Same Sex Marriage Archives

Here Is The Inevitable Next Step in Our Culture’s Quest to Redefine Marriage

April 8, 2016

There’s even a term for it. “Genetic Sexual Attraction.” GSA.

GSA is when a mother and her biological son, or a father and his biological daughter, are in a sexual relationship.

I had never heard this term before, but I suppose it sounds better than the word that really describes such relationships: incest.

And now GSA people want to get married.

I saw an example of this in a recent article about a 51 year-old mother and her 32 year-old son who are in a sexual relationship. Here is the mother’s defense of her behavior:

She said: “This is not incest, it is GSA. We are like peas in a pod and meant to be together.
“I know people will say we’re disgusting, that we should be able to control our feelings, but when you’re hit by a love so consuming you are willing to give up everything for it, you have to fight for it.

What is incredible about all of this, is that this is precisely the same situation that same-sex marriage was in just a few years ago. It was deemed to be unnatural and unhealthy and now our culture has fully endorsed it.

Notice also that the woman above even used the same argument that is used to justify same-sex marriage, namely that they are in “love,” and are not “able to control our feelings.”

In other words, this behavior is not a choice, but is genetic. And who can deny us the opportunity to express our love?

Get ready for round two of the marriage wars. The move to justify incest will be next.

Of course, sadly this should come as no surprise. In many of my prior posts on our culture’s gender confusion (e.g., see here), I have pointed out what many others have also pointed out, namely that the culture’s quest to redefine marriage will not (and cannot) stop with same-sex marriage.

If a man and a man are allowed to marry, then what keeps us from denying most anyone (any combination of people) the right to marry?

Why not a mother and her biological son? Why not a father and his biological daughter? Why not a man and two men? Or a man and two women? Or a woman and two men?

There’s no logical reason–given the rationale used for same-sex marriage–why we should deny marriage to these other groups. To do so would simply be discriminatory (on modern definitions of the term). Why should they not be allowed to enjoy the blessings of marriage? Why should they not be allowed to marry those they love?

This simply highlights one of the most often missed points in the whole same-sex marriage debate. Advocates of same-sex marriage often claim, “Everyone else gets to marry the person they love, so why can’t we? That’s discrimination.”

But this sort of claim is monumentally misleading. The marriage laws of this country have never said people can marry whomever they love.

Same-sex marriage advocates make it seem as if they are singled out unjustly. But, that is not the case. There have always been restrictions on marriage such as age, gender, biological relationships, number of spouses, etc.

What same-sex marriage advocates want is for our country to remove just one of these restrictions, the one pertaining to gender. The problem is that the rationale for removing that restriction–people should be allowed to marry whom they love–can be equally used to remove all the restrictions.

No doubt there will be some who would be pleased with such a development. “Yes,” they might say, “let’s remove all restrictions on marriage.”

But, if marriage can simply be whatever a person wants to make it, then it is swallowed up in an ocean of subjectivity. If marriage is entirely self-constructed there can be no such thing as “marriage.”

Marriage becomes a chimera. An illusion.

And this is why Christians have been opposed to same-sex marriage from the start. We are opposed to it simply because it isn’t marriage. Indeed, we’ve been opposed to it because, in the end, it will not enhance marriage in our country but lead to its disappearance.

One of the Most Original Books on Homosexuality in Years

February 2, 2016

The issue of homosexuality and same-sex marriage just won’t go away these days. Thus, Christians need to make sure they are well-equipped to meet the challenges of the post-Christian world we find ourselves in.

There have been many good books written to address this subject, but one of the most original I have seen is the recent volume by Don Fortson and Rollin Grams, Unchanging Witness: The Consistent Christian Teaching on Homosexuality in Scripture and Tradition (B&H Academic, 2016).

Don Fortson is the Professor of Church History here at RTS Charlotte, and Rollin Grams is professor of New Testament at Gordon Conwell.

What makes this book unique is simple. This book responds to those who claim homosexuality is compatible with Christianity by considering both the evidence from church history and the evidence from the Bible.

In other words, it considers not only what the Bible says, but what Christians have said the Bible says throughout the ages. I know of no other recent volume that does this.

