God, Guns, Grits, and Gravy Read online

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  If so, send them to the NSA. By now, they should have amassed all the information in the universe. Let’s see if they can actually pull anything useful out of it.

  7

  Same-Sex Marriage and the Law (God’s and Man’s)

  I WAS ELEVEN YEARS OLD before I ever heard the term “homosexual.” I had no idea what it meant. There were no shows on TV like Modern Family or Glee, and it would be decades before movies like Brokeback Mountain became mainstream. Here’s how it happened: As a member of a Boy Scout troop in my hometown of Hope, Arkansas, I heard rumors about the troop’s Scoutmaster and his very odd practice of inviting boys from the troop, one at a time, over to his house to work on merit badges. One of my more worldly fellow Scouts bluntly said that the Scoutmaster was “queer.” I had never heard the term applied to anyone and asked what it meant.

  The answer he gave was way too descriptive and blunt for this book. I didn’t believe at all what he told me, so that night I asked my dad what it meant. I’ll never forget how my dad fumbled around—with a look of absolute panic—and then said that the term applied to someone who was homosexual. That was another term I’d never heard, so when I asked what that meant, he stumbled for a few moments before simply saying, “It’s a man who loves another man.”

  That seemed really bizarre. It was so far from any concept I could imagine at that age that I hardly reacted at all. I couldn’t even visualize how that might be lived out, so I said, “Okay,” and went on my merry way. After the Scoutmaster was confronted about his extracurricular “work” with some of the Scouts in my troop, he was forced to resign and “go off and get some help.” He was from a wealthy and influential family; there was no publicity and no criminal charges filed. After spending a few weeks “in the hospital,” he came back and continued to live in our little community. People talked, but the boys he molested—a fairly sizable number—never went public, and he never had to register as a sex offender because in those days, the term didn’t exist and no one would have known what it meant. (Even today, that’s often unclear, but in this case it definitely would have meant child molester/pedophile.) To be clear, I am not equating all gay men with pedophiles; I’m just relating how this particular person was my introduction to the then-unfathomable concept of same-sex attraction. As I got into my teenage years, I would hear more about homosexuality, but it was far from mainstream and certainly wasn’t openly promoted in the culture.

  Things have changed.

  If someone had told me then that there would be a day when the President of the United States would call a basketball player and congratulate him for “coming out” as gay, or push publicly for marriage between people of the same gender, I would have thought that person had been getting too deep into Boone’s Farm Strawberry Hill. (For the non–baby boomers out there, this was a cheap fruit-flavored “wine,” more like alcoholic soda pop, that was the rage for underage drinkers at my high school in the late sixties and early seventies. I never tasted the stuff; the kids who drank it were generally the type who acted a bit loopy even before downing the booze.) Today, those of us who still believe that marriage means a man and a woman are told we’re “homophobic,” “gay haters,” or “on the wrong side of history.” Some things we’re called are much worse and quite unprintable in a book of such class and distinction as this one!

  Of course, as I noted earlier, President Obama was not always for same-sex marriage. He was against it before he was for it. In August 2008, during a nationally televised Saddleback Forum with Republican Presidential candidate John McCain and hosted by Pastor Rick Warren at the Saddleback Church in California, President Obama was asked his views on same-sex marriage. In opposing it, his answer was clear and direct. He stated that he believed marriage was a relationship between a man and a woman and that “as for me, a Christian, it’s a sacred union. God is in the mix.” By 2012, he’d not only accepted same-sex marriage but was promoting it and accusing anyone who didn’t support it of being against equality. Quite the turn in a short period of time!

  Let’s look at this logically. If the President opposed same-sex marriage in 2008 because of his Christian views and his belief that marriage is a sacred union, then only three possibilities exist to account for the dramatic change in his public position:

  1. He was lying then and really supported same-sex marriage, but knew that view would kill him politically in his first run for the White House.

  2. He is lying now and really believes in traditional marriage, but wants the political benefit he gets today from the left by “coming out” for same-sex marriage.

  3. He’s been told by God that the Christian teachings on which he’d based his opinion about same-sex marriage have been edited or revised. (Apparently God forgot to tell the rest of us.)

  These really are the only options, and I haven’t heard President Obama disclose which one is true. If you think I’m being too harsh, let me say that if he had simply stated in 2008 that he supported traditional marriage because of his personal views and traditions, he would’ve left himself the option to “evolve” on the issue. But once you invoke your Christian faith as the basis for your views, and then change them, you’ve got to admit being dishonest about your stated beliefs (then or now) or make a case for the Word of God changing somehow. It would be pretty bold for even a very confident and sometimes arrogant President to declare, “God has changed his mind! And he only told me!”

  It might surprise people—and cynics on the left will no doubt roll their eyes to hear me say it—but I have friends who are gay. My wife and I have entertained gay friends, including gay couples, in our home; I do business with gay people and have had gay people working for me. My beliefs and convictions don’t change with the people I’m around. I accept people who disagree with me and genuinely appreciate that they accept me as a friend and associate. I don’t argue with them, berate them, or condemn them. They don’t scream at me, call me homophobic, or tell me I’m a hater. It would be laughable to all of us if they did, since they’d be doing it while sharing my friendship and hospitality!

