Mike Jones, an associate editor of the Tulsa World, wrote the newspaper’s April 14th Opinion section lead editorial titled, “Childish things – It’s time to end the divide over gay marriage.” He is referring to 1 Corinthians 13:11 which says, “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child, but when I became a man, I put away childish things.”

Jones poses three general arguments in support of gay marriage. First, Jones attempts to label opposition to marriage between a same-sex couple a childish thing which results from prejudice and misunderstanding. Second, Jones believes that permitting gay marriage would be another step toward civil rights for all in the country. Third, Jones makes several biblical and religious arguments in support of gay marriage.

This article will demonstrate that Jones’s statements and claims are untrue, misinterpretations, misleading, and are couched in assumptive language in which seemingly simple statements contain huge assumptions that are not true. In Part I we will discuss Jones’s argument with regard to charges of prejudice and misunderstanding and the argument with regard to civil rights. In Part II we will address his arguments about presumed biblical/religious support of gay marriage.

Argument #1 – Jones claims that opposition to gay marriage (and by inference, opposition to homosexuality in general) is a result of prejudice and misunderstanding.

There are two general conceptions of marriage in society. The first is that marriage can only be between a man and a woman which forms the basis for the ordered family structure. The strength and depth of spousal commitment and unity that derives from a marriage consummated by the reproductive act, whether intended for purposes of procreation or not, cannot be matched by any other relationship. The nature of the reproductive act in marriage is distinctly and intrinsically unitive. This ordered family structure is part of the human constitution, a universal truth, one of the permanent things, and is central in every known society. The family attains status within society—legitimacy, social identity, legal recognition, cultural tradition, and an estate. Humans have fashioned numerous methods by which to organize their societies, but the common link to all is the family unit—a father, a mother, and children living together in bonds of committed caring. It is the fundamental unit upon which societies are built.

By contrast, homosexuality is a disorganizing concept with regard to human relationships and ultimately disorganizing in building stable, enduring societies. However, proponents wish to lift the status of homosexuality in society through its attainment of legitimacy, legal identity, and respect as a cultural tradition, a place at the table so to speak. These efforts involve court challenges to long-standing and culturally established norms, enactment of laws which favor the homosexual agenda and that diminish marriage, and promotion of homosexuality in the popular culture. The basis for this opposing view is that marriage is essentially a private relationship, and because marriage is the central organizing concept in society, it is critical for proponents of homosexuality to redefine what it means to be a family. Success in the legislative and legal efforts to redefine marriage to include homosexual couples of either gender, whether under law or in culture, will cause a culture to decline and disintegrate as the ideal of a mother and father for every child is weakened. (See article: Thank you, Grace. You are worthy of your name.)

Therefore, the Christian’s opposition to homosexuality is not about prejudice and misunderstanding as Mr. Jones would have us believe, but opposition is based on eternal truths and the commandments from the Bible. Mr. Jones and I will not agree as to who has the better argument because we have fundamentally different worldviews. The question is: which worldview is true? Undoubtedly, the weight of history supports the biblical worldview which is a reflection of truth received not only through biblical revelation to the ancient Hebrews and 1st century Christians but is also a reflection of those unchanging cultural universals built into God’s creation and observed down through the ages.

Argument #2 – Jones believes that permitting gay marriage would be another step toward civil rights for all in the country where “all men are created equal.”

Jones argues that laws allowing civil union are not good enough, i.e., you are less than a citizen if you can’t have a marriage ceremony and which means same-sex couples are “not worthy of rights held by the rest of us.” It appears that Jones does not understand that people opposed to gay marriage are generally opposed to civil unions for the same reasons. Those reasons are based on a biblical worldview upon which the nation was founded (but that is another argument for another day which I am very willing to address).

Jones appeal is on the basis of equality, i.e., homosexuals have a civil right to marry as do heterosexuals. The usual defense of the pursuit of the humanist ideal of equality is that social harmony will be achieved because the nation is moving closer to the ideals upon which it was founded. However, such pursuit has the opposite effect. In America the pursuit of equality has resulted in the identification of an ever expanding array of social problems demanding governmental attention. Such attention is demanded because of the creation of “illusory rights” supposedly on par with the original Bill of Rights (in this case the right of homosexuals to marry).

But a culture that elevates these demands to the status of rights is doomed. In his book Visions of Order, Richard Weaver states that when a culture “… by ignorant popular attitudes or by social derangements” imposes a political concept that creates a different principle of ordering society contrary to universal truths, dissatisfactions arise because society has tampered with the “nature of things.”

The victim of this tampering is justice. The concept of justice is a universal truth, a thing of permanence that transcends the whole of man’s time on this planet and pertains to all cultures. Ignoring corruptible man, the levelers of society admonish Justice to peek beneath her blindfold and act arbitrarily and capriciously to impose the latest standards dictated by the passions of the moment. Prescriptions of fairness, impartiality, and right action derived from an authority above the state and built up over the centuries are now considered quaint, failing to keep up with modern times, or just plain wrong-headed. In other words, the definition of justice has been changed by the humanists to fit their worldview. But no amount of humanist tinkering will change the heart of man with regard to a right understanding of right action in a civil society.

We will examine Mr. Jones’s supposed biblical and religious support for gay marriage in Part II.

