A so-called conservative writer parroted some silly arguments for same-sex marriage in – where else? – the Age yesterday. He finished by saying that marriage is a good thing (which it is), so it should be available for homosexuals as well. He is wrong big time here.
First of all, it is heterosexual marriage which is good for couples, not any old relationship. The wonderful interaction of a man and a woman in the complementarity of heterosexual marriage is what makes it so special and beneficial. This is not true of other types of live-in situations.
But there is an even more important reason why this writer is so very wrong. The truth is, homosexuals do not at all have in mind what most of us understand marriage to be. Indeed, they have something radically different in mind. Most seek to radically expand and alter the common understanding of marriage. Long-term monogamous fidelity is seldom part of this new understanding.
Simply reading through the homosexual press this becomes clear. Many seem to want to have their cake and eat it too. Article titles such as “How to Stay Married and Still Be a Slut” are not all that uncommon. Many homosexuals happily admit that traditional heterosexual marriage constraints are not exactly their cup of tea.
One homosexual writer for example, Andrew Sullivan, writes that if homosexual marriage contracts come into force, they would have to be “different”: that is, they would have to allow for “extra-marital outlets” and other major changes. Of course that undermines the very essence of marriage, which is the covenant of life-long sexual faithfulness.
It is worth quoting Sullivan further here. He speaks about the “foibles of a simple heterosexual model” for homosexual relationships. And then he makes this telling admission:
“I believe strongly that marriage should be made available to everyone, in a politics of strict public neutrality. But within this model, there is plenty of scope for cultural difference. There is something baleful about the attempt of some gay conservatives to educate homosexuals and lesbians into an uncritical acceptance of a stifling model of heterosexual normality. The truth is, homosexuals are not entirely normal; and to flatten their varied and complicated lives into a single, moralistic model is to miss what is essential and exhilarating about their otherness.”
Elizabeth Kristol offers some trenchant commentary on this: “Rote? Stifling? Moralistic? These are strange epithets to come upon in the final pages of a book whose goal is to convince readers that homosexuals want to marry and deserve to marry; that homosexual love is as dignified as heterosexual love; that it is inhumane not to allow the dignity of this love to find fruition in marriage; that marriage is so venerable an institution that it is single-handedly capable of leading men out of lives of empty promiscuity into unions of commitment and fidelity. Suddenly we learn, almost as an afterthought, that the institution of marriage may have to change to accommodate the special needs of homosexuals.”
Quite so. Indeed, as has been frequently documented, monogamy is rather rare in homosexual relationships. Many homosexual commentators have made it clear that if and when they do achieve the right to “marry” they will demand to radically redefine what that term means. Several more examples can be mentioned here.
Same-sex marriage proponent Richard Mohr openly affirms the importance of “flexibility” in same-sex unions. He is unashamed in saying this: “Monogamy is not an essential component of love and marriage.” Lesbian activist Paula Ettelbrick put it this way:
“Being queer is more than setting up house, sleeping with a person of the same gender, and seeking state approval for doing so. . . . Being queer means pushing the parameters of sex, sexuality, and family, and in the process, transforming the very fabric of society. . . . As a lesbian, I am fundamentally different from non-lesbian women. . . . In arguing for the right to legal marriage, lesbians and gay men would be forced to claim that we are just like heterosexual couples, have the same goals and purposes, and vow to structure our lives similarly. . . . We must keep our eyes on the goals of providing true alternatives to marriage and of radically reordering society’s views of reality.”
Homosexual activists Kirk and Madsen speak about how “open relationships” are so appealing to homosexual lovers. They speak about the “wayward impulse” as being “inevitable in man-to-man affairs, as in man-to-woman, only, for gays, it starts itching faster”.
They go on to say that “the cheating ratio of ‘married’ gay males, given enough time, approaches 100%. Men are, after all, as said earlier, more easily aroused than women, who tend to act as a relatively stabilizing influence; a restless gay man is more apt to be led astray by a cute face in the subway or the supermarket. Two gay men are double trouble, arithmetically squaring the probability of the fatal affairette.”
