Marriage Equality

In advance of a court case on the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and amid calls to repeal the discriminatory law, the Family Research Council today sent an appeal to members urging them to tell Congress that a repeal of DOMA would present a “grave threat” to the family and religious liberty. In an email to members, FRC president Tony Perkins lamented that the Obama administration has already “forced open homosexuality upon the military” and provided “taxpayer-funded marriage benefits to same-sex couples.”

Few were shocked by the recent announcement of President Obama's "evolved" support for redefining marriage. His words have finally followed his actions - or his inaction when it comes to marriage policy. In less than four years, the Obama Administration has forced open homosexuality upon the Armed Forces, opposed state marriage amendments, refused to do its constitutional duty to defend the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DoMA), and awarded taxpayer-funded marriage benefits to same-sex couples.

Now some in Congress are seeking to repeal DoMA - an act that would endanger the marriage laws in 44 states that currently define marriage as the union of one man and one woman.

There are those who hope you will step aside and allow this God-given institution to be redefined. We cannot allow the DoMA law to be repealed. Please sign our Stand for Marriage petition, and join us in showing Congress and President Obama that marriage is worth standing for.

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Given that the family consisting of marriage between one man and one woman is the foundation of civil society, I urge Congress and President Obama to uphold and defend the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DoMA), which defines marriage for the federal government and affirms the rights of states to protect the institution of marriage. President Obama's cynical endorsement of same-sex "marriage," along with his failure to do his constitutional duty to enforce and defend federal law in relation to marriage, combined with the plans of some in Congress seeking to overturn DoMA - is a grave threat not only to the well-being of the family, but to the religious liberty of countless Americans who do not wish to be forced to embrace a counterfeit version of marriage.

The Religious Right never fails to try to divide African Americans and the LGBT community and ignores the fact that there are many LGBT African Americans.

The latest example is an email alert from Gary Bauer of American Values, who said that the NAACP is hurting black families by endorsing same-sex marriage because allowing men to marry other men, Bauer claims, would exacerbate the problem of single motherhood:

The governing board of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) endorsed same-sex "marriage" over the weekend. The move is not likely to go over well with blacks, who have overwhelmingly supported traditional marriage in previous ballot measures.

Moreover, it is complete nonsense. The socio-economic status of black Americans has declined over the last few decades. We have an emerging black middle class, but the percentage of out-of-wedlock births, the number of abandoned black women, the number of black men incarcerated, etc., have all gone up and in some cases dramatically so. The NAACP's marriage to liberal ideology has been a failure.

The unemployment rate among blacks is a staggering 13%. Yet, the leaders of the NAACP got together this weekend and decided that a top priority for their organization was men "marrying" other men. How does that help the black family, which is already suffering from a lack of men in the home? If black leaders want to come up with a plan to address the ills of the black community and restoring fathers to their children and mothers is not at the top of their list, then they are not helping the black community.

The NAACP's decision pits the breakdown of the black family versus the demand of a largely white, upper-income sexual minority to redefine the meaning of marriage. That would seem to be an easy choice. But NAACP leaders chose to spend their political capital fighting for the interests of San Francisco and Greenwich Village. In doing so, they risk losing the moral authority of the people they claim to represent.

Star Parker even tried to link President Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan’s endorsement of marriage equality to low-performing public schools:

President Barack Obama now commands center stage following his formal announcement that, yes, he supports same sex marriage.

But for perspective on how we got to this point, we should shift our sights to three days before the president's announcement. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan appeared on MSNBC where he responded "yes, I do" when asked if he supports same sex marriage.

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It's not trivial that Duncan, the man who oversees this massive enterprise molding the minds of our nation's youth, publicly rejects the traditional definition of marriage in favor of one saying it just takes two (so far) warm bodies of any gender combination.

The president brandishes one of his favorite words in explaining his support for same sex marriage. "Fairness."

Actually, this is about unfairness.

We have bought into a grand illusion that we can make our public spaces value neutral. But this is impossible.

The struggle in our public spaces is about competing worldviews. Not neutrality.

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2011-2012 Resolutions of the National Education Association, the nation's largest teachers union, include support of same sex marriage and sex education programs that appreciate "diversity of ...sexual orientation and gender identification."

Randi Weingarten, president of the nation's second largest teacher's union, American Federation of Teachers, lives in an open lesbian relationship.

