One Man's Journey To Supporting Gay Marriage
Fade In. Camera pans into a hospital room.
There are several machines clustered around a bed, lots of numbers, lights, and beeps. An older patient is sleeping in the hospital bed, lots of tubes coming out of their arm hooked to the machines and drip bags beside the bed. The patient is not sleeping well, the rest is a fitful one. There are small groans and moans which slip out as they toss and turn.
As the camera pulls back we see a hallway and a bit further down we see a waiting room. There we see another older person crying, quietly sobbing, holding a tissue. They are talking to the doctor and the news is apparently not good. As the doctor leaves, we see the person continue to simply sit and cry. Hours, even days may pass. The visitor it turns out is the soulmate of our patient. They have been together for nearly 40 years, sharing birthdays, vacations, life's many happy and sad moments. However, now they are forced to remain apart.
One is dying, likely within hours or days from a cancer which has spread and is ravaging the patient. The other is forced to sit and wait, outside, down the hall and is not allowed to hold hands and comfort the other.
Why? Because they are the same sex, and the law does not permit them to be considered a family member despite over 40 years spent together.
When the patient finally passes away, the survivor will be subjected to more indignity, since the state will also not recognize any legal standing for them. They will be treated as simply someone the deceased knew.
This scene is tragically playing out in our country every day, and countless others just like it. The reason being, the state does not recognize the partnership, the relationship, the commitment to one another they had simply because they are homosexual.
I know several, perhaps even many of my friends who are very devout, wonderful people will vehemently disagree with my viewpoint that gay people be allowed to marry. They will quote Bible verses, anecdotal stories, and a multitude of reasons they oppose such "official" recognition. However, I cannot agree with them. I believe first and foremost in the basic premise we are all free to choose our own path in life. We are free to seek God in our own way, or not seek Him if that is your choice. We cannot and should not ever be forced by the state to follow it's designated path. Our founding fathers felt this to be so fundamental a right for everyone they made it the very first amendment to the US Constitution.
Please note I did not say we are not all free to believe differently. The same first amendment right grants everyone the right to disagree, to oppose such views and to be protected in their speech denoting so.
As far as my fellow Christians go, I am sure I will see many quotes from Leviticus, and other chapters in the Bible. However, those same Christians will gloss over the verses such as Deuteronomy 22:22 where adulterers are to be put to death ("If a man is found sleeping with another man’s wife, both the man who slept with her and the woman must die."). Or Deuteronomy 22:28-29, "If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her and they are discovered, he shall pay her father fifty shekels of silver. He must marry the young woman, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives."
Honestly, deep down inside, all Christians will try and follow the tenets of the Bible, it is fundamental to the religion. However, 99.9% (maybe more) will pick and choose over certain verses, or attempt to explain away the seeming inconsistencies as a context issue.
I am not going to blog on the many hundreds of back and forth verses and texts in the Bible. Rather, I am simply acknowledging the obvious fact we all tend to interpret parts of the Bible according to our own particular religious code, usually the specific tenets of our chosen church or faith. And that is precisely my point: we live in a country where the laws allow us the liberty to be free to choose our own beliefs.
Thus, the crux of my own belief is this issue needs to be addressed by our government; it is a matter of liberty. We should all be free to marry who we choose. You may not like who someone chooses, heck we all have friends who married someone we are not fond of, or outright don't like. But we don't stop caring for our friends. We don't look for legal obstacles to stop them from being able to marry.
Our country does indeed face many daunting challenges going forward. It is threatened from without and within. There are countries and religions out there that want to see America exterminated, wiped from the earth. I would honestly agree with the sentiment of some that our greatest threats are actually from within. There are those in our country who are working right now to erode our freedoms and restrict our liberty, nearly always in the name of keeping us safe.