William Aaron, a former homosexual, explains why concepts such as “monogamy” must be redefined by homosexuals: “In the gay life, fidelity is almost impossible. Since part of the compulsion of homosexuality seems to be a need on the part of the homophile to ‘absorb’ masculinity from his sexual partners, he must be constantly on the lookout for [new partners]. Consequently the most successful homophile ‘marriages’ are those where there is an arrangement between the two to have affairs on the side while maintaining the semblance of permanence in their living arrangement.”
American homosexual activist Michelangelo Signorile makes similar remarks, urging activists 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 that as it now stands keeps us down. The most subversive action lesbians and gay men can undertake – and one that would perhaps benefit society – is to transform the notion of ‘family’ entirely.”
Or as he said several years later: “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.”
Indeed, legalising same-sex marriage is not a minor or peripheral social shift. It is social change on a massive scale. Advocates of homosexual marriage admit as much. In addition to the quotes just given, consider one final remark. Leading homosexual marriage advocate Evan Wolfson admits to just what will happen: “This won’t just be a change in the law either; it will be a change in society. For if we do it right, the struggle to win the freedom to marry will bring much more along the way.”
The attempt to radically redefine the very essence of marriage is not a minor word change. It will be a major transformation of society as we know it. But the radical social activists know they have to weaken up the public to accept such massive social changes.
That is why it is a truism that social engineering is always preceded by verbal engineering. And there is plenty of this verbal sleight of hand taking place right now, even by so-called conservative social commentators.
Couples can decide their own rules in marriage. They can and they do. It’s not like everyone that has ever been married has never had extra marital affairs, it goes on rather a lot.
Men like having sex, some have it with other women, other than their wives, some have it with other men. Just because you don’t think it happens when a couple is married, doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen.
I can’t recall ever seeing an article in the gay press suggesting that I could still be a slut. I must look that up. It would seem that your information is out of date, and that in fact the information your are peddling needs a bit more scrutiny as it is uncommon to see such articles. (That’s not to suggest that they don’t exist)
Gregory Storer
Thanks Gregory
Ah, more wit and wisdom from the Secular Party of Australia candidate. Let me just slightly alter your comment: “Couples can decide their own rules in sex. They can and they do.” Yep, some people are into paedophilia, some into incest, some into group sex, and some into bestiality. We just make the rules up as we go along. After all, there is no absolute right and wrong in the homosexualist and secularist world view.
Indeed, “People can decide their own rules in football. They can and they do.” Thus I will demand the right to play for the Geelong Cats. Never mind that I am old, overweight, unfit, and have never played a game of AFL in my life. But hey, that’s OK, we can just make up the rules as we go along. All I have to do is scream ‘discrimination’. That should do.
And by the way, every time I touch the football, no one is allowed to tackle me. Every time I kick a behind, I will get 20 points, and every time I kick a goal I will get 50 points. Let’s get real here; the rules are simply whatever I decide they should be.
And then you don’t like who I quote. The article I was responding to quoted some of the same authors. So it was OK for him to do it, but when I do the same thing I am using “out of date” information! This is so typical of how your side “argues”. Sorry, but your do not seem to be making much of a case here.
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
This is a very interesting statement: “Homosexual activists Kirk and Madsen speak about how “open relationships” are so appealing to homosexual lovers. They speak about the “wayward impulse” as being “inevitable in man-to-man affairs, as in man-to-woman, only, for gays, it starts itching faster”.”
Any person who uses his brain at all would immediately ask why that is so? The possible answers do not encourage me to think that the homosexual lifestyle is to be sought after.
John Symons
You should come over to the UK, Bill, where homosexuals can now have “civil partnerships” which they keep calling “marriage” just to wind decent people up the wrong way.
They think nothing of holding hands and kissing in the streets, and all kinds of terrible sins go on on Clapham Common – all in the name of “tolerance” and “diversity”.
I’m only thankful that there are some beacons of hope out there, like Australia and the US, that haven’t fully succumbed to the homosexual agenda. Christianity is practically illegal here now.
Barbara Murray-Leach, UK
Perhaps another analogy would be the issue of becoming a citizen of foreign country. Wannabe immigrants have to swear oaths of allegiance to a host country and to uphold its values. Militants Muslims, however, wish to claim residency of Western countries without having to assimilate and merge with the indigenous population. What they want however is not to destroy a country, but to change it so as to make it conform to Islam.
