Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Why I Care About the Movement to Legalize Gay Marriage



Sometimes being a Latter-day Saint means standing up for seemingly unpopular or out-moded moral values.

Yesterday was one of those days for me. When I read the following letter-to-the-editor
in our local paper, I decided to respond with a letter of my own. My letter
appeared in today's paper. I have included both letters for you to read below.

Mine is the second letter titled "Caring opponents".
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Faith in politics

Although I carefully read Maggie Gallagher's recent rant ("Gay marriage and the future of religious liberty," The Daily Item, April 9 ) against gay and lesbian marriage, I came away just as confused as before. What I simply cannot understand is, "Why does she care?"

Indeed, why does anyone care? It is no skin off anyone else's nose if that gay or lesbian couple down the street want to marry.

How is Ms. Gallagher or anyone else, for that matter, even slightly inconvenienced by someone else getting married to whomever they wish?

Perhaps by way of argument, Ms. Gallagher writes, "... God himself made man male and female and commanded men and women to come together in a special way to image the fruitfulness of God."

Be that as it may, she is certainly free to believe it or not as she sees fit. So am I. And so is everyone else in this country. She, and everyone else in this country, is even at liberty to live her personal life by that rule, if that is what she wants.

But in this country religious belief is entirely a private matter. And what neither she nor anyone else is at liberty to do is to attempt to impose, by force of law, their private religious beliefs on other people.

Dale Hurliman,

Beavertown

Caring opponents

A reader of The Daily Item posed this question to people who are opposed to legalizing gay marriage: "... Why does anyone care? It's no skin off anyone else's nose."

Simply put: I care about what other people do, because I care about other people.

I care about my neighbors. I care about my children. I care about perfect strangers. I care about society. I care about religious liberty. I care about each person's right to choose how they will live. I care about the fact that every decision I make affects others, whether they realize it right away or not. I care about how our choices today will affect future generations.

The debate over whether to legalize gay marriage will not end soon. Surely there are misunderstandings on both sides of this important issue facing society. But let there be no misunderstanding on this point: Most people who oppose legalizing gay marriage do so because we do not see it as a path to true happiness, peace and stability for any individual, family or society -- and we earnestly care about every individual, family and society.

Ultimately, we will all choose how we will live our lives, thanks to this democracy in which we live, but only time will tell if our good intentions on both sides of this issue were appropriately placed.

Jocelyn Christensen, Lewisburg


3 comments:

  1. what makes it scary is as gay marriage grows in acceptance and legality, it is taught in our public schools as a viable life style.

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  2. I truly feel everyone has their own life to live however they wish to do so. I know it is wrong to have same sex marriage; but I am not going to throw my beliefs down their throat. That is not the Christian way. If I just avoid voting for the same sex law and accept them as children of God and love them unconditionally that's all I have to do. Adding to that I know for a fact gay people are one of the best parents around. Just like everyone else they also have a few bad apples that tares their lifestyle down but most of them are professionals and the best of friends you can ever have. Some of the gay friends and co-workers I have had in my life were the best people I have met. And you can count on them if you need them. They are true friends.

    You did a great job. BRAVO!

    P.S, Thanks for commenting on my inspirational blog. I love you.

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  3. I think sometimes homosexual people are addressed in a similar manner as someone having a legitimate disease. Just because they choose to live an alternative lifestyle from mainstream society (well, different from mainstream thus far, though not for long)doesn't diminish their ability to be loving, caring individuals. Of course they can still embody some of the greatest personal attributes as anyone else and can even live greater Christian principles than some Christians that we might know. It is because of this that it is so important that we do not judge them for their choices. With this in mind, however, it does not negate the importance for us to stand up for what we believe in and to protect that which is important to us. We don't allow people to get away with murder, or selling drugs, or even running red lights. Though people are free to commit these acts, they are detrimental to society as a whole. Homosexuality is no different from these other examples in its affect on society- by removing the sanctity of the familial structure, we deny the children raised in such environments the divine importance (and even inherent right) of a fatherly or motherly influence. Science has proven time and again the importance of these two functional roles in the development of a growing child. And once we have removed that right, then we have taken away the free agency of another individual. So while we allow others to make choices of their own accord, I feel a passionate responsibility to fight for those future childrens' rights that they are so unable to fight for themselves.

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