And I can tell you, the result is absolutely devastating for the claim that Christianity and homosexuality go together. A person might be able to convince themselves that the Bible allows it (by reinterpreting even the plainest of passages), but it is a bit hard to explain away 2000 years of absolutely consistent church history.

And that is exactly what we find in the historical record. From the very beginning of the church, all the way to the modern day, Christians have uniformly declared homosexuality to be incompatible with the Christian faith.

This consistency is particularly noteworthy in the earliest centuries because the church was quite diverse and represented a variety of cultures, ethnicities, and pagan backgrounds. Yet, with one voice, the church was unified it its opposition to homosexual behavior.

In essence, this forces the pro-homosexuality camp to argue that only in the modern day, really only in the last few years, have Christians, for the first time, finally understood what the Bible really teaches about homosexuality. And, every other Christian generation, for two-thousand years, has been bigoted, discriminatory, and oppressive.

The arrogance and audacity of a claim is stunning. But, that is precisely what the pro-homosexual camp is forced to believe.

Of course, some who are committed to the superiority of the modern will no doubt respond by saying, “Just because the church believes something doesn’t make it right.” True. But, the key issue in this case is that the church believes something that is also clearly the plain teaching of Scripture. Thus, we have both the testimony of Scripture and the church on the same side.

And if the Bible and the history of the church both seem to be saying the same thing, then that is a compelling reason to think it is true.

For those who are intellectually honest, this just becomes too much to bear. After reading Fortson’s and Rollin’s book, they may not agree with what Christians have always believed. But, they would have to admit that Christians have always believed it.

Yet Another Example of the Fatal Flaw in the Argument for Same-Sex Marriage

May 6, 2015

In my prior post, I argued that the primary argument for why same-sex marriage should be legalized–“it is discriminatory to tell consenting adults who love each other that they cannot get married”–is fatally flawed. On the logic of this argument, virtually any kind of marriage could be justified, including polygamous marriage and incestuous marriage.

In one of the comments on my prior post, there was a link to a fantastic video of Ryan Anderson speaking for the Heritage Foundation. He makes precisely this point and utterly dismantles the argument that denial of same-sex marriage is discrimination.

What is particularly stunning is that the man asking the question in the video is totally unaware of the inconsistency of his argument. Indeed, he just talks in circles, unable to provide a coherent answer to the very simple question of why homosexuals should be granted special rights, but not polygamous or incestuous couples.

When you listen to this exchange, it becomes excruciatingly clear that the debate over same-sex marriage in this country is not being decided (by most people) on the basis of reason or logic. But on the basis of emotion and cultural pressure.

This video is short (4 minutes) and worth a careful listen:

What the Media Isn’t Telling You Regarding the Judicial Arguments Over Same-Sex Marriage

May 4, 2015

There has been a lot of talk in the last week over the oral arguments presented for and against same-sex marriage before the Supreme Court. Not surprisingly, the mainstream media is presenting the outcome as a foregone conclusion. There are no reasonable or logical reasons to be against it, we are told.

But, there is one main reason to be against same-sex marriage that the mainstream media simply won’t talk about. And it is a reason I’ve mentioned numerous times on this website (e.g., see prior posts here and here), and that many others have also observed.

That reason is simply this: the logic being used to promote same-sex marriage could be used to support a variety of other sexually questionable forms of marriage.

If marriage is just about consenting adults that love each other, then why can’t a mother and her adult son get married? Why can’t an adult brother and adult sister get married? Why can’t a man marry three wives? Or a wife marry three husbands?

As I said in a prior post, “The logic used to justify homosexual marriage is like an acid that will eventually eat its way through every remaining sexual boundary in our culture. And pretty soon, there will be no boundaries.”

This very problem with the same-sex marriage argument was noted by several justices during oral arguments. The mainstream media hasn’t talked much about this, but here is a transcript of the conversation. Bonauto is the lawyer arguing for same-sex marriage and it is clear that she has no coherent answer to this problem. My own comments are embedded in the dialogue in blue.