But those arriving on our shores from Gaytranselvania and Lesboland (assuming of course that their gay genes, like those coming from Jamaica, would show us their place of origin) wish go much further. Not only do they reject assimilation and settling down to raising families, but they are intent on discarding any and all constraints and limitations that are normally accepted to becoming a citizen of cohesive, stable nation. In other words they wish to destroy any and all border controls. Want they want is a global utopia without limits or constraints. It means the destruction of marriage, family and the nation, for these by definition exclude absolute sexual anarchy which inevitably causes destabilisation, disintegration, destruction, disease and death.
David Skinner, UK
Listen to Peter Tatchell:
“Lesbian and gay freedom involves more than mere equal rights….. queer politics celebrates sexual difference, opposes both assimilationism and separatism, seeks social transformation, and affirms that everyone is potentially queer……queer politics positively celebrates sexual difference. It rejects the idea that the campaign for our human rights should be based on the argument that homosexuals are ‘just the same’ as heterosexuals, or that we are ‘just as good’ as straights. The sexual behaviour, relationships, aesthetics, and lifestyles of these queer dissidents are quite dissimilar to those of the average heterosexual.……n many ways, our transcending of heterosexual mores is a positive and immensely liberating experience. Compared with most straights, queers tend to be more sexually adventurous with a wider repertoire of sexual behaviour, less bound by the strictures of traditional morality, and more experimental in terms of relationships…….queer politics challenges the heterocentric view that exclusive heterosexuality is somehow natural and eternal, and that lesbian and gay sexuality is inevitably destined to remain a minority sexual orientation. It sees sexuality as being primarily a social construction, rather than a biological given.
Who we are attracted to largely derives from a combination of social experience and ideology. In other words, everyone is born with the potential to be queer. Exclusive heterosexuality is mainly the result of a socially-encouraged repression of same-sex desire. In a society where there were no pressures or privileges associated with being straight, a lot more people would be queer or bisexual. Lesbian and gay attraction would cease to be a minority sexual orientation and become something that almost everyone would experience…..”
Some really good points to ponder. Essential and exhilarating about their otherness, this is priceless. Honestly Bill, they reason like a 7 year old just bigger words.
Daniel Kempton
I think this is where the marriage act needs to be strengthened. If the homosexual lobby were to get the “rights” of marriage, then marriage needs stronger protection for monogamy. That is to say that if you wish to be married, then extramarital affairs would be deemed illegal, consensual or not.
And why would the homosexual lobby disagree? They want marriage, don’t they? Then they have the same responsibilities. Including being faithful. If they disagree, then you have the smoking gun to prove that marriage isn’t something they require.
“If you want marriage, but don’t want to be faithful, then why do you want marriage in the first place?”
Ask that in a public forum, and you get an interesting response from the audience whilst leaving a bitter taste in the mouth of those you debate.
John McKay
If the “cheating ratio” of “married” male homosexual couples approaches 100% given enough time then that means a progressively higher incidence of sexually transmitted diseases amongst the couples. That is not marriage but self-destruction. And it will stigmatise male homosexuality, along with other typical characteristics, the more open the problems become. Stigma is of course what they are trying to avoid by creating a veneer of normality through “marriage”.
I also think the much vaunted acceptance of homosexuality in the liberal West is partly illusory. It seems to be maintained in the abstract by avoiding attention to the gritty behavioural details. Perhaps in the future when we have the burden of health costs aggravated by diminished resources people will be more willing to question the social costs. After all, homosexuality does not seem to have any useful function, unlike heterosexuality.
John Snowden
Dear Bill,
Thanks for your courageous work. The above article is most enlightening because it brings out the essential libertarianism that is foundational to the homosexual marriage push.
I’m wondering if you are aware of the great work being done by the Christian sociologist, Bruce Wearne (dr) in this field? His articles can be found at http://members.ozemail.com.au/~bcwearne/nj.htm . Again thanks for your hard work. We need articulate voices in the Christian community today speaking out on these matters.
Ian Ridgway
Thanks Ian
I don’t think I have heard of him before, so I will check it out, thanks.
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
To all those above.
I worked for many years in Sexual Health Policy (Govt advisor) on the issue of HIV/AIDS. One of most profound statements on fidelity came from a gay colleague.
