Christians because they aren't repenting of their sin. Like the Christians that won't throw out their idols, there will be people that won't even acknowledge that their behavior is wrong.
In the Bible, the only acceptable outlet for sexual desire is between the husband and wife. Everything else is sin or, at the very least, evidence of our sinful nature. Can you really picture sanctified sodomy between two married men in the same way that you can the holy consummation of a marriage between a husband and wife?
Again, if we lived under a government that didn't give us the task of voting or squelched our freedom of speech, my attitudes may be a little different. I would probably be prone to accept a church that is more insular that possesses a more fatalistic view of the visible world. But we don't live in that time and place so it is our responsibility to talk about and vote on these issues.
Do you still not believe me? Do you still disagree? Fine, let's have gay marriage. I'll remember 1 Corinthians 5:12 that tells me not to judge those outside the church. I’ll leave the good things in the past and let the world have all kinds of gay marriages. Let's forget about the entire history of Western society and have a family free for all.
Let gays, polygamists, bestiality people, and nudists adopt kids, teach in schools, join the Scouts and the Knights of Columbus, infiltrate the Masons, and run for political office.
As long as churches that call themselves Christian or Bible-believing don't start offering gay marriage, I’ll stop caring and worrying. This is exactly what the Bible says to do. I'll accept God's will and obey.
I’ll sit and think about all of my own sins and frustrations and stop judging everyone else.
I promise that I'm not being sarcastic. If you lose hope in groups like Focus on the Family and their cultural "hit squads"; if you ignore the Western (perhaps faulty) tradition to make laws based on the Bible; and if you minimize the importance of our vote, this is exactly what scripture says Christians should do.
Thank you for reading. This is my last response to this thread.
Granted, some legislation is basically amoral, but legislation concerning moral issues necessarily takes morality into account, even if it's not exclusively (or ultimately) determinative. No one's saying legality = morality, only that morality should be a/the fundamental consideration of legislation concerning moral issues, e.g. gay marriage, with all its moral implications (beyond just the couples in question).
As far as your last comment, there wasn't much from the mouth of the OT prophets that 'attracted' people to Judaism. The fear of God attracted them. Neither were Jesus' words all affirming. Lots of doomsday rhetoric about repentance and judgment...even hell (gasp!).
If denouncing homosexuality were not itself an act of love, both for the homosexuals and for the rest of society, then you might have a point about the pointlessness (or harm) of our stance against it. I realize none of us here has made a case for the immorality of homosexuality, but that discussion is so technical that it doesn't really belong on a blog. It would be impossible to have the discussion without getting into thousand-word comments back and forth. We all know the basic arguments for and against. What's left is justifying them, and that's a complex issue. Suffice it to say that the 'gay hermeneutic' is exegetically problematic, and the science (LeVay and Byne) is at best grossly inconclusive.
Assuming that gay people are immoral libertines, it would seem to me that gay people expressing a desire to enter into binding, stable, monogamous relationships would be evidence that they were becoming less immoral, not that marriage is losing its sanctity.
But really, I just don't believe that homosexuality is inherently immoral. So, as Beloved points out, I don't see any argument against gay marriage. I suppose this means that, at the moment, I can't really have a substantive conversation about this with people who see otherwise. I'll have to think about that, how I might do that.
I shouldn't have used the world "relationship" -- you got me there. But the sentiment remains. Illegal drugs were de-prioritized last week, while legal recognition of two committed people were banned.
I did not say the polygamy argument was laughable. I said the animal argument was. It is.
I suppose the question comes down to who gets to decide what a marriage is. I'm not a theologian or a legal scholar and I really don't care to argue on those terms anyway. What I care about is that in this age when the institution of marriage is trounced and trampled on by so many with seemingly so little commitment, it strikes me as fairly insane that we would tell a whole group of people that they are second-rate citizens.
They are being told they are like the run-down house down the street with a car on blocks in the front yard -- that their very existence cheapens what all the rest of us enjoy. I do not and will never buy that line of reasoning. I will not look my gay friends in the eye and tell them that. Should I have a gay child someday, I will not tell them that. It is simply wrong.