  My personal views are indeed based on my faith and adherence to biblical teaching. They are not mere preferences, but unwavering convictions that I don’t have the right to revise. I realize that to an increasing number of people, especially those living in Bubble-ville, some of my views are archaic, even the stuff of bigotry or hate. I find that discouraging because it’s an argument built on fear and intentional misrepresentation. Critics standing on such shaky ground have no alternative but to attack the motives and character of those who disagree with them. A rational debate, based on logic and facts, becomes impossible.

  There are numerous issues involved in a discussion of same-sex marriage, some based in God’s law and some based in our Earthly law. I’ll seek to address it from the perspective of one whose orientation is God-centered and not man-centered. The points below reflect considerations from Bible-believing Bubba-ville:

  1. First, there is the issue of homosexuality and other types of sexual preference. Are such variations normal? Which ones? Are there any limits on what is an acceptable attraction? If so, what is the objective basis for those limits, and who gets to draw that line?

  2. There is the issue of marriage itself. What is marriage; what are its historical, biological, psychological, sociological, and theological roots? Is marriage merely a contract to accommodate a social bond between people? Are there any limits to how we define marriage? Why does it matter to heterosexual married people if homosexuals wish to marry? What difference does it make?

  3. Then there is the issue of constitutional law and the balance of powers. If there are changes in the law regarding the definition of marriage, who should make them? What role, if any, should the judicial branch play? How much power should it be able to exercise? (These particular questions should be very important to all Americans, not just Bible believers like me.)

  A God-centered worldview is considerably diffe
rent from one that is man-centered. Either there is a God or there isn’t. If there is, either He’s knowable or He isn’t. If He’s knowable—and, come to think of it, even if He isn’t—either He’s involved in our world or He isn’t. If He’s knowable and involved, then either He has boundaries and purpose for us, or He doesn’t. If He does, then we need to be aware of them, for without them we cannot know what true success and fulfillment is.

  Winning at any game is possible only when we understand its objective and play by its rules. Either the “endgame” is knowable or it’s not. If it is, we need to live according to that knowledge or accept that we will come to regret making up our own rules.

  I believe we live in a God-centered world and that all the definitions of success, fulfillment, morality, value, family, and life are His to give and ours to follow. They provide a roadmap for us. They also are immutable, meaning unchangeable.

  In a man-centered world, it’s “every man for himself.” Each person acts as his or her own god. Rules exist according to either an agreement among the people or the will of the strongest against the weaker. In fact, the very existence of the weak is determined by the will of the strong. This is essentially social Darwinism, in which moral law boils down to “survival of the fittest.” Those who are weak and unable to convince the strong of their value have no recourse or form of appeal. They live at the whim and mercy and ultimately for the utility of the strong. In a world with no acknowledgment of a higher power, no one answers to a moral authority that is fixed and absolute and applied equally to all. Any canons of right and wrong can be moved without being measured against such an authority. In the biblical era of the Judges, it was said that “every man did what was right in his own eyes.” The same could be said of our culture today.

  Those with a man-centered worldview are free to think, feel, and believe in their own way, and it would be utterly improper for others to question any of it. Indeed, America is not a theocracy, and we have the right to our own thoughts, feelings, and beliefs. But those who try to reflect a God-centered worldview accept that their own behavior will be judged against a higher standard. For such a person, the ultimate test of authority is, “Did God say anything about this, and, if so, what did He say and how should it affect what I do?”

  To those of us for whom biblical and historical orthodoxy matter, same-sex marriage is just part of a much larger issue: the definition of marriage. In recent years, for example, the trivialization of fatherhood has contributed greatly to the confusion within our culture as to what constitutes “marriage” and “family.” We’ve been bombarded in movies, television, and pop culture with the message that a father is expendable to both marriage and parenting. When a Hollywood “A-lister” has a baby without bothering to marry or chooses artificial insemination so that the “father” is only a sperm donor, the only thing we wonder about is how soon after giving birth she’s going to be bikini-ready. The father is not viewed as an integral part of having or raising a child. It’s no surprise that people are confused about the purpose of marriage when it’s seen as a separate issue from having children.

  Earthly fathers have become so marginalized that even when believers speak of “God the Father,” it’s hard to know what that means. (Same with “Founding Fathers.”) The word seems diminished somehow.

  It’s hard to convince people that the monogamous marriage of a mother and father matters when the divorce rate approaches 50 percent, births to unwed mothers equal or exceed those to married couples, and cultural role models cohabitate and have children without the commitment of a lifetime marriage. This is why—and I’ll bet you didn’t expect to hear this from me—the claim that same-sex marriage is destroying society is actually greatly overstated. Christians who themselves abandoned the primacy of lifelong marriage to follow the divorce and remarriage customs of a secular society have as much to answer for as do those who militantly push to redefine marriage. Sadly, many church leaders already have loosened the definition to allow for unrestricted divorce and remarriage and now feign to be “Shocked! Shocked!” when even more versions of marriage are proposed.