He remarked to me one day (on fidelity amongst gay men in Sydney)…
“Paul it’s not uncommon for us to have 10 different partners in a single night”….
He might have been lying; he might have been exaggerating…. But as a gay man, and as a gay activist he was at least comfortable to acknowledge that monogamy is not exactly the “norm” for gay men.
I want to say this though… I love gay men. I’ve held many in my arms and I’ve wept with them – some of whom were dying of AIDS. I’ve eaten with them, I’ve laughed with them, I’ve shared deep truths and have been overwhelmed by some of the moments of transparent humanity I’ve shared with them… I believe I have the love of God in my heart and I LOVE these men.
But we need to be real about the facts for (as Bill correctly points out and I’ve vociferously DISAGREED with Bill on some issues previously) gay men are highly unlikely to adhere to society’s monogamous marriage vows norm because for the vast majority it’s just not a cultural option. Moreover, (in my experience working in the field) monogamy is at best, tacitly shunned.
Herein lays the crux of the problem: Bill articulates that to move “forwards” to gay marriage legislation actually reconstructs society as we know it. I happen to agree.
Whether anticipated or not, a “Trojan horse” stands at the door of our society.
One of the most admired gay spokesmen I’ve ever read spoke openly… He wrote (in the late 80’s) and I’ll paraphrase… “Let’s not pretend that we can fit the gay lifestyle into the Bible because it can’t be done. We need to reject the Biblical authority and move on. Let’s just be honest about it”. That’s an author I respect. No subterfuge, no smoke and mirrors, just raw honesty about the issues at hand.
On Greg’s allegation that Bill’s information “must be out of date” I say this… Just wander down Oxford St (Sydney) this Saturday night and you’ll see “up to date” culture in action.
Shalom,
Paul Evans
Well said Paul.
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
Thanks Paul
That’s a timely piece you put together. We all can get of track and i think i have been, the important thing is we love humans. This infiltration into marriage with an agenda is like having a black baby because its fashionable.
OK so your Gay but do you really want the world to be Gay and can being Gay be the answer to the worlds problems? Admittingly the leaders of this world haven’t done a great job. But i don’t see you digging wells in Africa so some Kids have some water. Just like the Muslims are for themselves, its all about you.
Daniel Kempton
Paul Evans – could you send me your email address?
Thanks
Love in Jesus
PS Love your insights and experience and authority base.
Ian Brearley
Thanks Ian
I will send it to you.
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
Thank you Bill. I’ve never looked at this topic’s ‘for and against’ previously. Good on you for upholding purity and faithfulness. I am a teacher. Unfaithfulness and unnecessary divorce brings such sadness and wreckage to our social fabric.
Neil Geuer
Thanks Bill for your great articles.
This week I sent a very well put together letter to the Sydney Morning Herald in response to a very silly letter from a lady claiming every extended family has a gay person living in it and that her 2 cousins living in 25 year monogamous gay relationship were essentially the normal expectation for gay couples.
I argued as you do that the heterosexual definition of marriage is completely different to a homosexual viewpoint and that a even 5 year “monogamous” gay marriage was not the norm based on current data.
You guessed it.
The pro Gay Sydney Morning Herald didn’t print my letter. SMH is prepared to promote and print facile and erroneous viewpoints that support gay marriage but won’t print a letter with some serious quality.
On another front, abuse and ridicule of those against Gay Marriage is also now common in Australian media. Bella Counihan’s ‘Gay marriage dinosaurs should evolve or die out’ was reprinted across many papers in Australia and of course, the old favourite “homophobe” tag is commonly used in the media for anyone who dares makes a non positive comment on gays.
Regrettably this is what the supporters of traditional marriage in Australia now face along with the “big mouth” American gay celebrities such as Ms Portia de Rossi arguing for leadership from PM Julia Gillard.
Why doesn’t Ms Portia de Portia butt out. Portia de Rossi doesn’t live in this country, she doesn’t pay taxes in Australia and doesn’t even vote. It’s unbelievable. Why should Portia de Rossi’s viewpoint be given a higher priority against all others who are Australians and will have to put up with gay marriage if it comes in. It’s a pathetic situation.
Keep up the fight Bill. You and others such as Warwick Marsh and Fred Nile are in the minority and it is very sad that the majority of Christians in Australia who should be saying something are completely apathetic. Christians can stop gay marriage if they are prepared to commit themselves to the fight.