It should come as no surprise when Obama says he sees much of the growth in support for same sex marriage as "generational," with strong support coming from our youth.

Attitudes reflect education. We have created a world in which it is illegal to teach youth in our public schools traditional religious values but it is not illegal to teach them competing values of nihilism, materialism and relativism. And these competing values are actively promoted.

As elsewhere, the main victims are poor, minority kids, often from broken families, held hostage in these public schools and prohibited from being taught the very values that could save their lives.

Is there a way out? I only see one: Universal school choice. Liberate parents and kids from government and union controlled schools. In a free America, parents who don't share Arne Duncan's values shouldn't have them forced on them.

Washington Times columnist and Edmund Burke Institute president Jeffrey Kuhner appeared on The Janet Mefferd Show yesterday where he said that members of the LGBT community “are even worse than the radical Islamists” and more terrifying than the dictators he often writes about, calling them “the most fanatical, hate-filled…and intolerant people I’ve ever met.”

Listen:

Kuhner: As a journalist I write on a wide range of issues, I write on the Communist Chinese, I write on Putin’s regime, I write on brutal dictatorships over the world, the gay, lesbian, transgender community, the LGBT community, is the most intolerant than I have ever witnessed, they are even worse than the radical Islamists. I get death threats, my family is threatened, they call on me to be fired, they want to destroy my career. I have never seen people as intolerant, as malicious, as so desperate to engage in smear and slander and libel as people and activists in the LGBT community, it is really despicable. So for them to run around and say over and over again, all we want is tolerance, all we want is respect for diversity, all we want is respect for civil rights, it is a complete lie. They don’t practice what they preach, they are some of the most fanatical, hate-filled, and I’m choosing my words very carefully, and intolerant people I’ve ever met. I believe that Middle America does not understand the full threat posed by the homosexual agenda and the homosexual lobby.

Kuhner warned that the sitcom “Will and Grace” and romantic comedies that include “the loveable, fuzzy gay person,” which he claimed are “a form of cultural Marxism,” give “us very much a false picture” of the “vulgarity” that is “at the heart of the homosexual lifestyle”:

Kuhner: You wouldn’t believe the vulgarity, the coarseness, the permissiveness, the promiscuity at the heart of the homosexual lifestyle. And so if you actually saw it with your own eyes, and you actually saw the physical damage, and the psychological damage and the emotional damage that comes from living this lifestyle over many years, if the American people would see that with their own eyes I think they would have a very, very different conclusion and very different take. So what we’re getting is, it’s a form of cultural Marxism. You’re getting propaganda. And if you notice, it’s “Will and Grace” on television, I can’t go see a romantic comedy now without, there’s always the loveable, fuzzy gay person who just wants to be accepted for who he is, he’s completely harmless. So they’re giving us very much a false picture.

Mefferd mentioned Kuhner’s column, “Obama’s Homosexual America,” about President Obama’s endorsement of marriage equality, which he said will lead to “civilizational collapse” and a possible “political-cultural civil war” that will determine whether America “will go the way of other non-Christian, pagan societies into the dustbin of history.”

Mefferd: This is just not a small deal, this is a massive deal and he’s put ‘America on the path to moral disintegration,’ as you put it.

Kuhner: And I think civilizational collapse.

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Kuhner: The important issues facing us are really not even economic, I understand that people are worried about their jobs and the deficit, it’s really defending a culture of life and if we do not defend a culture of life, we will go the way of Ancient Greece, we will go the way of Ancient Rome, we will go the way of other non-Christian, pagan societies into the dustbin of history. I believe that gay marriage is a symptom of our moral decay and cultural decline and that’s why I think Middle America has said, enough is enough, and so you saw the people of North Carolina vote overwhelmingly, 61-39%, for Amendment One, passing a constitutional amendment defining marriage as it’s been for thousands of years as between a man and a woman. To what is to me frightening, and I don’t want to overplay this, but you almost see a political-cultural civil war brewing.

Kuhner went on to attack judges who overturned laws banning same-sex marriage as “fascists in black robes” and said the left is imposing a “soft totalitarianism.” “It’s an assault upon freedom, it’s an assault upon liberty, it’s an assault upon our democracy,” Kuhner said of the gay rights movement, “this is about defending our fundamental, basic democracy.”

