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Same-Sex Marriage

Same-Sex marriage can only be imposed by activist judges, not by the democratic will of the people. The vast majority of people define marriage as the life-long union of a man and a woman. They will strongly resist redefinition. The imposition of gay marriage would bring contempt for the law and our courts in the eyes of many Americans - including those in heterosexual marriages—over the long run. Strong political measures may be necessary to maintain the traditional definition of marriage, possibly even a constitutional amendment. As for marriage, let us keep the definition as it is, and strengthen our capacity to live up to its ideals.

Of all the phony arguments for gay marriage, the phoniest is the argument that it is a matter of equal rights. Marriage is not a right extended to individuals by the government. It is a restriction on the rights they already have. People who are simply living together can make whatever arrangements they want, whether they are heterosexual or homosexual. They can divide up their worldly belongings 50-50 or 90-10 or whatever other way they want. They can make their union temporary or permanent or subject to cancellation at any time.

Marriage is a restriction. If my wife buys an automobile with her own money, under California marriage laws I automatically own half of it, whether or not my name is on the title. Whether that law is good, bad, or indifferent, it is a limitation of our freedom to arrange such things as we ourselves might choose. This is just one of many decisions that marriage laws take out of our hands. Oliver Wendell Holmes said that the life of the law is not logic but experience. Marriage laws have evolved through centuries of experience with couples of opposite sexes -- and the children that result from such unions. Society asserts its stake in the decisions made by restricting the couples' options.

Society has no such stake in the outcome of a union between two people of the same sex. Transferring all those laws to same-sex couples would make no more sense than transferring the rules of baseball to football. Why then do gay activists want their options restricted by marriage laws, when they can make their own contracts with their own provisions and hold whatever kinds of ceremony they want to celebrate it?

The issue is not individual rights. What the activists are seeking is official social approval of their lifestyle. But this is the antithesis of equal rights. If you have a right to someone else's approval, then they do not have a right to their own opinions and values. You cannot say that what "consenting adults" do in private is nobody else's business and then turn around and say that others are bound to put their seal of approval on it.

The time is long overdue to stop word games about equal rights from leading to special privileges - for anybody - and gay marriage is as good an issue on which to do so as anything else. Incidentally, it is not even clear how many homosexuals actually want marriage, even though gay activists are pushing it. What the activists really want is the stamp of acceptance on homosexuality, as a means of spreading that lifestyle, which has become a death style in the era of AIDS.

Marriage Threat Grows

The campaign to topple traditional marriage is gaining steam. Lawsuits to legalize homosexual marriage are now pending in nine states. The top courts in three states—New Jersey, New York, and Washington—will likely issue rulings this year. Final decisions from the state supreme courts in the other six states—California, Connecticut, Iowa, Maryland, Nebraska, and Oklahoma—are expected in 2007 or later.

In California, two men seeking the right to marry argued their case in April before the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, the most liberal federal appeals panel in the nation. Whichever way the Ninth Circuit rules, the outcome will be appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, which strongly hinted in a 2003 decision striking down state bans on sodomy, that same-sex marriage is constitutionally okay. Public Opposition

All this while public attitudes remain opposed to giving marriage licenses to same-sex couples. An American Enterprise Institute analysis of polling done between 2000 and 2005 found that just a quarter of Americans support homosexual marriage.

The same-sex marriage campaign in the courts is also facing a strong pro-family backlash at the ballot box. Some 19 states have already passed, by an average margin of 71.5 percent, state constitutional amendments reserving marriage to one man and one woman. Voters in another seven states: Alabama, Idaho, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Virginia, and Wisconsin decide this year whether to place marriage into a constitutional lockbox.

Doing so will protect marriage from activist state judges, but federal courts can easily overturn state constitutions that limit marriage to a man and a woman. That is why passage of the federal Marriage Protection Amendment, which places marriage beyond the reach of both state and federal courts, is needed now.

Why the Push for Same-Sex Marriage?

What is the real goal behind same-sex marriage? Since homosexuals don’t live faithful lives "‘til death do us part,” what is it they seek by being able to walk down the aisle? They are seeking the legal recognition and approval of their lifestyle. That is the goal.

Same-sex marriage is a tool to help further the goal of total acceptance of the homosexual lifestyle. And regarding such acceptance, they don’t mean for us to leave them alone to do what they want to do, but for us—all of us—to embrace it. What makes this scary to Christians is that we stand in their way. So conflict is inevitable.

The Final Tool

To homosexual activists, the legalization of gay marriages is a major prize. As one of them, Andrew Sullivan, put it about a decade ago: "If nothing else were done at all, and gay marriage were legalized, 90 percent of the political work necessary to achieve gay and lesbian equality would have been achieved. It is ultimately the only reform that matters.”

Robert Knight, director of the Culture and Family Institute, a division of Concerned Women for America, points out that it’s one thing for homosexuals to publicly express their appreciation for each other. It’s quite another to use the force of law to get the rest of us to accept it. Same-sex marriage is using the force of law to persuade others to accept the unacceptable.

