Gay Marriage and Joseph Goebbels

Joseph Goebbels, chief Nazi propagandist

The arguments from Focus on the Family and the anti-gay "christian" right run something like this.

Gay marriage:

1. will destroy (makes a mockery of) heterosexual marriage

2. goes against what the Bible "clearly" says

3. goes against the historical view of every society about marriage for the last 5000 years (I don't know why they say 5000 years since chronologically the marriage of Adam and Eve was 6000 years ago)

4. will inevitably lead to polygamy and beastiality

5. will bring God's judgment on America and we'll be destroyed like Sodom

I believe these arguments are disingenuous at best and intentionally dishonest at worst.

Argument 1. Gay marriage will destroy (makes a mockery of) heterosexual marriage

Answer 1. Gay marriage says nothing negative about heterosexual marriage. Many anti-gay marriage proponents insist that (a) homosexuality is chosen behavior, that (b) no one is born gay or lesbian and (c) that gays only make up about 1% of the population.

If the antigay crowd is right, then gay marriage will always represent only a miniscule portion of folks getting married and will have no statistical impact on heterosexual marriage. So what are they so worried about?

According to famous conservative evangelical pastor (and leader of Dallas Theological Seminary) Chuck Swindoll, on his personal blog in February, 2008, 50% of heterosexual men in evangelical churches like his, have a problem with pornography.

Not 50% of men in general but 50% of men in evangelical churches including the deacons, elders and leaders.

A Barna poll of unmarried, heterosexual, born again evangelicals found that 32% of the evangelical heterosexual christian respondents admitted to having sexual relationships outside of marriage.

One cannot help but observe that if anyone is making a mockery of heterosexual marriage, it is heterosexual christians themselves, who prefer to scape-goat their gay brothers and lesbian sisters instead of putting their own house in order.

Argument 2. Gay marriage goes against what the Bible "clearly" says.

Answer 2. The anti-gay lobby reads the story of Adam and Eve and concludes that God will never bless any marriage relationship except the Adam and Eve, one man with one woman paradigm. Obviously the Bible proves that conclusion is wrong because God richly blessed polygamous marriages which are not after the Adam and Eve, one man with one woman paradigm.

Argument 3. Gay marriage goes against the historical view of every society about marriage for the last 5000 years.

Answer 3. If the anti-gay crowd was honest, they would admit that they don't really want modern marriages to follow Biblical patterns for marriage.

If the anti-gay crowd was honest, they would admit they are as against Biblical polygamous marriages and Biblical incestuous marriages and Biblical levirate marriages and Biblical prisoner of war marriages as they are against gay marriages.

They use the Bible when it supports their agenda and ignore the Bible when it doesn't support their agenda.

Yet polygamous, incestuous marriages like Abraham, Sarah and Hagar OR polygamous marriages like Jacob, Leah, Rachel, Bilhah and Zilpah are as much a part of Biblical marriage as the Adam and Eve patnership.

If Abraham could marry his half-sister Sarah and they could spend their long lives in a romantic sexual marriage relationship, with God's full and abundant blessing, it does not strain credulity to believe that the same principle, two people with complementary sexual orientations who love each other forming a life-long marriage partnership, can also apply to same sex couples.

Argument 4. Gay marriage will inevitably lead to polygamy and beastiality.

Answer 4. With all Christian kindness and no disrespect intended, this is perhaps the dumbest and weakest argument against gay marriage. Any Christian with a rudimentary knowledge of the Bible knows that polygamy first shows up in the Bible in Genesis 4:19, long BEFORE anything even remotely homosexual is mentioned in scripture.

A form of Beastiality (human women marrying angels) first shows up in the Bible in Genesis 6:1-13, long before anything even remotely homosexual shows up in scripture. By the way, this true story exposes the false teaching that angels are sexless beings incapable of procreation or that angels are female, but I digress.

So if we accept the Bible as true (I do, do you?), homosexuality doesn't lead to polygamy and beastiality - those occurred long before any same sex activity is mentioned in the Bible. I'm just sayin...

The Bible never posits that gay marriage causes polygamy and beastiality.

The world has had 6000 years of polygamy and beastiality, which have not produced an explosion of gay marriages.

The Focus (if you'll pardon the expresson) on gay marriage in recent history is the result of gay and lesbian Christians refusing to accept unscriptural interpretations and unChristian treatment meted out to us by so many professing christians.

Argument 5. Gay marriage will bring God's judgment on America and we'll be destroyed like Sodom.

Answer 5. Anti-gay marriage rants sometimes conclude with this sound bite:

"If God doesn't judge America or San Francisco or (insert your city here), He'll have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah."

This argument plays on the Biblical ignorance of professing christians who think that the Bible mentions homosexuals in Sodom or think the Bible says God destroyed Sodom because of homosexuality. Of course, the Bible never says anything about homosexuals or homosexuality in Sodom in the 48 verses where Sodom is mentioned in Holy Scripture.

For years, when anti-gay preachers mentioned gays, it was to excoriate gays for living promiscuous lifestyles.

Why did gays have to be SO promiscuous? Why couldn't gays settle down and rein in our carnal desires?

Aside from the insulting stereotype, when gays and lesbians formed life-long partnerships and did not live promiscuous lifestyles, the anti-gay preachers then adjusted their argument and accused gays and lesbians of trying to destroy heterosexual marriage.

Modern "christians" often speak of gays as a group, to be vilified, feared, attacked and discriminated against. They refuse to think of us as individuals.

Most gays and lesbians are too honest and have too much grace to do this but if we stereotyped heterosexual Christians the way heterosexual christians stereotype gays and lesbians, they would get angry.

Modern anti-gay "christians" use Joseph Goebbels style propaganda against gays and lesbians, attempting to portray us as untermensch (sub-human).

If they can convince people that gays and lesbians are sub-human and therefore, not worthy of equal rights, like the Nazis convinced Germany that Jews were sub-human and therefore, not worthy of equal rights, then they can legally destroy us.

If they can convince people that gays and lesbians are undermining heterosexual marriage and destroying western civilization by spreading AIDS, as the Nazis convinced Germany that Jews were a plague on German society and were spreading disease and death, then the next step is to take away the rights of gay people as the Nazis took away the rights of Jews.

Anti-gay "christians" hurl vicious false accusations against us, such as:

a. Gays and lesbians want to destroy heterosexual marriage and families

b. Gays and lesbians make a choice to live wicked immoral lives

c. Gays and lesbians are fake Christians, not true Christians

d. Gays and lesbians will bring God's harsh judgment on us

e. Being gay or lesbian is SO bad that the Bible says to kill gays and lesbians

f. Gays and lesbians have no morals

Let not your hearts be troubled, brethren.

God is still on His throne. Keep trusting God, walk in the Spirit daily and study so that you know what your Bible says. There is no substitute for knowing what scripture actually says instead of "knowing" what it is presumed to teach.

GayChristian101.com has lots of helpful FREE information about being both gay and Christian.