PART ONE:
When it comes to the gay question, this country is divided, almost right in half. And, although it largely seems to play-out as the religious verses the non-religious, it is more than just, faith against non-faith or believers against non-believers. Even Christians are divided on this issue. Most large and mainstream Protestant Christian denominations have had the gay question arise more than once in their regional and national assemblies. What’s happening?
Why is this issue so volatile? Exactly what kind of issue is it really: Is it a justice, civil-rights issue? Is it a religious, faith issue? Is it a political, power-play issue? Or is it a rule-of-law, authority issue? Yes.
If it were just a religious faith-issue, the conservative religious voice would have long been dismissed as irrelevant and relegated to the innocuous corner of one’s private religious beliefs, and left at that—in the same way that observing Kosher laws or rules about fasting on certain days is dismissed as a matter of private personal belief-preference—by our greater society.
Obviously it’s more than a simple religious issue. It’s also a social issue, directly affecting laws that govern the economy of marriage and family, among other things. Thus, it not only becomes a legal or legislative question, but a question of authority and social-power, which raises the following questions: Whose rights are being protected? Who defines these rights, and for whom, and on what basis?
These are questions of power and authority. They are also questions, the answers of which are directly or indirectly drawn from one’s Worldview—i.e., one’s assumed and presumed universal norms, principles, and truths—belief in God or belief in no God or belief in a particular kind of God, etc. Our variant and competing Worldviews are at odds with each other in this pluralistic society of ours. And at root is our fear that we are going to lose some basic foundational rights, privileges, and values, if “the other side” gets its way.
For example: if a Christian couple turns their home into a Bed-N-Breakfast hospitality center, must they be forced to allow gay couples to stay in their home against their conscience? Who says so, and on what legal, ethical, social, or authoritative basis? Or, should the gay couple have the right to sue for discrimination because the Christian couple on the basis of their faith refuse to house and serve “their kind” in their own Bed-N-Breakfast home? Whose rights are being trampled upon in such a situation? This example alone reveals the complexity of the issue. It is a freedom-of-conscience, faith issue, a social justice issue, a legal/authoritative issue, not to mention an economic issue. Hence, it is an emotionally touchy and explosive issue, held with great passion on both sides.
According to our traditional historical American values and principles, Christians (and people of any Faith) should be free to exercise their conscience in pursuit of their religious convictions without hindrance by government. On the other hand, even some religious convictions are unacceptable in practice and outlawed by our government—for example, polygamy—thus, it might be a fair question to ask, if we are to accept the legalization of same-sex marriage, why not also legalize polygamy? Still, we readily admit that specific religious faith-practices or life-styles are not to be imposed upon the whole of American society. For example, so-called “Blue Laws,” forbidding businesses from opening on Sundays, have been largely discarded for unfairly imposing a religious faith-practice on the general public.
As to the question of legalizing gay marriage, neither side wants to lose on this one. Each side fears the social political power of the other, fighting against legislative law and economic restriction enforced by the opposing side. It appears to be a straightforward win-lose battle with no happy solution with more of the same—civic division, political battle-cries, and tactical legislative power-plays.
PART TWO:
Writing to my fellow Christians aside, I think that we are being derailed from our call and duty by struggling to maintain power and control over the moral politics of this great American society. The church is not called to enforce its ethical and moral beliefs upon this nation or any other nation. Christians are sojourners in the world, in the world not of the world, said Jesus (see John 17).
The church (the collective body of Christians) is called to do two things and two things only: The Great Commission and The Great Commandment. So, as long as Christians go around worrying about whether gays should have the legal right to marry while lining their pocketbooks with the world’s resources, pursuing the American Dream, Christians are missing the point no matter how conservative their theology may be.
Furthermore, throw no stones, Jesus effectively said. Remember his response to the woman they brought to him who was caught in adultery: “Let the one who is without sin throw the first stone.” No one dared cast the first stone after hearing that. Think about it, what Christian family is not without its alcoholic or gambler, adulterer or fornicator, drug addict or sex addict, thief, cheater, or loser, and yet is still accepted as a member of the family?
We affirm freedom of conscience. Let God be the judge. If a person believes he/she, in good conscience, may marry someone of the same sex. So be it. He/she will answer to God, not me, not you, not this government. It’s that simple.
Keep in mind the words of the Apostle Paul in Romans 14:10-12, which says: Why do you pass judgment on your brother or sister? Or you, why do you despise your brother or sister? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God. For it is written, ‘As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall give praise to God.’ So then, each of us will be accountable to God.
It is not for us to play God and do God’s work of judgment, condemnation and damnation? To do such is contrary to our responsibility to carry out the Great Commission and the Great Commandment. When the early church began to equate itself with the Roman Empire, it began to lose real spiritual and moral vitality. Let us not make the same mistake while in the American Empire.
Thus, there is no contradiction. A Christian need not oppose this society’s trend in allowing legal same-sex marriage in order to maintain faithfulness to Christ. Indeed, the Christian witness in general might be better received if he/she were more gracious about the whole thing. For Jesus reminds us that His Kingdom is NOT of this world; His followers are citizens of Heaven, not earth. Thus, we need not fret ourselves over this issue at the social, cultural, political level. Our task is to simply bear witness to the grace, compassion, mercy, and love of Christ for all of humanity. Jesus came to save, not condemn, the world. As for judgment, that’s God’s business, not ours.
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