Michelangelo Signorile, a homosexual writer, pointed out further that acceptance of gay marriage could help them redefine marriage in general: "A middle ground might be to fight for same-sex marriage and its benefits and then, once granted, redefine the institution of marriage completely, to demand the right to marry not as a way of adhering to society’s moral codes, but rather to debunk a myth and radically alter an archaic institution.” Thus the destruction of marriage itself is in their sights.

Furthermore, Signorile added that same-sex marriage could give them the legal tool by which they could force their agenda on society: "It is also a chance to wholly transform the definition of family in American culture. It is the final tool with which to dismantle all sodomy statutes, get education about homosexuality and AIDS into public schools and, in short, usher in a sea change in how society views and treats us.” Thus, the push for homosexual marriage is a lot more sweeping than a handful of people expressing their love for each other in a public forum. The long-term consequences could be devastating for society, the family, children, and the Church.

Just a Small Percentage Marry

If homosexuals really wanted to marry for marriage’s sake, then when the opportunity was made available to them, wouldn’t it follow that they would quickly rush to walk down the aisle? Yes, but that generally has not happened. It’s not about marriage, fidelity, or commitment. It’s about forced acceptance.

Dr. Timothy J. Dailey of the Family Research Council notes: "Data from Vermont, Sweden, and the Netherlands reveal that only a small percentage of homosexuals and lesbians identify themselves as being in a committed relationship, with even fewer taking advantage of civil unions or,in the case of the Netherlands, of same-sex ‘marriage.’”

This indicates that even in the most "gay friendly” localities, the vast majority of homosexuals and lesbians display little inclination for the kind of life-long committed relationships that they purport to desire to enter. The legalization of marriage is so important to homosexuals because, in their mind, legal means moral. We live in a society where God and His standards have been removed. If you do not go to God’s Word for the standards of right or wrong, good or evil, where do you go? To the law.

Matt Daniels founded the Alliance for Marriage. This is one of the key groups leading the fight against same-sex marriage. He pointed out how the homosexual activists are working on the theory that to many Americans, legal means moral: "That is the reason for the movement to destroy marriage under American law. Those who are behind this movement understand that if they can ever succeed in that effort, they will change the moral and social DNA of America forever, because they will be changing our society at the highest level morally for many people, for many Americans, which is human law, especially when they invoke the Constitution.”

Daniels points out that those who have taken out long knives to plunge into the heart of traditional marriage are spending a fortune behind the scenes to get this thing passed—through the courts, by unelected judges, where "We the people” have no voice in the matter. They do all of this regardless of the consequences. Says Matt Daniels: "Most people have no idea how big this is. There is a coalition of over a dozen major activist groups that are involved in this effort. They work together systematically—as I said, they spent $200 million, and that was in 1999 alone. They’ve been spending more every year since, and that’s according to their own figures.”

Acceptance in Schools

Another aspect of the homosexual agenda is the push for acceptance in our schools. Same-sex marriage would make it difficult to stop broad, sweeping promotion of the gay lifestyle in our public schools—divorced from the consequences. Younger children are very susceptible to sexual identity teaching. When you teach a little boy from the first grade on that when he grows up, it will be perfectly all right for him to marry Billy, his friend; when you teach first-grade children that Heather has two mommies, and that’s perfectly normal—talk about creating sexual confusion. But that is what is going on in some of our schools.

If same-sex marriage becomes fully legalized across the country, then it would be very difficult to stop homosexuals and lesbians from teaching total acceptance of the lifestyle in the schools. "We are about power,” homosexual activists have said. But in their book After the Ball, Marshall Kirk and Hunter Madsen give the principles of their agenda. Listen to Principle 5: Portray gays as victims of circumstance and oppression, not as aggressive challengers. In any campaign to win over the public, gays must be portrayed as victims in need of protection so that straights will not be inclined to refuse to adopt the role of protector ... we must forego the temptation to strut our gay pride publicly to such an extent that we will undermine our victim image. The mask is off. Their real goal, of which same-sex marriage is a major strategy, is revealed—to get straight America to accept their lifestyle.

D. James Kennedy, Ph.D. and Jerry Newcombe. Adapted from What’s Wrong With Same-Sex Marriage. Why the Push for Same-Sex Marriage? Impact Newsletter. Volume XVIII, No. 5. May 2006.

The Truth about Same-Sex Marriage: 6 Things You Need to Know about What's Really at Stake Do you know what the Bible says about marriage? About homosexuality? Are you read with an answer--with all gentleness and reverence--and yet never wavering from scriptural truth? Do you know how to take your beliefs to the streets and courtrooms? Dr. Erwin W. Lutzer, pastor of the Moody Church in Chicago and esteemed theologian, will soon release The Truth About Same-Sex Marriage in response to the attacks that marriage has sustained over the past several months and years. His answers will help you formulate your own answers to outspoken opponents of the biblical definition of marriage. Be ready. Be biblical. Be responsive.

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