Justice Samuel Alito: Suppose we rule in your favor in this case and then after that, a group consisting of two men and two women apply for a marriage license. Would there be any ground for denying them a license?
Mary Bonauto: I believe so, Your Honor.
Alito: What would be the reason?
This is the question Bonauto has been dreading…
Bonauto: There’d be two. One is whether the State would even say that that is such a thing as a marriage, but then beyond that, there are definitely going to be concerns about coercion and consent and disrupting family relationships when you start talking about multiple persons. But I want to also just go back to the wait and see question for a moment, if I may. Because—
Notice how irrelevant the first response is: “One is whether the State would even say that that is such a thing as marriage.” This is a nonsense statement. The whole issue is what logic the State would use to make such a decision. To raise the question of whether the State would is just a diversionary tactic.
The issue of “coercion and consent” is also a red herring. You will notice below that she just repeats this mantra with no explanation for what it means or for how it rules out other forms of marriage. And, as you will see, neither Alito or Scalia even understand what she is trying to say.
How quickly she tries to change the subject shows that she realizes it is a problem for her view.
Justice Antonin Scalia: Well, I didn’t understand your answer.
Scalia rightly doesn’t understand her answer because she really didn’t provide one.
Alito: Yes. I hope you will come back to mine. If you want to go back to the earlier one –
Bonauto: No, no.
Alito: — then you can come back to mine.
Bonauto: Well, that’s what — I mean, that is — I mean, the State –
Alito: Well, what if there’s no — these are 4 people, 2 men and 2 women, it’s not–it’s not the sort of polygamous relationship, polygamous marriages that existed in other societies and still exist in some societies today. And let’s say they’re all consenting adults, highly educated. They’re all lawyers. What would be the ground under–under the logic of the decision you would like us to hand down in this case? What would be the logic of denying them the same right?
Alito rightly won’t let this go. On a judicial level, the arguments for same-sex marriage will just lead to future court cases where those wanting polygamist marriage or incest marriage claim their civil rights are being violated.
Bonauto: Number one, I assume the States would rush in and say that when you’re talking about multiple people joining into a relationship, that that is not the same thing that we’ve had in marriage, which is on the mutual support and consent of two people. Setting that aside, even assuming it is within the fundamental right –
This is incredible. Bonauto actually rejects polygamous marriage on the grounds that “that is not the same thing we’ve had in marriage.” In other words, Bonauto actually appeals to tradition–to the long history of the way marriage has always been. But, this same rationale would lead one to reject same-sex marriage. If we are talking about the history of the institution, then same-sex marriage has no chance.
Alito: But–well, I don’t know what kind of a distinction that is because a marriage between two people of the same sex is not something that we have had before, recognizing that is a substantial break. Maybe it’s a good one. So this is no — why is that a greater break?
Notice that Alito picks up on the inconsistency of her argument. If the history of marriage is the standard, then that would not only rule out polygamy but same-sex marriage as well. He is clearly confused by her reasoning when he says: “But–well, I don’t know what kind of a distinction that is because a marriage between two people of the same sex is not something that we have had before.”
Bonauto: The question is one of–again, assuming it’s within the fundamental right, the question then becomes one of justification. And I assume that the States would come in and they would say that there are concerns about consent and coercion. If there’s a divorce from the second wife, does that mean the fourth wife has access to the child of the second wife? There are issues around who is it that makes the medical decisions, you know, in the time of crisis. I assume there’d be lots of family disruption issues, setting aside issues of coercion and consent and so on that just don’t apply here, when we’re talking about two consenting adults who want to make that mutual commitment for as long as they shall be. So that’s my answer on that.
All the talk of the complications over divorce is not a meaningful argument. Divorce laws are always complicated–and yes, could be even more complicated in a polygamous relationship. But, is this really enough for the state to deprive people of their constitutional rights (assuming her own argument for a moment)? If she is correct that consenting adults can define marriage for themselves, then the complications of divorce are not relevant. She is straining out a gnat, but swallowing a camel.

In the end, Bonauto simply does not have a coherent argument for why marriage should be changed for homosexuals, but not changed for polygamist and incestuous individuals.

And this simply shows what everyone has always known: homosexuals want to be able to redefine marriage for themselves, but don’t want to let others redefine marriage. Which means they don’t want equal treatment, they want special treatment.