We must therefore remain vigilant in protecting our cherished freedoms and liberties, even if we don't always agree with each others viewpoint (I could go on here for a while about the Westboro Baptist Church folks). So, even if you disagree with the notion of gay marriage, you are free to do so. However, I think you should at least take the time to ponder how your opposition fits into the fundamental principles of freedom and liberty before you go forth publicly condemning it.
I will even admit I used to be opposed to gay marriage. I felt as though the Bible condemned the practice. My church hammered away at those verses. It felt so clear. However, I knew it wasn't right to force raped women to marry their rapist. I realized the church allowed divorced people to remarry even though the Bible did not permit it (except in a very select few circumstances). So, over time I came to find many paths to God being shown to me, but yet none of them were mine.
Eventually, I realized God wanted me to find my own path to Him. When I did find my way, God helped me to grow and understand His message and I realized it wasn't a rigid set of directions where one wrong turn led directly to hell, but rather His message one was of love, respect, salvation and forgiveness. Jesus did not hang out with the most devout and righteous of His time, He spent His time with the very folks those devout ones preached against the most. I realized God loves us all. We will all one day answer to Him for all of our choices, and perhaps most importantly, we are all free to make those choices. I certainly do not have all of the answers. In fact, I am only certain of the fact that I don't have all the answers. But I do know Christ's message is to love God with all your heart and to love one another.
So, I began to ponder why I had been so opposed to the idea. Who did it hurt? Did it threaten my marriage? Did such a view support Christ's "love one another as I have loved you" commandment? Countless other questions. In the end, I came to realize I had only opposed it because I felt like I had to do so to fit in at church. Simple unrelenting peer pressure. And I saw the injustice gay couples had to endure, the obstacles they faced at virtually every turn, and despite all of those pressures; so many stayed devoted to one another. My conscience convicted me. I had been so blind to ignoring their lack of freedom. So, I changed my view. I started to share my convictions with others. I found I was not alone in those thoughts and sentiments.
In light of the current Supreme Court cases being argued this week, it seemed like a good time to express my support in the hope it might lead others to do the same.
Gay couples deserve the right to marry and to have their rights protected, the same as everyone else.
There are several machines clustered around a bed, lots of numbers, lights, and beeps. An older patient is sleeping in the hospital bed, lots of tubes coming out of their arm hooked to the machines and drip bags beside the bed. The patient is not sleeping well, the rest is a fitful one. There are small groans and moans which slip out as they toss and turn.
As the camera pulls back we see a hallway and a bit further down we see a waiting room. There we see another older person crying, quietly sobbing, holding a tissue. They are talking to the doctor and the news is apparently not good. As the doctor leaves, we see the person continue to simply sit and cry. Hours, even days may pass. The visitor it turns out is the soulmate of our patient. They have been together for nearly 40 years, sharing birthdays, vacations, life's many happy and sad moments. However, now they are forced to remain apart.
One is dying, likely within hours or days from a cancer which has spread and is ravaging the patient. The other is forced to sit and wait, outside, down the hall and is not allowed to hold hands and comfort the other.
Why? Because they are the same sex, and the law does not permit them to be considered a family member despite over 40 years spent together.
When the patient finally passes away, the survivor will be subjected to more indignity, since the state will also not recognize any legal standing for them. They will be treated as simply someone the deceased knew.
This scene is tragically playing out in our country every day, and countless others just like it. The reason being, the state does not recognize the partnership, the relationship, the commitment to one another they had simply because they are homosexual.
I know several, perhaps even many of my friends who are very devout, wonderful people will vehemently disagree with my viewpoint that gay people be allowed to marry. They will quote Bible verses, anecdotal stories, and a multitude of reasons they oppose such "official" recognition. However, I cannot agree with them. I believe first and foremost in the basic premise we are all free to choose our own path in life. We are free to seek God in our own way, or not seek Him if that is your choice. We cannot and should not ever be forced by the state to follow it's designated path. Our founding fathers felt this to be so fundamental a right for everyone they made it the very first amendment to the US Constitution.
