Readers Respond to Obama's Complex Stance on Gay Unions
By Dan Gilgoff, God & Country
Many readers vented outrage over my attempt to reconcile President Obama's recent remarks that "you will see a time in which we as a nation finally recognize relationships between two men or two women as just as real and admirable as relationships between a man and a woman" with his refusal to support gay marriage.
I argued that Obama isn't necessarily being inconsistent. Many of you disagreed.
Here's Robert St. Genis of Louisiana:
We should have learned that separate but equal is anything but. We should also not allow the rights of the minority to be subject to the tyranny of the majority. Women did not gain the right to vote by popular vote. Interracial marriage was not a proposition that the populous voted upon.
Hector of Florida argues that civil unions, which Obama supports, don't reflect the president's assertion that gay relationships are as "real and admirable" as straight ones:
If indeed civil unions were legally equal to marriages, there would be no problem. But they are not. The same people who state they are then go around when confronted with a civil union and they say they don't recognize it because it is not marriage. We have this situation in New Jersey, where insurance companies are rejecting coverage because of "the wording is not marriage". This, despite the NJ law supposedly being equal in every way but in name.
And John of California proposes a novel way to get straight people to sympathize with the plight of gap couples:
The problem with civil unions is that they don't exist and would have to be specially created for gay people, even if the plan were that all existing marriages would become civil unions and in the future everyone would get a civil union.
While we were waiting for civil unions to be created, opposite-sex couples could still get married. There would be no urgency to create civil unions. I can only imagine how much foot dragging Congress would engage in, not to mention state legislatures.
So let's have an agreement. No more marriages from here on. The clerks' offices are closed. No one is getting state recognition of their unions until the government actually addresses this in a fashion that does not discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation. Treat every couple as legal strangers. That might give things some urgency.
- See President Obama's top faith moments.
- Follow Dan Gilgoff on Twitter.
Tags: religion | marriage | gay rights
Tools: 
Share
|
| Comments (27) | Print
Reader Comments
"Homoseuals"?
(Who's the idiot now?) Science only deals with the imperical-or observable-part of our world. It can not tell humanity what is right or wrong. Even if we were using a normal murderer for this discussion (assuming any murderer is normal), science could not tell us if it is right or wrong. Mankind simply does not tolerate murder? Why? Because something in each human being screams that this is wrong. The same goes for the murdering mad man. No society is willing to tolerate them. This is not a scientific issue. It is a moral issue.
Love and sex are not evil. However, the improper use of either of them can be evil. Homosexuals commit no crime against you or me, but they do sin against the God who created sex as an expression of love. All of this, again, is not scientific, but moral.
I very much doubt that biblical thinking about homosexuality will be ignored. The dietary laws were seen as not being moral laws but ceremonial laws. Check out Romans. Paul knew his Old Testament very well.
Likening gays to murderous psychopaths (no hyphen, idiot)
is contemptible. You lost the argument in the first two sentences. Premeditated murder is a crime condemned by all societies, secular and religious, and all philosophy. Psychopaths are mad; they are not punished but studied. So even science recognises that the madman is not 'evil' but sick.
Gays hurt nobody. They commit no crime. Love and sex are not sins and those who say that they are, are wrong and the books they quote are wrong. The public is awakening to this truth like never before. This argument is over. The Biblical distaste for homoseuals will go the way of injunctions against shellfish and tattoos. It's over.
That is not good enough, Ted...
I sympathize with you, but your argument is quite weak. For the sake of argument, let's say I am murderous psycho-path (no I am not a murderous psycho-path). I have tried very hard not to be a murderer, prayed to God about it, saw doctors, but none of that has worked. Does this mean people should just accept me as I am because God doesn't make mistakes? No! God doesn't make mistakes, but humans are born into sin.
I do sympathize with your predicament, but I do not believe you should accept what has been condemned by God and the apostles just because you feel incapable of overcoming your sins. This verse is often over-quoted and misinterpretted, but I believe it was written for all believers that are having similar struggles as your's. Philippians 4:13
advertisement