My sister and brother in laws dated for 10 years. Everyone told them they should get married, already. They said it was just a piece of paper. When they finally did marry, they expressed to me sometime after that they realized it was not just a piece of paper. It's a meaningful commitment to be honored and cherished. Having seen the way marriage has greatly improved my life for the better, I am loathe to deny it to two people who want the same.
No, it does not stop anyone from simply having a relationship. But the difference between a relationship and a marriage, in our personal lives and the eyes of the law, is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug and we all know it.
lj, you are very smart. i don't mean that sarcastically. you, and mike's last comment, highlighted the lynch pin of the debate (sorry to have to use the d word... it is): the moral issue. but there's a deeper issue, which is how we determine/establish/understand morality. the reason we differ is either (a) because we come at morality from different paradigms, and/or (b) we have different sets (or perceptions) of facts we're working from. So far, little has been said about either, which reacher was pleading for. I'm happy to discuss it, but it's probably better one issue at a time. also, i'm wary of blog-hogging, b/c i'm prone to it.
let me just concede this to those of you who are pro gay marriage (at least on the legal level): i recognize we live in a pluralistic society, and that is what creates the complexity (and the problems resulting from the complexities). i'm in a course on Christian Ethics, and the first thing one has to do in debating an ethical issue is decide what ethical approach one will take (consequentialism and non-consequentialism being the two dominant contenders). Christians, who believe that God has made his will known in Scripture, take that as the starting point, and work from there. non-Christians are consigned to either ideal observer theory or consequentialism (there are a couple others), but the latter is really the only serious alternative to non-consequentialism. i happen to think a lot can be achieved through consequentialist reasoning, but it ultimately stalemates once you get down to foundational premises. at some point, you either deny that morality in general can be known, or you have to establish the objective ground of it. divine command theory seems to be the paradigm least fraught with difficulties. epistemological and text critical concerns are the biggest challenges, but they can be soundly overcome. now that is a topic for another time and place.
Consider a person who believes that God has made his will known in a concrete form other than the Christian Scriptures. Is it possible for this person to live a good, moral life? Is it possible for this person to be a good, moral person?
Consider further a person who does not believe that God has made his will known in any clear form. Is it possible that they could live a good life, that they could be a moral person?
Is it possible for someone to make a morally right decision apart from God's revelation in Scripture? Obviously. Is is possible for someone to consistently live a life that parallels certain moral teachings of Jesus? Sure, it's possible.
The question is how they justify the morality of their decisions. As far as policy is concerned, justification is non-negotiable.
People can appeal to whatever source of authority they want to. The last paragraph in my previous comment was basically a lament of this. The determiner of moral decision-making in our democratic society is mob rule. That's just the practical reality. We fool ourselves into believing that scrupulously grounded ideals are the bases of morally oriented policies in a pluralistic society, but in reality the most powerful voice(s) decide. The mass media factor throws a significant (and concerning) wrench into the machine.
18 comments:
If we lived in a society where an emperor or king claimed total authority and decided what was best for the people, the controversy about gay marriage wouldn't be worth fighting. Christians, Conservative Jews, and Islamics just wouldn't recognize the marriages, and everyone else would tolerate them.
Thankfully, God has put us in a society where an educated electorate gets to decide the laws and policies. Apparently, the majority of people don't want gays to marry. They don't want to deviate from traditional beliefs about marriage. The people also don't want polygamy, they want a legal process for divorce, they only want certain people with certain authority to conduct marriage.
His comparison to racism is downright wrong. Unlike blacks fifty years ago, gays can vote and travel, and they tend to make more money than everyone else. Forcing them to recognize that society-at-large recognizes same gender sexual relations as immoral by denying them "marriage" status does not hurt their ability to function in life.
