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YOU CAN INFLUENCE OTHERS
IN THE BATTLE FOR MARRIAGE
Christian and non-Christian men and women find
themselves in one of the most heated battles in the culture war to date. There
is a powerful force in support of legalizing same-sex marriage. This subject
will undoubtedly be discussed in your Bible class, during an evening meal with
friends, or at the office. How can you take a stand on truth and be faithful
to the Creator of marriage?
Some people want to wrap same-sex marriage in the cloak
of civil rights. Gregory Koukl, President of Stand to Reason (www.str.org),
offers logical arguments for you to use as you defend the institution of
marriage as God designed. What follows are excerpts from his reply to those
who are demanding this revision of civilization.
(“Same-Sex Marriage – Challenges and Responses”
by Gregory Koukl, Solid Ground, May/June 2004)
Challenge: “We’re being denied the same rights
as heterosexuals. This is unconstitutional discrimination.”
Response: Any homosexual can marry in any state
of the Union and receive every one of the privileges and benefits of
state-sanctioned matrimony. He just cannot marry someone of the same sex.
These are rights and restrictions all citizens share equally.
Let me illustrate. Smith and Jones both qualify to vote
in America where they are citizens. Neither is allowed to vote in France.
Jones, however, has no interest in U.S. politics; he’s partial to European
concerns. Would Jones have a case if he complained, “Smith gets to vote [in
California], but I don’t get to vote [in France]. That’s unequal protection
under the law. He has a right I don’t have.” No, both have the same rights and
the same restrictions. There is no legal inequality, only an inequality of
desire, but that is not the state’s concern.
The marriage licensing law applies to each citizen in
the same way; everyone is treated exactly alike. Homosexuals want the right to
do something no one, straight or gay, has the right to do: wed someone of the
same sex. Denying them that right is not a violation of the equal protection
clause.
It’s true that homosexual couples do not have the same
legal benefits as married heterosexuals regarding taxation, family leave, health
care, hospital visitation, inheritance, etc. However, no other non-marital
relationships between individuals – non-gay brothers, a pair of spinsters,
college roommates, fraternity brothers – share those benefits, either. Why
should they?
If homosexual couples face “unequal protection” in this
area, so does every other pair of unmarried citizens who have deep, loving
commitments to each other. Why should gays get preferential treatment just
because they are sexually involved?
The government gives special benefits to marriages and
not to others for good reason. It’s because they involve children. Tax relief
for families eases the financial burden children make on paychecks. Insurance
policies reflect the unique relationship between a wage earner and his or her
dependents. These circumstances, inherent to families, simply are not intrinsic
to other relationships, as a rule, including homosexual ones. There is no
obligation for government to give every human coupling the same entitlements
simply to “stabilize” the relationship. The unique benefits of marriage fit its
unique purpose. Marriage is not meant to be a shortcut to group insurance rates
or tax relief. It’s meant to build families.
Peter Sprigg of the Family Research Council sums the
issue up nicely:
“Gay citizens” already have the same right to marry as anyone else – subject to
the same restrictions. No one may marry a close blood relative, a child, a
person who is already married, or a person of the same sex. However much those
restrictions may disappoint the incestuous, pedophiles, polygamists, and
homosexuals, the issue is not discrimination. It is the nature of marriage
itself. (“Questions on Same-Sex Unions Answered: Responding to Andrew
Sullivan,”
www.frc.org)
Challenge: “They said the same thing about
interracial marriage.”
Response: This is strong rhetoric, but a silly
objection.
Consider two men, one rich and one poor, seeking to
withdraw money from their bank. The rich man is denied because his account is
empty. However, on closer inspection, a clerk discovers an error, corrects it,
and releases the cash. Next in line, the poor man is denied for the same
reason: insufficient funds. “That’s the same thing you said about the last
guy,” he snaps. “Yes,” the clerk replies. “We made a mistake with his account,
but not with yours. You’re broke.”
It simply is not relevant that the same objection
has been used to deny both interracial and homosexual marriage. It’s only
relevant if the circumstances are the same, regardless of the objection. They
are not.
Same-sex marriage and interracial marriage have nothing
in common. There is no difference between a black and a white human being
because skin color is morally trivial. There is an enormous difference,
however, between a man and a woman. Ethnicity has no bearing on marriage. Sex
is fundamental to marriage.
This approach won’t work to justify polygamous or
incestuous unions (“In the past people wouldn’t allow interracial marriages,
either.) It is equally ineffectual here. The objection may be the same, but
the circumstances are entirely different.
Challenge: “We shouldn’t be denied the freedom
to love who we want.”
Response: Gay marriage grants no new freedom, and
denying marriage licenses to homosexuals does not restrict any liberty. Nothing
stops anyone – of any age, race, gender, class, or sexual preference – from
making lifelong commitments to each other, pledging their troth until death do
them part. They may lack certain entitlements, but not freedoms.
Denying marriage doesn’t restrict anyone. It merely
withholds social approval from a lifestyle and set of behaviors that homosexuals
have complete freedom to pursue without it. A marriage license doesn’t give
liberty; it gives respect.
Respect is precisely what homosexual activists long for.
Same-sex marriage is not about civil rights. It’s about
validation and social respect. It is a radical attempt at civil engineering
using government muscle to strong-arm the people into accommodating a lifestyle
many find deeply offensive, contrary to nature, socially destructive, and
morally repugnant.
Columnist Jeff Jacoby summed it up this way in The
Boston Globe:
The marriage radicals . . . have not been deprived of the right to marry – only
of the right to insist that a single-sex union is a ‘marriage.’ They cloak
their demands in the language of civil rights because it sounds so much better
than the truth: They don’t want to accept or reject marriage on the same terms
that it is available to everyone else. They want it on entirely new terms.
They want it to be given a meaning it has never before had, and they prefer that
it be done undemocratically – by judicial fiat, for example, or by mayors
flouting the law. Whatever else that may be, it isn’t civil rights. (“Gay
Marriage Isn’t Civil Rights,” The Boston Globe, 3/7/04)
NOTE: For more on this issue see “When the Bride Is a
Groom” at
www.str.org |
