The Supreme Court of the United States is hearing testimony today
on two cases that ban same-sex marriage. One is Proposition 8 from California
that makes same-sex marriage illegal. The second is the Defense of Marriage
Act, or DOMA, which claims that marriage is supposed to be nothing but one man
and one woman.
The problem with these two items is that they are highly
discriminatory. In this era of supposed equal rights for all, we are still a
long way from actually having equal rights. There are far too many people still
judging, still discriminating, still hating others based on the most trivial of
reasons. By trivial, I mean they have no good reason for their bias.
I have asked many times for any non-Biblical reason why
same-sex marriage should not be allowed. I have to date heard one. That
argument is that the dictionary states marriage is one man and one woman.
Unfortunately, the dictionary was written initially in a time when marriage was
just that: one man and one woman. Of course, arranged marriages were common, as
were forced marriages, but that’s irrelevant. Definitions for many things have
changed over years of usage. The definition of marriage should be updated to be
more inclusive rather than staying in the Middle Ages.
Many people are against same-sex marriage because they
believe it is wrong, according to the Bible. Let me say, before I counter this
argument, that what you believe is up to you, no matter how hateful it is. You’re
entitled to believe it to be true, just as I am entitled to believe it to be
false. That being said, the argument using the Bible is extremely biased.
Yes, there are passages in the Bible which can be used to
make the argument that homosexuality is wrong. There are also passages in the
Bible that say women are supposed to be subservient to men, that Saturday is
the correct day for worship, and that eating pigs is wrong. I don’t see these
passages being touted. Sadly, many who use the Bible as their sole basis for
being discriminatory are unfamiliar with the entire Bible. They pick and choose
what they want to follow, discarding the rest. They then wear their beliefs as
a badge of honor, thrusting it in the face of any who dare disagree with them.
I know many churches will not permit a wedding to be held in
that location if one or both of the people getting married is not of that
religion or even a member of that particular church. This is fine.
Discriminatory, yes, but it is up to those in charge of that particular church
to make such decisions. This does not make marriage the sole institution of
that church, however, or any church. Marriage is not a religious institution,
no matter how badly some want it to be.
As I said, you have the right to believe what you want. I
support that fully, no matter how wrong your beliefs may be. That does not give
you the right, however, to force others to follow your beliefs. There is no
justifiable reason for any law in the United States to be made forbidding
same-sex marriage. Religion has been used as a battering ram for racial
segregation, for sexual orientation segregation, for any type of discrimination
that those wielding it wanted. That doesn’t make it right.
Imagine, for a moment, if someone decided that pork should
be banned, because the Bible says we should not eat pork. There goes the Easter
ham, there goes the bacon, there goes pork chops. Would you follow that law?
What if a law were created based on a religion other than yours, forcing women
to wear their hair a certain way, or certain clothing? Would you follow that
law? Probably not, because it would be against your beliefs. Yet you expect
others to follow your laws because you believe them to be right? How arrogant
are you?
You have the right to not agree with same-sex marriage, or
same-sex couples. Absolutely. You do not have the right to tell them they are
wrong, or cannot marry. You don’t have to like it. You don’t have to
participate in it. You don’t have to agree with it. But you do not have the
right or the authority to ban others from liking, participating, or agreeing
with it. To believe you do have that right, that power, is arrogant, ignorant,
and certainly not based on anything a loving God would do, no matter what
religion has been attached to Him.