He is also wrong to criticize coerced marriage. Please read my recent blog post about this topic. In certain societies, many people are quite happy with this situation.
http://www.cneil.com/2008/11/arranged-marriage-vs-dating.html
Everything that he says seems to indicate that individual happiness should be the goal of society. It isn't. There need to be freedoms, but it shouldn't be a free for all. You could use Keith's same line of reasoning to support, polygamy (something that is actually in the Bible), marriage to animals, or marriage to comic book characters (http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20081030/od_afp/japancartoonmarriageoffbeat_081030061822), I'm glad that most people don't.
Your argument is laughable, my friend. Seems to smack of separate but equal to me. Any line of reasoning that goes to the point of marriage to animals is ridiculous and intellectually dishonest, period.
Think about this: last week many states voted to de-prioritize illegal drugs yet they banned loving and stable relationships. What is wrong with this picture?
E PLURIBUS UNUM
I would have to agree largely with the words of CNEIL.
(Mikeandmo... which states banned loving and stable relationships? I didn't know there were any referendums to ban certain relationships! This is an incendiary and misleading argument.
The commentary makes a religious appeal for "spreading happiness", but in reality, this is NOT a tenet of Christianity. Rather, we are to spread love, learning, blessing, authenticity, compassion, etc, etc, but there is no right in biblical Christianity (or Judaism) to a certain amount of individual pleasure. The Bible actually says more about spreading reproof and correction, than about spreading "happiness".
And there is nothing laughable about CNEIL's comparison to polygamy. Olbermann could make same exact commentary, with all the same logic, to appeal on behalf of those who believe in group marriage.
One thing I usually like to point out when this discussion comes up: No one is being denied the right to marry. Everyone has the right to marry someone of the opposite sex. The government does not ask you if you are gay or straight. If you, because of your sexual identity, choose not to exercise your right to marry according to the law, then you are free to live some other law-abiding way. A union of two men or two women will never be marriage, even if the government erroneously labels it as such.
Here's a challenge: Name for me one reason why the inability for a gay couple to marry amounts to an inability for them to be happy together.
If the only answer is "recognition", it must be understood that gay couples will always be recognized by some peers, and not by others, no matter which way the laws of the land swing.
Any other ACTUAL obstacles to their happiness that can be reasonably removed, I am for it. I just don't believe that a re-definition of marriage is one of those obstacles.
"Here's a challenge: Name for me one reason why the inability for a gay couple to marry amounts to an inability for them to be happy together."
Suppose it was illegal for a biracial heterosexual couple to marry, and someone asked you, "Name me one reason why the inability of a white man and black woman who love each other to marry amounts to an inability for them to be happy together." What would you say? Why do those same arguments not apply here?
(I recognize that the current civil rights situation for gays is a lot better than it was for African-Americans in the 1950s. That along is not a reason to extend all civil rights to homosexuals.)
I will concede that the ability to legally adopt children might be used as an argument against me.
Mikeandmo, I did engage in lame slippery slope argumentation at the end of my comment. I'm sorry if you weren't amused.
The other things I said weren't laughable. I was actually quite serious about them.
I wouldn't compare interracial marriage and gay marriage either. With racism there is a large body of literature, dating back to the Bible, that speaks against that particular prejudice. When I look myself in the mirror, I must admit that if it wasn't for this literature and my travels, I would probably reach racist conclusions very similar to Thomas Jefferson (http://www.teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=45). Perhaps this makes you less inclined to listen to me, but I hope that you would respect me for my honesty, for "reaching" if you will.
With homosexual marriage, I don't see any historical, societal, or literary evidence indicating that this is a good idea. In fact, I see the gay marriage debate as a libertine bastardization of civil rights rhetoric. My attitude might actually be moved a little if someone could produce some evidence that any Christian thinker before the twentieth century thought that homosexual marriage was a good idea.
Does it have to be a Christian thinker?
Any philosophy or history or biology I might try to quote seems to me to be missing the point. It really boils down to this: I know of several homosexual couples in my community with children, and they are among the best parents I've ever seen. A lot better than a lot of heterosexual parents I know, actually. I see these people, and I just can't think of any reason why they shouldn't be able to marry and raise children like anybody else. They're not standing in they way of any heterosexual couple getting married or having children, so difference does it make?
