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Thoughts about the same-sex marriage thing

By: Leopard1996 (Diary)  |  May 11th, 2012 at 02:04 PM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

I was reading through the diary entry and post of one of the others here, and one of the respondents had asked the diarist to make a conservative arguement for “gay marriage” without using typical liberal talking points, getting into the religion conundrum, or just being downright insulting to social conservatives.

My first point is for all of us to accept a definition of conservatism as if the choice is between more government or less government, less government is always better.  Lets also accept that as conservatives we would be against any other type of discrimination where the availability of rights for one would not be available to someone else.  If these two things hold true, then it would be the conservative point of view that some legal recognition of these homesexual relationships should be recognized so that there is an equitable way for these couples to do things like transfer property upon death, name insurance beneficiaries, hospital visitation, etc. 

The questions becomes what we call it.  And that is where I too am a little leery of the marriage title.  My main reservation about the label is what can be done with that label once it is given to a homosexual couple in whatever state where they want to give that title.  For example, once a homosexual couple gets a marriage license what stops them from going to the local churh and insisting that the church marry them, and when that church doesn’t because of their 1st amendment rights, that church gets locked into litigation which could bring that church down because they are going against the unlimited resources of the ACLU. 

So where do we go from this point.  Personally, I would have no problem with a state deciding to recognize these unions as marriage, with the caveat that they would have no right to approach a church, synagogue, mosque, or recognized house of worship to force them to give a religious blessing to the union.  I would go as far as criminalize the ability to sue said religious institution so that our courts would never get bogged down with the cases. 

 

COMMENTS

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  • zachv

    Many of my fellow conservatives have an almost knee-jerk hostility toward gay marriage. This does not make sense, because same-sex unions promote the values conservatives prize. Marriage is one of the basic building blocks of our neighborhoods and our nation. At its best, it is a stable bond between two individuals who work to create a loving household and a social and economic partnership. We encourage couples to marry because the commitments they make to one another provide benefits not only to themselves but also to their families and communities. Marriage requires thinking beyond one’s own needs. It transforms two individuals into a union based on shared aspirations, and in doing so establishes a formal investment in the well-being of society. The fact that individuals who happen to be gay want to share in this vital social institution is evidence that conservative ideals enjoy widespread acceptance. Conservatives should celebrate this, rather than lament it.

    http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2010/01/08/the-conservative-case-for-gay-marriage.html

  • zachv

    What’s preventing Jew, Muslims or atheists from walking into a Christian church and suing them for not marrying them?

    Churches will not be forced to marry gays anymore than they are currently being forced to marry someone of a different faith.

    Second — why would a gay couple force a church to marry them when most Protestant churches (Lutherans, Presbyterians, Anglicans) already perform gay marriages?

    • PowerToThePeople

      and yet you keep glossing over this issue failing to ever address it no matter where you post your crap.

      I am going to just use two example out of the many and you explain to me how it will not happen when it is happening.

      Hutchinson Kansas is working on a law right now that would do the very thing you claim would not happen. They are making it so that no church can deny the use of their buildings/sanctuary for gay marriages. A refusal to abide by the law would result in both civil and criminal action. PS, the same thing is being considered in the entire state of Washington State.

      Second, gay activist groups have been petitioning certain states to enact hate crime laws that would cause any pastor or person who states homosexuality is a sin or gay marriage is a sin to be arrested and prosecuted. Seems to me this harms people.

      And stop with the nonsense, most protestant churches do not marry gay couples regardless of edicts passed by the head office. In fact most of the edicts have not required compliance, only gives the choice. So out of a 100 churches, what percent have chosen to do it….10%……..20% but under the proposed laws all churches would HAVE to comply or face arrest.

      You can keep on preaching your nonsense here till either you grow tired or the site stops it. But at least have enough moral fortitude to be honest in your arguments as that is a true conservative value.

