The Salt Lake Tribune reports, in a scandalous tone, that Utah Legislators dared use the word "procreation" in their effort to defend traditional marriage.
While I am the first to criticize religious beliefs that lead to racism or other injustice (such as Covenant Theory). I applaud arguments that reflect the deeper moral sense of the Christian tradition.
The traditional Christian view starts with the view that human life is sacred. If life is sacred, then the process that creates life is sacred. In theology, the term "procreation" refers to the process that creates human life.
A sacrament is way of acknowledging the sacred nature of an action. In Christian Theology, one sees the sacrament of marriage as a way to sanctify procreation. This is an affirmative view that holds life sacred.
Humans, like most multi-cellular forms of life on this planet (including fish and trees) reproduce through sexual reproduction involving a man and a women. In sexual reproduction, the DNA of the male combines with the DNA of a female to create a new DNA pattern. This process of sexual reproduction (combining DNA) appears to be fundamental to the evolution of life on this planet. Saying otherwise is anti-science.
The ideas behind procreation have both a solid theological and scientific foundation.
Way back in the 1980s, I was an early supporter of Same Sex Marriage. For that matter, I still support recognition of same sex civil unions and really have no problem with people calling their relation a "gay marriage" as long as "gay marriage" is held to be something different from the sacrament of marriage.
In the 1980s, I went to a lecture with some progressive friends. I was for gay-marriage. I felt that if two people wanted to call their relation a marriage, then more power to them. Oddly, my progressive friends were against gay-marriage. One made a point of rejecting all forms of marriage as antiquated. The other, who I suspect was gay, thought the gay experience should be commitment free life style. In his view, marriage was a thing of the past and in the glorious progressive future no-one would be constrained by any form of social commitment ... well, other than commitment to the glorious state.
During the presentation, a slick lawyer argued that, once the state recognizes gay marriage, then the progressive legal community could start attacking churches under the equal protection clause. If Gay Marriage was held to be the legal and logical equivalent of a heterosexual marriage, then lawyers could attack any church that held that marriage was a sacrament formed around procreation.
Please note. The current movement is called "The Marriage Equality Movement." True equality would me that the state must punish any church that holds that marriage is a sacrament formed around procreation.
This idea of attacking churches scares me. Procreation is the belief that human life is sacred. Attacking the idea that life is sacred leads to some very dark places.
Having sat through a lecture in which a sleazebag lawyer outlined a course for a fundamental attack on religious beliefs, I changed my position. Oddly, my progressive friends changed their positions as well.
BTW: I knew people who hate the institution of marriage, but who actively support "gay marriage" as a way to attack their enemies ... Progressivism is sickening.
I have no problem with people calling their personal relationship a "gay marriage." Calling one's relation a marriage is an act of free speech. But forcing others to acknowledge one's relation as equal to the sacrament of marriage is a different thing.
Attacking sacred beliefs of others is not an act of extending liberty. It is a direct attack on the moral conscious of a people.
The traditional Christian view is that life is sacred. The process that creates life is sacred and is recognized as such with the sacrament of marriage.
The marriage equality movement demands that churches be forced to extend the sacrament of marriage to same sex couples. This goes squarely against ages of thinking and the scientific evidence surrounding evolution.
If I could find a way to support gay marriage that wouldn't be hijacked by the far left and used as an attack on procreation, I would support the move. I support people calling their relation a "gay marriage." I support same sex civil unions, but this is not what the "marriage equality" movement is after. This ugly movement wants a full scale attack on religion. They want a attack on beliefs in the sanctity of human life and they want an attack on religious freedom.
When culture warriors begin an assault on fundamental freedoms, I will stand with the fundamental freedoms every time. So, I applaud the Utah legislature for using the term "procreation." The idea that life is sacred and that marriage is a sacrament built around the sanctity of life is beautiful.
If anything, I wish the Christian community would take their belief in the sanctity of human and life and question the practices in the fertility industry which destroys numerous embryos for each life created by this mad science.
ADDED: After writing this post, I stumbled on an article about a Christian group being listed as a "Domestic Hate Group" for supporting traditional marriage.
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