I realize that this isn't convincing to you or to most people opposed to gay marriage, and I just really don't know what to say. For me, it feels like arguing with someone trying to persuade them that the sky is blue or lemons are sour. It's just so obvious to me, and I have difficulty comprehending why it's not obvious to everyone (besides fear of the unfamiliar).
I will say this: I sometimes wonder if, as a matter of strategy or compromise, the gay community should give up on gay marriage for the time being. Since the views of anti-gay-marriage people are so unshakable (they have God on Their Side), let them have the word "marriage." Instead, focus on allowing same-sex civil unions or domestic partnerships with all the same legal and financial rights and benefits as marriage. Those here who are opposed to gay marriage, would you go along with that?
Here's some of that "love" Olberman was talking about:
http://www.kpsplocal2.com/global/video/flash/popupplayer.asp?vt1=v&clipFormat=flv&clipId1=3115942&at1=News&h1=Prop%208%20Rally%20Turns%20Violent%20-%20Live%20Report&rnd=70882418
I would be in favor of a some type of agreement for people living together to have hospital visitation rights, share power of attourney, grant custody of their children to one another, apply for certain tax breaks, or anything else. This could be granted to anyone that lives together for a certain length of time: roommates, grown brothers and sisters, retired widows, etc.
The problem is that the government should never be in a position to endorse, sanction, or even recognize homosexuality as a legitimate lifestyle.
At best, homosexuals should be treated the same way as naturists and nudists. Yes, it is a "natural" activity. Yes, it makes some people happy. Yes, it is a peaceful pursuit. No, naturists and nudists don't face violent opposition or have problems going about their daily business. However, we don't need nudist sections of state parks. It is an activity that is totally outside of mainstream America. If they are too vocal about it, a nudist would probably have difficulty adopting a child. And if a known nudist tried to join certain churches or civic organizations their morality would be questioned.
What does marriage mean anymore, anyway? I mean, with annulments, with legalized sodomy, with no fault, "any reason" divorces, what can it possibly mean? Legal rights... a certain amount of social capital. After all, it's still "the norm", and people intuitively know it's the right context for a commitment to sexual oneness and child rearing. But it's mocked by pop culture and profaned by immaturity, greed, and careerism. It's gonna take a lot more than saving marriage to save America. There are more deeply rooted and serious issues with the fabric of our society.
As far as the issue of love and supporting gay marriage goes, a lot weighs upon the morality of homosexuality. In fact, the moral argument bears almost all of the weight of the political one. If homosexuality is immoral, then condoning it by sanctioning gay marriage is prima facie immoral. And if homosexuality is immoral, then creating a culture that views it as moral leads to the socialization of future generations who will view it as moral, which is immoral. And if homosexuality is immoral, that means its contrary to the will of God, in which case God's judgment would be upon the gay couple (insofar as they behave homosexually toward one another), which would have obvious negative repercussions for their children should they be allowed to adopt or created them in vitro. So by banning gay marriage, we are protecting children, for the granting of custody rights will necessarily follow if gay marriage is legalized. That is an unloving move for the children's sake.
But again, all of this is predicated on the immorality of homosexuality. If it's not immoral, there's no argument against gay marriage. All others rest on slippery slopes.
No self-respecting legal scholar would accept the premise that we shouldn't sanction anything immoral.
Legal does not equal moral.
But, let's accept the premise for now. Why is homosexuality immoral?
Oh, and by the way, I haven't seen much in these recent comment sections that would attract anyone to Christianity. Of course, maybe that's not the aim.
Lj, it probably does have to be a Christian thinker. Since my understanding of morality is heavily filtered by my understanding of biblical scripture, I would need to find some authoritative person who interprets scripture in a similar way to even be influenced.
Reach, I understand legal does not equal moral. I’m not a legal scholar and I may not be self-respecting, but I thank you for listening and humoring me.
However, I ask if something that you consider immoral is already against the law, why would you vote to change it?
Becoming a Christian requires repentance and belief. If there is no consensus about the definition of sin, preaching and having people believe the gospel becomes much more difficult. Repentance, a vital step to salvation, becomes impossible.
