By Bishop Bill Atwood

For centuries (especially before GPS), mariners have used a simple system of harbor lights to navigate the channel of safe passage into port. When the vessel is properly lined up in the channel, the pilot looks to land and sees three lights at different heights that look like this:

If the ship is off course to the left, the lights look like this:

Conversely, if the ship is off course to the right, the lights look like this:

The lights are on dry land and don’t move. The ship maneuvers to find the safe passage through water that is deep enough and doesn’t have hazardous rocks. If the line-up of the lights does not appear vertical, the ship is maneuvered until they are lined up properly. That tells the pilot where the ship will wind up. In this case, it will be safely in port.

The principle works in many other areas of life as well. If some things are known, they can be projected to determine where things are going to wind up. This is not a guess. It is not speculation. It is geometry.

While people rarely think with this kind of insight, it is possible to do so.

The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) has been hearing arguments about cases that involve same-sex marriage over the last week. Those who are opposing a California proposition that defined marriage as between one man and one woman are arguing that the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution makes the “Proposition 8” unconstitutional. They argue that the Fourteenth Amendment insures “equal protection under the law,” therefor same-sex couples must be allowed to marry, just as men and women are. In another case, President Obama is urging the Supreme Court to overturn the Defense of Marriage act. Because he does not like the law, the President has directed the Justice department not to enforce it. (I’m actually stunned that a sitting President would instruct the Justice Department to ignore the law just because he doesn’t like it. Working to change a law is moral. Ignoring a law one doesn’t like is out of order. Hopefully, the President will not also develop a dislike for the law of gravity.)

At stake in the Supreme Court cases is not just a decision that impacts things now, it is one that has far reaching implications. Like with the harbor lights, it is possible to see where things are headed.

Of course, it is a decision whether or not to re-define marriage. The definition of marriage has sweeping implications for the culture. Marriage has been the building block of stable civilization for seven thousand years. Such a dramatic shift of longstanding understanding is not a small thing. How ever well intentioned, a superficial decision about this could be disastrous. The arrogance of modern liberals to assume that they are competent to re-shape society is quite remarkable.

Also at stake is the standard by which things are judged and decisions made. A third issue is the whole area of consequences that rise from changing societal foundations.

This is not the first time that radical re-direction has been considered by SCOTUS. Twice before, Supreme Court Decisions have set dramatic new directions that departed from generations of legal precedent. In 1963, the Supreme Court issued a completely novel decision to disallow Bible reading and prayer in schools. They departed from almost two hundred years of practice, innovating on what the founders clearly had intended. For generations, the understanding was that no religion would be “established” as part of the government as it is in England. Because language evolves and changes, to understand what the founders intended it would be better to say that they directed that no denomination would be established. That, however, had never meant that the Church or Christians had to be silent in public discourse or even in government deliberations. Not only are countless Scriptures etched into government buildings in Washington DC and throughout the States, Christian prayer was always a normal part of public life. The United States Congress was even the publisher of the first edition of the Bible printed in North America.

I wrote about this in one of my books, Wild Vine~Fruitful Vine.(1)  Woven into many of the original documents of the United States was the understanding that the responsibility of leaders was to discern God’s will rather than just impose their own thinking.  In the state constitution of Vermont in 1786, elected officials had to make the following assertion:

You do believe in one God, the Creator and Governor of the Universe, the rewarder of the good, and punisher of the wicked. And you do acknowledge the scriptures of the Old and New Testament to be given by divine inspiration; and own and profess the Protestant religion.(2) 

Not only are such assertions no longer made by government officials, (I’m sure to the satisfaction of Roman Catholics!) one would not have to look too far to find bishops and clergy today who could not affirm the Scriptures in their plain sense meaning.

Contrary to the assumptions of many twenty-first century people, most of the founders of the nation were not Deists or unbelievers.  Even in states that are often presumed to be liberal, Christian roots were undeniable in the State Constitution.  Witness the oath required before one could be seated in public office in Delaware.

“I, A B. do profess faith in God the Father, and in Jesus Christ His only Son, and in the Holy Ghost, one God, blessed for evermore; and I do acknowledge the holy scriptures of the Old and New Testament to be given by divine inspiration.”(3) 

In addition, there was originally an assumption that the purpose of decision making was to find and obey God’s will.  This was true not only among legislatures but also assumed among the population in general.

…ought to observe the Sabbath, or the Lord’s day, and keep up, and support, some sort of religious worship, which to them shall seem most agreeable to the revealed will of GOD.(4)  

The pattern of democratic decision-making seems to have worked reasonably well when the surrounding culture was overwhelmingly Christian, but there is a fundamental flaw.  The fidelity of the decisions was based not on qualities inherent to the process; rather they were dependent on the character and the worldview that the participants brought to the process. Slowly, as succeeding iterations of documents were produced there was less and less specific Christian focus.  Eventually, Christian values were assumed rather than expressed. Today, they have been forgotten.

Now we face the possibility that the Supreme Court will set aside the definition of marriage that has been used for millennia. The argument seems to be that everyone is afforded equal protection under the law. While it is true that we have equal protection, it does not follow that all behaviors should be equally welcome. They are certainly not all equally productive.

Should the Supreme Court ruling force approval of same-sex marriage, they will be opening the door to an increased measure of chaos in the society. If they apply the fourteenth amendment to insist that that society does not have the right to order itself around certain positive behaviors while limiting other behaviors that are unhelpful, then “the walls come tumbling down.” The logical implications are staggering.