  The dominant culture of Bubble-ville is based on the man-centered view that all people are basically good, that everyone gets to follow his or her own set of morals, and “if it feels good, do it.” The dominant culture of Bubba-ville is based on the belief that there is a God, we can know Him, and the rules we ought to live by are His. The difference shines through clearly in the arguments one hears in support of same-sex marriage: “Why can’t I marry the person of my choice? Who has the right to tell me I can’t?” I, me, mine.

  The arguments for ignoring the history of nearly every civilization in recorded time and insisting on a redefinition of marriage are almost always expressed in very personal terms—what “best” satisfies the feelings and passions of the person desiring to marry within his or her own gender. Rarely is there cited an objective source of authority, whether it be the experience of past cultures; a religious source such as the Bible or Koran; or, for that matter, the teachings of Confucius.

  It’s not my intent to be combative or to appear to be uncaring or indifferent to what are true desires and passions. But the attempt to tar those who don’t support same-sex marriage (still a majority in Bubba-ville) as homophobic bigots is simply disingenuous; it’s a tactic to cut off rational debate by impugning the motives of the other side. This isn’t a matter of hating or fearing gay people; it’s a matter of loving God, seeking to honor the clear descriptions of marriage as repeatedly revealed in Scripture, and maintaining faithfulness to the institution of the family.

  Let’s examine the first question I posed: Are there limits on which combinations of relationships are allowed and which are not? If man/man and woman/woman marriages are considered normal and acceptable, what about marriage between a man and multiple women? Or multiple men? Are women limited to marrying one man or one woman, but not both at the same time? By what standard has this been determined? Who has the authority to decide? No one? Okay, then, should we include any relationship?

  When I have posed such a question to gay activists, I’ve often found myself at the receiving end of angry, profanity-laced rants that same-sex marriage is only about two people loving each other. They’re missing my point: Why limit marriage to just two people? If we’re going to accommodate one sexual preference, isn’t it only fair to accommodate any and all preferences? If mere consent of the participants makes something right, then any combination of consenting adults should be absolutely legal, moral, and defensible.

  As for the broader context of marriage, there are historical, psychological, sociological, theological, and biological aspects of a marital relationship. I fully understand that it’s awkward to bring some of these up, but if we want a legitimate and honest assessment of whether it’s in the best interest of society to make a radical change in what marriage means, then it’s imperative that we have a full conversation about it.

  Some of the objections to same-sex marriage are biological (this is the awkward part, but here we go). Male and female bodies were designed by the Creator (that’s my God-centered view and I’m sticking to it) so that they complement each other physically. It’s truly a wonder that the male body has the capacity to physically unite with the female body for the purpose of copulation and procreation. In the act of conceiving a child, a man and woman literally do become “one flesh,” as it’s described in the Bible, in that they create a new individual with unique DNA. (I love that the “one flesh” description of sex was written thousands of years before we knew anything about genetic code.) Sex is also a way for husband and wife to strengthen their emotional connection. And, yes, it’s obvious that sexual union also has a recreational value. Even so, while two bodies of the same gender can engage in a variety of sexual activities, which can certainly involve a deep emotional connection, none of them fit the natural physical expression that is the male/female union as I believe God designed.

  When advocates of
same-sex marriage say, “What’s the harm?” the honest reply is that at this point, we simply don’t have enough reliable accumulated data to be able to say. While homosexuality has been around throughout recorded history, with references to it even in the Old Testament, one has to be more imaginative than Pixar to claim that the Bible approves of homosexual behavior, much less homosexual marriage. One would have to say that the traditions as well as the biblical texts are simply wrong.

  If a person doesn’t accept a God-centered worldview, and with it a God who establishes the “ground rules” for life, then it’s possible to accommodate pretty much any lifestyle imaginable. This is not to say that nonbelievers can’t see the wisdom of following many faith-based traditional norms; many do, and strive to lead a moral life just for the sake of doing good and making the world a better place. Nonbelievers can certainly commit to lifelong fidelity, just as Christians can, because they grew up with those “ground rules” and see the Earthly benefits of having them.

  But if we lose those “ground rules” and start redefining marriage, where do we stop? Can we stop? Are there any limits on what marriage can mean? For example, if a person is self-described as bisexual, equally comfortable relating to members of either gender, then by the very nature of the mandate to allow people to love anyone they want, shouldn’t a bisexual be able to have both a male and a female spouse? Wouldn’t restricting that person access to both genders be denying the bisexual his or her marriage “equality”?

  While I realize that the biological and historical aspects of marriage are grounded in some level of objective research and data, the psychological and sociological components are more complicated. Until the 1970s, homosexuality was considered a disorder. Was the change in the definition based on sound science and objective research, or was it in part the result of political pressure? Is Lady Gaga correct when she sings about being “Born This Way”? We know that some people appear to transition from straight to gay, and sometimes back again, but others seem extremely unlikely to do this. It’s apparent that numerous factors are involved in sexual orientation; as with global warming and virtually every other issue being studied, the science is not settled! Someday we’ll look back on this time and marvel at how little we knew.