Except for idol worship or praying to false Gods, the things Christians consider immoral would also be considered immoral by most people in the world. The world just has more tolerance for those things. Think about actions like murder, theft, acts of revenge, and drunkenness.
Sometimes the prevailing evil world will try to say that things are okay when they are sinful. The gay marriage debate is one of those situations.
As voting people who are part of a participatory government, Christians should vote, as much as possible, to make sure that society's views of good and evil correspond with the New Testament's ethic of good and evil.
In Asia, I have seen houses torn apart because a Christian in the home wants to give up Buddhist idols, little statues that sit on the shelf, and the other people in the family don't. For a multitude of reasons, some people, even Christians, think it is acceptable to keep these idols. However, like the argument against homosexual relations, every iota of scriptural evidence suggests that idolatry is wrong and the leader in the home has the responsibility to get rid of false gods.
If it becomes legal and acceptable to have a gay marriage partner, you'll find a situation where people can't believe the gospel and become Christians because they aren't repenting of their sin. Like the Christians that won't throw out their idols, there will be people that won't even acknowledge that their behavior is wrong.
In the Bible, the only acceptable outlet for sexual desire is between the husband and wife. Everything else is sin or, at the very least, evidence of our sinful nature. Can you really picture sanctified sodomy between two married men in the same way that you can the holy consummation of a marriage between a husband and wife?
Again, if we lived under a government that didn't give us the task of voting or squelched our freedom of speech, my attitudes may be a little different. I would probably be prone to accept a church that is more insular that possesses a more fatalistic view of the visible world. But we don't live in that time and place so it is our responsibility to talk about and vote on these issues.
Do you still not believe me? Do you still disagree? Fine, let's have gay marriage. I'll remember 1 Corinthians 5:12 that tells me not to judge those outside the church. I’ll leave the good things in the past and let the world have all kinds of gay marriages. Let's forget about the entire history of Western society and have a family free for all.
Let gays, polygamists, bestiality people, and nudists adopt kids, teach in schools, join the Scouts and the Knights of Columbus, infiltrate the Masons, and run for political office.
As long as churches that call themselves Christian or Bible-believing don't start offering gay marriage, I’ll stop caring and worrying. This is exactly what the Bible says to do. I'll accept God's will and obey.
I’ll sit and think about all of my own sins and frustrations and stop judging everyone else.
I promise that I'm not being sarcastic. If you lose hope in groups like Focus on the Family and their cultural "hit squads"; if you ignore the Western (perhaps faulty) tradition to make laws based on the Bible; and if you minimize the importance of our vote, this is exactly what scripture says Christians should do.
Thank you for reading. This is my last response to this thread.
Granted, some legislation is basically amoral, but legislation concerning moral issues necessarily takes morality into account, even if it's not exclusively (or ultimately) determinative. No one's saying legality = morality, only that morality should be a/the fundamental consideration of legislation concerning moral issues, e.g. gay marriage, with all its moral implications (beyond just the couples in question).
As far as your last comment, there wasn't much from the mouth of the OT prophets that 'attracted' people to Judaism. The fear of God attracted them. Neither were Jesus' words all affirming. Lots of doomsday rhetoric about repentance and judgment...even hell (gasp!).
If denouncing homosexuality were not itself an act of love, both for the homosexuals and for the rest of society, then you might have a point about the pointlessness (or harm) of our stance against it. I realize none of us here has made a case for the immorality of homosexuality, but that discussion is so technical that it doesn't really belong on a blog. It would be impossible to have the discussion without getting into thousand-word comments back and forth. We all know the basic arguments for and against. What's left is justifying them, and that's a complex issue. Suffice it to say that the 'gay hermeneutic' is exegetically problematic, and the science (LeVay and Byne) is at best grossly inconclusive.
Assuming that gay people are immoral libertines, it would seem to me that gay people expressing a desire to enter into binding, stable, monogamous relationships would be evidence that they were becoming less immoral, not that marriage is losing its sanctity.