      • lineholder

        This is one of the points that is going to be hardest to deal with. For Christians, church is a place of worshiping God…the same God who defines what sin is. The role of a pastor is to provide MORAL and SPIRITUAL leadership for the church body (i.e. members), particularly in regards to obeying the Word of God.

        Yeah, it’s going to present some problems if laws are put into place saying that pastors and their congregations have no choice on the matter.

        • acat

          I’ve heard it said it’s a group of people … but there sure are a lot of purpose-built facilities*….

          Seems to me the Hutchinson, KS dilemma is only possible if a church isn’t a group of people…

          Again, outsider here… but the double-meaning of “church” clearly plays into this.

          Mew

          * and why is it that the Episcopalians have such amazing and varied architecture, while the Catholics are merely varied, and the Baptists seem to always go for Gothic designs?

          • PowerToThePeople

            yet we still need a structure to live in. And we shoot those who break into the structure.

            A church CAN be where two or more meet, but a house of worship (church, sanctuary) is the structure where the people congregate. You could take away the structure (by force, natural disaster, etc) and you could still hold church, but that still does not mean we should sit by and allow it.

          • acat

            but I get your meaning.

            The point I’m after, though, you seem to have missed, so let me try again.

            “Using your opponents’ strength against him” …

            If the government seeks to define who can control what happens in a house of worship, then .. remove the house of worship and let ‘em flounder.

            This law isn’t about forcing use of a facility, it’s another step in forcing acceptance of a minority lifestyle. Not tolerance, not even legal equality, acceptance. Yes, congregations are going to be shaken by this .. they were shaken by slavery and by interracial marriages as well, what’s new there?

            Eventually, the ministers (or priests or rabbis or whatever title a given group assigns) end up sitting alongside pharmacists and others, and we end up at the root question…

            Can pharmacists be forced to sell morning-after pills? Can a religious leader (shepherd?) be forced to perform a gay marriage?

            The answer is, I believe, no… and both stem from individual liberty as well as freedom of religion.

            Mew

          • lineholder

            Already, efforts are underway to remove conscientious objections clauses that have protected physicians and other health care professional who do not choose to be directly involved in abortions.

            http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/26/opinion/from-rep-joe-pitts-er-care-and-abortion.html

            If laws such as the one being considered in KS are passed, then the ACLU will become an advocate for the LGBT community in protecting any rights that might be provided within the scope of that law.

            As of yet, there are no such conscientious objections provisions that exist where the actions of a pastor who might refuse to perform a ceremony for reasons of conscientious objections. And given RECENT trending patterns, (with recent obviously being the operative word)….would YOU really want to place any bets as to the outcome of such litigation would be?

          • lineholder

            is that if a church body (congregation) wants to prevent this type of scenario, then simply don’t offer any marriage ceremonies at all in the church building.

            It still leaves the issue of any “hate laws” restricting speech to be addressed, though.

          • PowerToThePeople

            but the problem is that it is not a reality anymore.

            There are a ton of churches that “could” just stop worshiping in a building, but most could not. Where do you meet that can accommodate 6000 as my church has.

            I just think that there comes a point we have to say no, not just play games.

          • lineholder

            in this particular case, if the kinds of legal actions being pursued in KS extend nationally.

        • westcoastpatriette

          of the radical leftists and individual liberty and will stop all the attempts to force homosexuality on the rest of us. The First Amendment will continue to prevail, I believe, as the protector of our religious freedom. Churches cannot be forced to bow to the homosexual demands for equal rights as long as we have the Bill of Rights standing in their way. Same with trying to force their beliefs on us as individuals. Legal protections for homosexuality violate the first amendment’s protections of religious liberty. Period. The two cannot be reconciled unless our Constitution is abolished.

          • lineholder

            I suspect that people who are gay could find it much harder to win their case than they might think on this point.

      • zachv

        Right on the facts, but close. Hutchinson is making it so that any church that offers its building to the general public can’t deny gays to rent it out. The rule here.