3400 years of heterosexual marriage as defined as a male and female union and first referenced in Deuteronomy may be permanently degraded by the gay community.
Marriage as a foundational union critical to society and protection of children is now being treated so so lightly. We are clearly living in the latter days. Christ’s return may now be only 10-20 years away. It will probably get a lot worse towards the end.
Note: We must pray daily for PM Julia Gillard that she will protect the institution of marriage.
best wishes and Christian love
Phil Browne
Bill,
Couples can decide their own rules in marriage. They can and they do. It’s not like everyone that has ever been married has never had extra marital affairs, it goes on rather a lot.
Men like having sex, some have it with other women, other than their wives, some have it with other men. Just because you don’t think it happens when a couple is married, doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen.
I can’t recall ever seeing an article in the gay press suggesting that I could still be a slut. I must look that up. It would seem that your information is out of date, and that in fact the information your are peddling needs a bit more scrutiny as it is uncommon to see such articles. (That’s not to suggest that they don’t exist)
Gregory Storer
Thanks Gregory
Ah, more wit and wisdom from the Secular Party of Australia candidate. Let me just slightly alter your comment: “Couples can decide their own rules in sex. They can and they do.” Yep, some people are into paedophilia, some into incest, some into group sex, and some into bestiality. We just make the rules up as we go along. After all, there is no absolute right and wrong in the homosexualist and secularist world view.
Indeed, “People can decide their own rules in football. They can and they do.” Thus I will demand the right to play for the Geelong Cats. Never mind that I am old, overweight, unfit, and have never played a game of AFL in my life. But hey, that’s OK, we can just make up the rules as we go along. All I have to do is scream ‘discrimination’. That should do.
And by the way, every time I touch the football, no one is allowed to tackle me. Every time I kick a behind, I will get 20 points, and every time I kick a goal I will get 50 points. Let’s get real here; the rules are simply whatever I decide they should be.
And then you don’t like who I quote. The article I was responding to quoted some of the same authors. So it was OK for him to do it, but when I do the same thing I am using “out of date” information! This is so typical of how your side “argues”. Sorry, but your do not seem to be making much of a case here.
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
This is a very interesting statement: “Homosexual activists Kirk and Madsen speak about how “open relationships” are so appealing to homosexual lovers. They speak about the “wayward impulse” as being “inevitable in man-to-man affairs, as in man-to-woman, only, for gays, it starts itching faster”.”
Any person who uses his brain at all would immediately ask why that is so? The possible answers do not encourage me to think that the homosexual lifestyle is to be sought after.
John Symons
You should come over to the UK, Bill, where homosexuals can now have “civil partnerships” which they keep calling “marriage” just to wind decent people up the wrong way.
They think nothing of holding hands and kissing in the streets, and all kinds of terrible sins go on on Clapham Common – all in the name of “tolerance” and “diversity”.
I’m only thankful that there are some beacons of hope out there, like Australia and the US, that haven’t fully succumbed to the homosexual agenda. Christianity is practically illegal here now.
Barbara Murray-Leach, UK
Perhaps another analogy would be the issue of becoming a citizen of foreign country. Wannabe immigrants have to swear oaths of allegiance to a host country and to uphold its values. Militants Muslims, however, wish to claim residency of Western countries without having to assimilate and merge with the indigenous population. What they want however is not to destroy a country, but to change it so as to make it conform to Islam.
But those arriving on our shores from Gaytranselvania and Lesboland (assuming of course that their gay genes, like those coming from Jamaica, would show us their place of origin) wish go much further. Not only do they reject assimilation and settling down to raising families, but they are intent on discarding any and all constraints and limitations that are normally accepted to becoming a citizen of cohesive, stable nation. In other words they wish to destroy any and all border controls. Want they want is a global utopia without limits or constraints. It means the destruction of marriage, family and the nation, for these by definition exclude absolute sexual anarchy which inevitably causes destabilisation, disintegration, destruction, disease and death.