Larry G. Johnson

Sources:

Mike Jones, “Childish things – It’s time to end the divide over gay marriage,” Tulsa World, (April 14, 2001), G1.

Larry G. Johnson, Ye shall be as gods – Humanism and Christianity – The Battle for Supremacy in the American Cultural Vision, (Owasso, Oklahoma: Anvil House Publishers, 2011), pp. 229, 334-235, 354, 356.

Richard M. Weaver, Visions of Order, (Wilmington, Delaware: Intercollegiate Studies Institute, 1964), pp. 22-23.

Grace Evans is an 11-year old Minnesota girl who testified earlier this month before a Minnesota statehouse committee as it deliberated on a bill to permit gay marriage. (The committee subsequently approved the bill which was sent to the full house. A similar bill is in the state senate.)

Speaking against passage of the bill to allow gay marriage in Minnesota, Grace talked of the importance of each of her parents and that each parent provides something unique to her life that can’t be provided by the other. “Even though I’m only 11 years old, I know that everyone deserves to have a mom and a dad. If you change the law to say two moms and two dads can get married, it would take away something very important for children like me across the state.”

Grace’s approximate two-minute address included twenty-one seconds of silence as she twice asked the committee members, “I know some disagree, but I want to ask you this question: Which parent do I not need – my mom or my dad?” She waited, but no committee member answered her question.

Even though Grace is only eleven, she recognizes that marriage between a man and a woman is a cultural universal. It transcends time and space because it is a reflection of the nature of God. To give a better understanding of what I mean and what Grace understands, I quote from my book:

As one reflects on how humans have organized themselves over time, there is and has been a great diversity of societal forms in different cultures and periods of history. However, underlying this variety is a structured order or arrangement that reflects the “creational givens.” One of these givens is that the family structure is a societal institution established by the Creator. And the family structure consisting of “…a father, mother and children living together in bonds of committed caring is not an arbitrary happenstance; nor is it mere convention that can be dismissed when it has outlived its usefulness.” This ordered family structure is a part of the human constitution and is ingrained in man’s nature in all of its facets—biological, emotional, social and moral. This structure allows for variety but sets definite boundaries, i.e., lines that cannot be crossed without being in opposition to the structured order of the family. [Larry G. Johnson, Ye shall be as gods – Humanism and Christianity – The Battle for Supremacy in the American Cultural Vision, (Owasso, Oklahoma: Anvil House Publishers, 2011), pp.307-308; quoted portions are from: Albert M. Wolters, Creation Regained, 2nd Ed., (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2005), p. 95.]

In Christianity, the marriage relationship was of such importance that it is described in terms of Christ’s relationship with the church (his bride) and is a reflection of the character or nature of God. And that marriage relationship is unmistakably to be between a man and a woman for the Bible gives a very clear understanding of God’s view of homosexuality in the book of Romans.

Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. Their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural, and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error. [Romans 1:24-27 RSV.]

Even though the legitimization of same-sex marriage is relatively new, its devastating effects are already being felt in those countries that have allowed it. Documenting 10 years of same-sex marriage and civil unions in Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, Hoover Institution researcher Stanley Kurtz has found that it has led to far fewer marriages and soaring illegitimacy in which “80 percent of firstborn children are born out of wedlock, and 60 percent of children born thereafter are born to unwed parents. This has a devastating impact on children since unmarried parents are much more likely to separate.” Kurtz wrote, “Marriage in Scandinavia is in deep decline, with children shouldering the burden of rising rates of family dissolution. And the mainspring of the decline—an increasingly sharp separation between marriage and parenthood—can be linked to gay marriage.”

Of course Grace and her parents have received much attention since her testimony. She has been called many things including a “stupid indoctrinated child” and an “11-year old bigot” (a favorite word for those who defend gay marriage). Her parents have been described as spoon feeding the script to Grace and that they need to check into a mental hospital. Given the amount of vitriol spewed against the opponents of the bill, my guess is that we can’t depend on the assurances of supporters of gay marriage that its passage won’t affect religious freedom or freedom of speech.

Should the bill become the law of Minnesota, one can easily envision parents such as the Evanses being charged with child abuse or having their children removed from their home for teaching the biblical view of homosexuality and marriage. If one is doubtful of the intentions and reach of bureaucrats and judges with a humanistic worldview, review the case of a 10-year old New Hampshire girl. A New Hampshire court ordered the home-schooled girl into a government-run school because “her religious beliefs (Christian) are a bit too sincerely held and must be sifted, tested by, and mixed among other worldviews…” The court agreed that the 10-year-old Christian girl is “social and interactive with her peers” and “intellectually at or superior to grade level…” However, the court found that the girl “appeared to reflect her mother’s rigidity on questions of faith” and that her interests “would be best served by exposure to a public school setting” with “different points of view.” [“Home-Schooler Ordered to Attend Public Classes,” Pentecostal Evangel, November 15, 2009, 23.]

One of the definitions of “grace” found in Noah Webster’s 1828 dictionary reads as follows: “That [quality] in manner, deportment or language which renders it appropriate and agreeable; suitableness; elegance with appropriate dignity. We say, a speaker delivers his address with grace…” Grace, your name fits you well. You are a true Culture Warrior. Thank you for your courage.

Larry G. Johnson