        “… if a church has a parish hall that they rent out to the general public, they could not discriminate against a gay couple who want to rent the building for a party. If the church only rents the building to their parishioners, they can continue to do so.”

        The edicts that you talk about have generally been majority votes by the congregations. Therefore, it has to be at least 50% of ELCA Lutheran, Methodist, Anglican, UCC, etc congregations.

        • Jack_Savage

          Much like Obama’s edict on birth control, churches will be forced to deny access to their buildings to the general public – AA meetings, basketball leagues, yoga classes. Gay activists have swung at churches, and hit innocent bystanders yet again, just like abortion / contraceptive activists have done when it comes to the Catholic church.

          As I have said before, gay activists will happily tear anything apart that doesn’t submit to their will. And you all wonder why Amendment One passes 61% – 39%. It’s self-defense as much as anything.

        • lineholder

          So, this much more than just a simple move for gay marriage, isn’t it?

        • PowerToThePeople

          you are playing semantics and you know it.

          Most churches allow rental, whether free or not, to the community as part of their outreach. They also allow members to utilize their buildings. Each and every church would be forced to chose between ministry and gay marriage and that is not acceptable, period.

          And if you do not know what you are talking about when it comes to how votes are handled, do not mention it. You are wrong on how the votes are held.

          I just had this discussion with the pastor that coaches with me in TBall. He is the Lutheran pastor of our town. The decisions made, this time was whether or not to allow gay ministers, are one vote per church which the lead minister makes. One could state that he makes the decision based on his congregations wishes and while that may be true sometimes, it is also false. My friend voted no, the pastor of a church one town over voted yes in clear violation of his congregations wishes. The congregants tried to fire him, but the headquarters said no. So when he came to pastor the next week, one family was there, the rest visited other churches.

          Lets not play semantics shall we Zach. The law will affect many many churches both in KN and in Washington State and will affect many people who do not believe the way you and other gay people want them to believe. And most churches do not hold gay marriages regardless of the vote. This is not an assumption, it is a fact. You just need to be honest in your arguments instead of trying to act as if gay marriage would not hurt anyone and the skies would remain beautiful.

  • keepcoolwithcoolidge

    And from a religious standpoint, everyone is a sinner. We don’t criminalize sin in the U.S., we criminalize actions that infringe upon the rights of others. Murder and theft are illegal because the harm someone else’s rights. It is not illegal to lie to you brother’s face so long as no direct economic or physical harm results.

    As all sins are equal, I can’t help but feel that its kind of hypocritical to pick and choose what sins the government should enforce and which they shouldn’t. Gingrich cheated on 2 different wives. He’s not in jail nor should he be. So I never see the argument in “the Bible says homosexuality is a sin, so we should use government to restrict the activity of homosexuals,” when the Bible also says that the we should honor the sabbath, but we don’t target violators of that anymore. Everyone is a sinner and all sins are equal, so relying on the fact that something is “sinful” as justification for big government is hypocritical unless applied to all sins, you know the whole “log in your own eye, speck in your brother’s” argument. Then we are all in jail.

    • PowerToThePeople

      as is really an asinine argument.

      No one is calling for any “sinner” to be put in jail so not sure why you bring it up.

      The Bible clearly states to judge a sin no matter how you try to twist the verse you used.

      And denying gay activist the ability to trounce all over traditional marriage has nothing to do with the Bible.

      Try again and this time try to not make yourself look like a fool. Damn you morons are a joke.

    • Jack_Savage

      That’s one big difference here, and why we are now having to focus on this issue.

    • Viet71

      Erick said this morning all sins are equal. Check.

      And you are correct legally: The law does not criminalize sins. The law criminalizes wrongs against the state.

      I know that sound odd.

      But murder, for example, is a wrong against the state, from a legal viewpoint.