David Skinner, UK
Listen to Peter Tatchell:
“Lesbian and gay freedom involves more than mere equal rights….. queer politics celebrates sexual difference, opposes both assimilationism and separatism, seeks social transformation, and affirms that everyone is potentially queer……queer politics positively celebrates sexual difference. It rejects the idea that the campaign for our human rights should be based on the argument that homosexuals are ‘just the same’ as heterosexuals, or that we are ‘just as good’ as straights. The sexual behaviour, relationships, aesthetics, and lifestyles of these queer dissidents are quite dissimilar to those of the average heterosexual.……n many ways, our transcending of heterosexual mores is a positive and immensely liberating experience. Compared with most straights, queers tend to be more sexually adventurous with a wider repertoire of sexual behaviour, less bound by the strictures of traditional morality, and more experimental in terms of relationships…….queer politics challenges the heterocentric view that exclusive heterosexuality is somehow natural and eternal, and that lesbian and gay sexuality is inevitably destined to remain a minority sexual orientation. It sees sexuality as being primarily a social construction, rather than a biological given.
Who we are attracted to largely derives from a combination of social experience and ideology. In other words, everyone is born with the potential to be queer. Exclusive heterosexuality is mainly the result of a socially-encouraged repression of same-sex desire. In a society where there were no pressures or privileges associated with being straight, a lot more people would be queer or bisexual. Lesbian and gay attraction would cease to be a minority sexual orientation and become something that almost everyone would experience…..”
http://www.petertatchell.net/lgbt_rights/equality_not_enough/beyond_equality.htm
David Skinner, UK
Thank You Bill
Some really good points to ponder. Essential and exhilarating about their otherness, this is priceless. Honestly Bill, they reason like a 7 year old just bigger words.
Daniel Kempton
I think this is where the marriage act needs to be strengthened. If the homosexual lobby were to get the “rights” of marriage, then marriage needs stronger protection for monogamy. That is to say that if you wish to be married, then extramarital affairs would be deemed illegal, consensual or not.
And why would the homosexual lobby disagree? They want marriage, don’t they? Then they have the same responsibilities. Including being faithful. If they disagree, then you have the smoking gun to prove that marriage isn’t something they require.
“If you want marriage, but don’t want to be faithful, then why do you want marriage in the first place?”
Ask that in a public forum, and you get an interesting response from the audience whilst leaving a bitter taste in the mouth of those you debate.
John McKay
If the “cheating ratio” of “married” male homosexual couples approaches 100% given enough time then that means a progressively higher incidence of sexually transmitted diseases amongst the couples. That is not marriage but self-destruction. And it will stigmatise male homosexuality, along with other typical characteristics, the more open the problems become. Stigma is of course what they are trying to avoid by creating a veneer of normality through “marriage”.
I also think the much vaunted acceptance of homosexuality in the liberal West is partly illusory. It seems to be maintained in the abstract by avoiding attention to the gritty behavioural details. Perhaps in the future when we have the burden of health costs aggravated by diminished resources people will be more willing to question the social costs. After all, homosexuality does not seem to have any useful function, unlike heterosexuality.
John Snowden
Dear Bill,
Thanks for your courageous work. The above article is most enlightening because it brings out the essential libertarianism that is foundational to the homosexual marriage push.
I’m wondering if you are aware of the great work being done by the Christian sociologist, Bruce Wearne (dr) in this field? His articles can be found at
http://members.ozemail.com.au/~bcwearne/nj.htm . Again thanks for your hard work. We need articulate voices in the Christian community today speaking out on these matters.
Ian Ridgway
Thanks Ian
I don’t think I have heard of him before, so I will check it out, thanks.
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
To all those above.
I worked for many years in Sexual Health Policy (Govt advisor) on the issue of HIV/AIDS. One of most profound statements on fidelity came from a gay colleague.
He remarked to me one day (on fidelity amongst gay men in Sydney)…
“Paul it’s not uncommon for us to have 10 different partners in a single night”….
He might have been lying; he might have been exaggerating…. But as a gay man, and as a gay activist he was at least comfortable to acknowledge that monogamy is not exactly the “norm” for gay men.
I want to say this though… I love gay men. I’ve held many in my arms and I’ve wept with them – some of whom were dying of AIDS. I’ve eaten with them, I’ve laughed with them, I’ve shared deep truths and have been overwhelmed by some of the moments of transparent humanity I’ve shared with them… I believe I have the love of God in my heart and I LOVE these men.
