Monday, March 19, 2007
About the Author
Michael S. Heath is executive director of the Christian Civic League (christiancivicleague.org).
Maine appears to be equally divided on the question of homosexuality.
The emphasis here must be put on "appearances." Maine is not as divided as voting over the past few decades makes it appear.
While Maine people, like all people, feel compassion for victims, they also feel either ambivalence toward immoral sexual practices or outright disdain. Nobody thinks that unhealthy, immoral sex is good.
Political activists, their friends in academia and all forms of the media have brilliantly manipulated our ambivalence. They have persuaded many of us to feel compassion for something we dare not think about.
It is fascinating how this sleight of hand has been accomplished. It is breathtaking to witness its success.
A case in point is playing out in the Maine Legislature right now in the form of L.D. 375. This bill appears to be a benign expansion of an obscure law known as the Family Medical Leave Act. But this seemingly innocent bill attracted strong support from the radical homosexual lobby.
My interest turned into anguish when I learned that Maine's largest and most powerful Christian congregation had thrown its support behind the bill.
But Maine's Roman Catholic Chancery flatly rejected our offer to join a partnership in defense of traditional marriage in 2005. Nevertheless, working nearly alone against overwhelming political odds, we attracted 47 percent of the electorate to our side.
For some reason there appears to be a great deal of synergy between the chancery and the so-called "gay" lobby. LD 375 is one more example on a growing list of sad incidents that will culminate in the final battle over "same-sex marriage." It is only a matter of time.
While the chancery promises to fight "same-sex marriage," we need look no further than two states to the south to see what that means.
Massachusetts is the only state in America that has legalized same-sex marriage, and it is where faithful Catholics suffered greatly from sexually abusive clergy. Words are cheap, and their actions obviously ineffective, in this matter.
LD 375 gives homosexual activists something they must have to gain what they must not get (for their own good). Their relationships gain the coveted title in law of "family."
A judge sometime in the near future is going to put Maine's domestic partnership definition (which includes homosexual partnerships) together with the recently enacted sexual orientation law and force either civil unions or same-sex marriage -- and there will be nothing anyone can do about it.
When Maine joins Massachusetts, know that it didn't happen simply because politicians caved into the demands of a vocal minority. Maine's Christians gave up. They stopped practicing their freedom to speak out and consequently lost their civilization to the oldest religion in the book -- paganism.
This sad tale of loss, pain and difficulty doesn't mean that Maine people agree with the homosexual apologists. They do not. They feel compassion for people. We are, most of us, good and decent citizens.
It does appear, however, that we may have lost our courage and independence.
We also seem to have lost something more basic for Christians, and that is an interest in simple righteousness. The Bible and all of human history are full of examples of men and women taking a stand for it.
In this matter, such a stand would simply uphold marriage as the chief building block of civilization.
Leaders taking this stand would proactively work to make marriage the only warm hearth for sex. They would do this by teaching in a million ways that sex outside of marriage is immoral, it is wrong.
Hearts would swell while children frolicked in their restored innocence. Schools would be organized around parents, instead of against them. Communities would become strong as families grew in stature.
This is the future all of us want. Why settle for less?
- Special to the Press Herald
Reader comments
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I take issue with Heath making gay relationships just about sex. I know he does it to get his rallying cry out, but if people would just accept that same sex relationships are not all that different from male/ female relationships then we could all move on.
I've been in a partnership for 8 years now and our life together is more about paying taxes, making the mortgage payments and the car payments and the visa bill payments than it is about what goes on upstairs. We live in a quiet town among Heteros and we all get along just great. If we get married, whats going to change for the folks around us? NOTHING. Whats going to change for us? Inheritance rights, medical benefit rights, a legal nod to our commitment to each other, and of course, we'll have more kitchen appliances with the wedding registry and all.
Get over it Heath. We are already here and in committed relationships. How we consumate those relationships is nobody's business.report abuse
Neocon2008, your paranoid speculation that the gay community, when (not if) it does achieve equal treatment under the law, will turn on others is enlightening. The assumption by the current "haves" (Christians, monogamous heterosexual adults) that the "have nots" (homosexual, bisexual, asexual, transgendered, and intersexed adults) will assume the role of oppressor upon joining the "have" club exposes the power struggle here for what it truly is, and it is profoundly sad and disturbing. Evidently, to the religious right, if everyone has what they have, then it just won't be as valuable.
It's not wrong to feel strongly about something - indeed, it's something a thinking person can't really avoid - but it's wrong to act upon it in ways that are blatantly hurtful to others. Neocon, Michael Heath, and the rest of their ilk may tell me that what they're doing is "for my own good" (thanks, Dad), but then, that's what the abuser always tells the victim to maintain the status quo.report abuse
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