      Sins, I don’t know. I started re-reading Genesis today. Utterly fascinating. But does one person or group get to say what sin is? I’m waiting for the Book of Revelations.

      • lineholder

        You really have to step “outside the box” when you get to Revelations, though.

        • Viet71

          In Genesis, God interacts directly with his spawn. God is vengeful, because man fails.

          Right there, a whole bunch of issues:

          1) If God created man in his his own image, why did God punish man for transgressing God’s order?

          2) If the answer is, God was was displeased, then I guess we all need to find our own place.

          I’m confused.

          • lineholder

            We were made in God’s image, yes, but God wanted us to have the option to CHOOSE between good and evil of our own accord. Remember…He created us, and if He wanted us to be exactly the same and perfect in all things, then He could have just made us with the same level of wisdom and knowledge, character and holiness, righteousness and justice, that He possesses from the get-go…with no part of our nature as human beings that is vulnerable to what is of evil in life on any level whatsoever, no part of us that could ever be tempted to do anything wrong.

            So, He makes us in His image, yes, with the potential to succeed in what is right and good and honest and holy in life, but also with the potential for what is of evil as well.

            Then He says, “Don’t eat of this tree”. And He attaches a statement providing information about what the outcomes and consequences of it would end up being if they did. He was just telling Adam and Eve the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about. And what does Satan in the form of the serpent do? He automatically sees this as an opening, a means of tempting Adam and Eve (with Eve being first). What means does he use of tempting them? By appealing to their vanity, for one thing. “You’ll know everything that God knows”, yada, yada. And implying that God was lying to them, to undermine their trust and confidence in God. You get the idea, right?

            So rather than recognize that what God had done was to tell them truth from the get-go (about the consequences) and understanding that God was doing this because it was what would be right for them to do and best for them in the long run, and simply trusting Him on this point, they went against all of that. They gave way to temptations, and in doing so, failed to do what was right.

            Romans 3:23 “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God”. We aren’t perfect, Viet71. We have the potential for both good and evil inside who we are as human beings. All of us do.

            I’m sure that there are plenty of other people here at RS who can contribute much more in-depth knowledge than I might have, Viet71. I’m usually something of a reductionist in how I look at things, and I often express it in the simplest terms I can find.

            Stay with it, if you can find the interest and desire to do so.

          • lineholder

            and by an act of that will, we can choose.

          • westcoastpatriette

            but with the help of many good Bible teachers and lots of my own study, I see the love of God — as opposed to the vengeance of God — woven throughout the book.

            In the book of Genesis, for example, if God were vengeful — as it seems at first glance — because of the holiness and righteousness of God, Adam and Eve would have died immediately when they disobeyed God. But in His loving kindness and everlasting mercy, God provided the first animal sacrifice to atone for their sins until the ultimate and final sacrifice (Jesus) would pay the penalty for our sins in full at Calvary. See Genesis 3:21. So, God always had salvation on his mind for us as he knows how weak and frail we are.

            Thrilled to hear you have dusted off your Bible. Be sure to find good teachers to listen to. Cinco Solas here at RS is outstanding. Read everything he writes as he has a beautiful, in depth knowledge of scripture as well as tons of wisdom on how to deal with the cultural wars we are facing now. Good luck to you..

  • conservativerock5

    Which is to remove the power of the state from defining marriage. This is the best for both sides. From the Christian perspective, state defined marriage is blasphemy IMO. From the gay perspective, they can call themselves married if they want to. Both sides reserve the right to recognize their personal view of marriage.

    But instead, everyone is more interesting in “winning” and forcing their views on others. Two-party statism, isn’t it great?

    • acat

      and if the liberals run like they usually do …

      I give their “marriage experiment” 10 years. Tops.

      Mew

    • http://impudent.edublogs.org/ kyle8

      It causes me the most pain that on any given subject, it is the hardest thing to convince people that allowing more liberty and less government is usually the best solution.

      And many on the right find it just as hard to believe as do the left.