But we need to be real about the facts for (as Bill correctly points out and I’ve vociferously DISAGREED with Bill on some issues previously) gay men are highly unlikely to adhere to society’s monogamous marriage vows norm because for the vast majority it’s just not a cultural option. Moreover, (in my experience working in the field) monogamy is at best, tacitly shunned.
Herein lays the crux of the problem: Bill articulates that to move “forwards” to gay marriage legislation actually reconstructs society as we know it. I happen to agree.
Whether anticipated or not, a “Trojan horse” stands at the door of our society.
One of the most admired gay spokesmen I’ve ever read spoke openly… He wrote (in the late 80’s) and I’ll paraphrase… “Let’s not pretend that we can fit the gay lifestyle into the Bible because it can’t be done. We need to reject the Biblical authority and move on. Let’s just be honest about it”. That’s an author I respect. No subterfuge, no smoke and mirrors, just raw honesty about the issues at hand.
On Greg’s allegation that Bill’s information “must be out of date” I say this… Just wander down Oxford St (Sydney) this Saturday night and you’ll see “up to date” culture in action.
Shalom,
Paul Evans
Well said Paul.
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
Thanks Paul
That’s a timely piece you put together. We all can get of track and i think i have been, the important thing is we love humans. This infiltration into marriage with an agenda is like having a black baby because its fashionable.
OK so your Gay but do you really want the world to be Gay and can being Gay be the answer to the worlds problems? Admittingly the leaders of this world haven’t done a great job. But i don’t see you digging wells in Africa so some Kids have some water. Just like the Muslims are for themselves, its all about you.
Daniel Kempton
Paul Evans – could you send me your email address?
Thanks
Love in Jesus
PS Love your insights and experience and authority base.
Ian Brearley
Thanks Ian
I will send it to you.
Bill Muehlenberg, CultureWatch
Thank you Bill. I’ve never looked at this topic’s ‘for and against’ previously. Good on you for upholding purity and faithfulness. I am a teacher. Unfaithfulness and unnecessary divorce brings such sadness and wreckage to our social fabric.
Neil Geuer
Thanks Bill for your great articles.
This week I sent a very well put together letter to the Sydney Morning Herald in response to a very silly letter from a lady claiming every extended family has a gay person living in it and that her 2 cousins living in 25 year monogamous gay relationship were essentially the normal expectation for gay couples.
I argued as you do that the heterosexual definition of marriage is completely different to a homosexual viewpoint and that a even 5 year “monogamous” gay marriage was not the norm based on current data.
You guessed it.
The pro Gay Sydney Morning Herald didn’t print my letter. SMH is prepared to promote and print facile and erroneous viewpoints that support gay marriage but won’t print a letter with some serious quality.
On another front, abuse and ridicule of those against Gay Marriage is also now common in Australian media. Bella Counihan’s ‘Gay marriage dinosaurs should evolve or die out’ was reprinted across many papers in Australia and of course, the old favourite “homophobe” tag is commonly used in the media for anyone who dares makes a non positive comment on gays.
Regrettably this is what the supporters of traditional marriage in Australia now face along with the “big mouth” American gay celebrities such as Ms Portia de Rossi arguing for leadership from PM Julia Gillard.
Why doesn’t Ms Portia de Portia butt out. Portia de Rossi doesn’t live in this country, she doesn’t pay taxes in Australia and doesn’t even vote. It’s unbelievable. Why should Portia de Rossi’s viewpoint be given a higher priority against all others who are Australians and will have to put up with gay marriage if it comes in. It’s a pathetic situation.
Keep up the fight Bill. You and others such as Warwick Marsh and Fred Nile are in the minority and it is very sad that the majority of Christians in Australia who should be saying something are completely apathetic. Christians can stop gay marriage if they are prepared to commit themselves to the fight.
3400 years of heterosexual marriage as defined as a male and female union and first referenced in Deuteronomy may be permanently degraded by the gay community.
Marriage as a foundational union critical to society and protection of children is now being treated so so lightly. We are clearly living in the latter days. Christ’s return may now be only 10-20 years away. It will probably get a lot worse towards the end.
Note: We must pray daily for PM Julia Gillard that she will protect the institution of marriage.
best wishes and Christian love
Phil Browne