Please note I did not say we are not all free to believe differently. The same first amendment right grants everyone the right to disagree, to oppose such views and to be protected in their speech denoting so.
As far as my fellow Christians go, I am sure I will see many quotes from Leviticus, and other chapters in the Bible. However, those same Christians will gloss over the verses such as Deuteronomy 22:22 where adulterers are to be put to death ("If a man is found sleeping with another man’s wife, both the man who slept with her and the woman must die."). Or Deuteronomy 22:28-29, "If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and rapes her and they are discovered, he shall pay her father fifty shekels of silver. He must marry the young woman, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives."
Honestly, deep down inside, all Christians will try and follow the tenets of the Bible, it is fundamental to the religion. However, 99.9% (maybe more) will pick and choose over certain verses, or attempt to explain away the seeming inconsistencies as a context issue.
I am not going to blog on the many hundreds of back and forth verses and texts in the Bible. Rather, I am simply acknowledging the obvious fact we all tend to interpret parts of the Bible according to our own particular religious code, usually the specific tenets of our chosen church or faith. And that is precisely my point: we live in a country where the laws allow us the liberty to be free to choose our own beliefs.
Thus, the crux of my own belief is this issue needs to be addressed by our government; it is a matter of liberty. We should all be free to marry who we choose. You may not like who someone chooses, heck we all have friends who married someone we are not fond of, or outright don't like. But we don't stop caring for our friends. We don't look for legal obstacles to stop them from being able to marry.
Our country does indeed face many daunting challenges going forward. It is threatened from without and within. There are countries and religions out there that want to see America exterminated, wiped from the earth. I would honestly agree with the sentiment of some that our greatest threats are actually from within. There are those in our country who are working right now to erode our freedoms and restrict our liberty, nearly always in the name of keeping us safe.
We must therefore remain vigilant in protecting our cherished freedoms and liberties, even if we don't always agree with each others viewpoint (I could go on here for a while about the Westboro Baptist Church folks). So, even if you disagree with the notion of gay marriage, you are free to do so. However, I think you should at least take the time to ponder how your opposition fits into the fundamental principles of freedom and liberty before you go forth publicly condemning it.
I will even admit I used to be opposed to gay marriage. I felt as though the Bible condemned the practice. My church hammered away at those verses. It felt so clear. However, I knew it wasn't right to force raped women to marry their rapist. I realized the church allowed divorced people to remarry even though the Bible did not permit it (except in a very select few circumstances). So, over time I came to find many paths to God being shown to me, but yet none of them were mine.
Eventually, I realized God wanted me to find my own path to Him. When I did find my way, God helped me to grow and understand His message and I realized it wasn't a rigid set of directions where one wrong turn led directly to hell, but rather His message one was of love, respect, salvation and forgiveness. Jesus did not hang out with the most devout and righteous of His time, He spent His time with the very folks those devout ones preached against the most. I realized God loves us all. We will all one day answer to Him for all of our choices, and perhaps most importantly, we are all free to make those choices. I certainly do not have all of the answers. In fact, I am only certain of the fact that I don't have all the answers. But I do know Christ's message is to love God with all your heart and to love one another.
So, I began to ponder why I had been so opposed to the idea. Who did it hurt? Did it threaten my marriage? Did such a view support Christ's "love one another as I have loved you" commandment? Countless other questions. In the end, I came to realize I had only opposed it because I felt like I had to do so to fit in at church. Simple unrelenting peer pressure. And I saw the injustice gay couples had to endure, the obstacles they faced at virtually every turn, and despite all of those pressures; so many stayed devoted to one another. My conscience convicted me. I had been so blind to ignoring their lack of freedom. So, I changed my view. I started to share my convictions with others. I found I was not alone in those thoughts and sentiments.
In light of the current Supreme Court cases being argued this week, it seemed like a good time to express my support in the hope it might lead others to do the same.
Gay couples deserve the right to marry and to have their rights protected, the same as everyone else.
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