Logically, if equal protection means that same-sex persons have a right to marry, then how will other groups logically be denied the benefits of marriage in the society? How will any behaviors that are destructive be limited?

Modern liberals think that they can depart from the dusty foundations of Christian thought and apply new standards without suffering any negative repurcussions. Judeo-Christian standards are not only those that are used to define marriage, they are the standards by which other social norms are established. Liberals forget that the revealed truth of Scripture offers stability that liberalism has utterly failed to replicate. They also overlook inconvenient facts when they are devastating to their argument, simply because they do not fit what they want. While it is popular to say that Christians have introduced judgment, pain, and hatred into society, in fact, it is Christian values that produced initiatives of social justice, healthcare, and education.

Here are just two (of many) problem areas that are overlooked in dealing with same-sex relations. First, while it is theoretically possible that there could be a stable same-sex relationship, only the tiniest percentage of same-sex relationships, actually are stable. In The Social Organization of Sexuality, 216; McWhirter and Mattison, it was reported that while 85% of married women, and 77% of men  report being faithful sexually, only 4.5 % of those in “committed same-sex relations” report being monogamous. Perhaps the numbers would go up somewhat if “committed relationships” are actually called “marriages,” but there appears to be a vastly different expectation in the homosexual community about what fidelity is.

The second area that is overlooked is the implication to health. William Satinover reports in Homosexuality and the Politics of Truth that the average American male involved in same-sex relations lives twenty-seven years shorter lifespan than the general population. A study in metropolitan Canada cites shorter lifespans of 8 to 20 years for those active in homosexual behavior. How can the church ignore such devastating implications in the lives of people who are precious to God and ought to be precious to us? If we love people well, we won’t encourage them to end their lives early with behavior that causes death.

The negative health impact is sweeping. Those active in same-sex intimacy account for something like 2% of the population, but one study showed that they had 54% of the HIV/AIDS infections. The incidence of infection is astronomically higher. In addition, the rate of infection for some types of cancer is 4000 percent higher in those active in same sex behavior!

There are also levels of depression that are much higher in those who act on same-sex attraction than the general population. Activists that promote same-sex relations blame judgment from the Church as the reason for higher levels of depression in those with same-sex attractions. In fact, studies in the Netherlands where same-sex relations are viewed with virtually complete acceptance show similar incidents of depression among those who pursue same-sex intimacy as are found in North America.

The Church should not be (and is not) against people finding fulfillment. The problem is that there is a mountain of evidence that same sex relationships result in harm, not fulfillment. Notwithstanding anecdotal evidence of some charming same-sex couples who seem to be stable over the long term, the fact is that such relationships are rare. What is more common are same-sex relationships that are not stable or monogamous.

The fantasy that same-sex couples’ relationships are substantively identical to those in heterosexual marriage overlooks both health and stability. Those who advocate for same-sex marriage and relationships claim to be the loving ones. They accuse those who disagree of being hateful. Instead of affirming people in behavior that is proving to be destructive, those of us who truly love others should be willing to love them enough to speak the truth that we don’t want them to die.

Advocates for same-sex marriage have studiously and intentionally emphasized the non-sexual parts of the relationship, focusing instead on other areas like the love that people have for each other, the need for inheritance, companionship, and legal partnerships. All those things are available through civil law. What is not available is legal affirmation for same-sex sexual contact. The roots of that stem from the Biblical truth that same-sex physical intimacy has health risks. Society that is rightly based on Biblical truth orders common life in ways that are loving.

If the Supreme Court Justices decide to change the definition of marriage, they will be doing a great disservice, even to those they seek to promote. Beyond the issue at hand, there will no longer be logical reasons to limit other behavior. If the Fourteenth Amendment is used as the justification for same-sex marriage, by what legal logic could marriage among a group be proscribed? How will arguments to set any other limits based on behavior logically hold up?

Is there a First or Fourteenth amendment right to ride a motorcycle without a helmet? If so, who pays the bill for the increased head injuries? When the resources of a “helmet freedom crusader” run out after an injury, it is society that picks up the tab for care. Don’t the people who will pay for that care have a right to say, “Use a helmet”?  A culture where “everyone does what is right in his own eyes” may sound inviting, but it’s trajectory is very problematic.

This is not only an issue for the United States. Liberal Church and government officials are working hard to export the same-sex agenda and abortion. Contrary to US law, government officials openly campaigned in Kenya for a change in the Kenyan Constitution to include abortion. They even sought to leverage US aid money to get abortion included in the new Kenyan Constitution (much to the dislike of most Kenyans). Same-sex relations are getting a similar boost, also leveraged with millions of aid dollars.

The role of the church is not to govern society, but it is to illuminate society with God’s revelation. That revelation has been established in Scripture. Neither is our role to judge, but it is not judgment to share which path leads to blessing and which leads away from it. It may seem to be futile to stand up against the same-sex lobby and the media machine that serves it, but it is important to do so. It may also seem foolish to challenge a government with its vast resources when we have such limited finances and worldly muscle, but we are called to speak the truth in love and show that abundance comes from following God’s plans and purposes.

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(1) Wild Vine~Fruitful Vine, Ekklesia Publications 2003, available through Amazon.com
(2) The Constitution of the State of Vermont, Article III, 1786.
(3) The Constitution of the State of Delaware, Article 22, 1776.
(4) The Constitution of the State of Vermont, Article III, 1776.