But really, I just don't believe that homosexuality is inherently immoral. So, as Beloved points out, I don't see any argument against gay marriage. I suppose this means that, at the moment, I can't really have a substantive conversation about this with people who see otherwise. I'll have to think about that, how I might do that.
A little late on this reply, but:
I shouldn't have used the world "relationship" -- you got me there. But the sentiment remains. Illegal drugs were de-prioritized last week, while legal recognition of two committed people were banned.
I did not say the polygamy argument was laughable. I said the animal argument was. It is.
I suppose the question comes down to who gets to decide what a marriage is. I'm not a theologian or a legal scholar and I really don't care to argue on those terms anyway. What I care about is that in this age when the institution of marriage is trounced and trampled on by so many with seemingly so little commitment, it strikes me as fairly insane that we would tell a whole group of people that they are second-rate citizens.
They are being told they are like the run-down house down the street with a car on blocks in the front yard -- that their very existence cheapens what all the rest of us enjoy. I do not and will never buy that line of reasoning. I will not look my gay friends in the eye and tell them that. Should I have a gay child someday, I will not tell them that. It is simply wrong.
My sister and brother in laws dated for 10 years. Everyone told them they should get married, already. They said it was just a piece of paper. When they finally did marry, they expressed to me sometime after that they realized it was not just a piece of paper. It's a meaningful commitment to be honored and cherished. Having seen the way marriage has greatly improved my life for the better, I am loathe to deny it to two people who want the same.
No, it does not stop anyone from simply having a relationship. But the difference between a relationship and a marriage, in our personal lives and the eyes of the law, is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug and we all know it.
mike
lj, you are very smart. i don't mean that sarcastically. you, and mike's last comment, highlighted the lynch pin of the debate (sorry to have to use the d word... it is): the moral issue. but there's a deeper issue, which is how we determine/establish/understand morality. the reason we differ is either (a) because we come at morality from different paradigms, and/or (b) we have different sets (or perceptions) of facts we're working from. So far, little has been said about either, which reacher was pleading for. I'm happy to discuss it, but it's probably better one issue at a time. also, i'm wary of blog-hogging, b/c i'm prone to it.
let me just concede this to those of you who are pro gay marriage (at least on the legal level): i recognize we live in a pluralistic society, and that is what creates the complexity (and the problems resulting from the complexities). i'm in a course on Christian Ethics, and the first thing one has to do in debating an ethical issue is decide what ethical approach one will take (consequentialism and non-consequentialism being the two dominant contenders). Christians, who believe that God has made his will known in Scripture, take that as the starting point, and work from there. non-Christians are consigned to either ideal observer theory or consequentialism (there are a couple others), but the latter is really the only serious alternative to non-consequentialism. i happen to think a lot can be achieved through consequentialist reasoning, but it ultimately stalemates once you get down to foundational premises. at some point, you either deny that morality in general can be known, or you have to establish the objective ground of it. divine command theory seems to be the paradigm least fraught with difficulties. epistemological and text critical concerns are the biggest challenges, but they can be soundly overcome. now that is a topic for another time and place.
reach...?
"non-Christians are consigned to either..."
Consider a person who believes that God has made his will known in a concrete form other than the Christian Scriptures. Is it possible for this person to live a good, moral life? Is it possible for this person to be a good, moral person?
Consider further a person who does not believe that God has made his will known in any clear form. Is it possible that they could live a good life, that they could be a moral person?
Is it possible for someone to make a morally right decision apart from God's revelation in Scripture? Obviously. Is is possible for someone to consistently live a life that parallels certain moral teachings of Jesus? Sure, it's possible.
The question is how they justify the morality of their decisions. As far as policy is concerned, justification is non-negotiable.
People can appeal to whatever source of authority they want to. The last paragraph in my previous comment was basically a lament of this. The determiner of moral decision-making in our democratic society is mob rule. That's just the practical reality. We fool ourselves into believing that scrupulously grounded ideals are the bases of morally oriented policies in a pluralistic society, but in reality the most powerful voice(s) decide. The mass media factor throws a significant (and concerning) wrench into the machine.
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