Kuhner: The moment the people have spoken, you see these secular, progressive liberals go right away to the courts, and three, five or seven judges, almost fascists in black robes, are now able to overturn and thumb their nose at the will of the people. They are becoming increasingly tyrannical, they’re becoming increasingly anti-democratic, and I believe you’re now seeing a soft totalitarianism begin to emerge among the hard left.

Mefferd: Oh yeah. And one thing that comes to mind, I reported on this story several days ago on my show, we had this Employment Non-Discrimination Act that Barney Frank introduced over and over and over again that tried to get through Congress and never made it, which was to give distinction to transgender individuals that you can’t discriminate against them in jobs. They couldn’t do it through Congress, so Chai Feldblum and her friends over at the EEOC, Chai Feldblum, this very well-known lesbian and gay activist, they passed, and by fiat basically, the EEOC did it themselves. I mean, this is what we’re seeing. If they can’t get done what they want to get done the traditional way, they’ll go around it somehow.

Kuhner: You’re seeing a social revolution being imposed from above. Mefferd: Yes.

Kuhner: And this is what’s very frightening. And I believe this is why it’s an assault upon freedom, it’s an assault upon liberty, it’s an assault upon our democracy. You are now seeing judicial tyranny in our midst. And that’s why this is not just an issue of traditional morality and defending Christian civilization, this is about defending our fundamental, basic democracy. It is now under siege.

During an appearance on the American Family Association’s radio program Nothing But Truth, Harry Jackson said that “radical gay activists” have turned America into Nazi Germany. Jackson, who claims demonic forces are behind the gay rights movement, said that since gays and lesbians “cannot reproduce” they “try to recruit” young people and “just like during the times of Hitler,” gay rights advocates are “coming after one group after another group after another group.”

Listen:

Jackson: It’s obviously disingenuous when they say marriage equality for everyone and I was just pointing out the fact that it really isn’t marriage for everyone, it’s a special kind of marriage for radical gay activists. They want to impose their will on the culture and if you cannot reproduce you may try to recruit, and what I mean by that is what is going on is an attempt to reshape, refashion the mind, hearts and desires of the next generation. Many Christians are sitting back and we aren’t speaking out, but the reality is just like during the times of Hitler we have people coming after one group after another group after another group, and folks are saying, well this doesn’t affect me I’ll let this slide, we have a problem that really we have a whole generation of people who want to affect not only their lives and choices but the choices of another generation.

American Family Association radio host Alex McFarland said that President Obama’s support for marriage equality has put America under “the judgment of God” and “will contribute to the damnation of so many souls,” especially “impressionable young people” and “his own daughters.” McFarland went on to doubt Obama’s Christian faith and called for leaders to “bow before the scriptures of God rather than the icons of Hollywood like George Clooney.”

Watch:

McFarland: In further legitimizing in the minds of millions of people, especially impressionable young people, especially his own daughters, our president’s position this week will contribute to the damnation of so many souls. Mr. President if you could hear this, you need to repent and for one thing let Jesus Christ become the Lord of your life because quite obviously right now he isn’t. Let God’s word guide your positions and you thought because right now it’s quite obvious it isn’t. Repent of leading the people of America astray and may the good Lord help you to lead in a more righteous way going forward. I love our president, I pray for our president, I wish him God’s blessings but I can tell you individually and nationally the judgment of God will be on us if we continue to thumb our nose at his truth and to wonder from it, may God give us leaders who are humble enough to bow before the scriptures of God rather than the icons of Hollywood like George Clooney.

The outcry from the Religious Right over President Obama’s endorsement of legalizing same-sex marriage continues, with the American Civil Rights Union’s Robert Knight attackig Obama for trying “to invoke Christ when doing the devil’s work” and creating “the sinews of tyranny”:

After having done everything in his power to undermine marriage, President Obama has come out of the closet, so to speak, with his announcement that he’s now for brideless or groomless “marriage.” But he didn’t come out alone. He brought Jesus with him, citing Christ as his inspiration for directly attacking God’s moral order. It’s one thing to be a hypocrite, which Mr. Obama has been for years. Since he began pretending to oppose the redefinition of marriage but refusing to defend the federal Defense of Marriage Act while homosexualizing the military. It’s quite another thing, however, to invoke Christ when doing the devil’s work.

Forget the voters. Mr. Obama’s going to have to answer to God for this one. Wednesday’s announcement even might sober up the people who voted for Mr. Obama simply to show that America has overcome racial division. Someone should survey pastors who support Mr. Obama and ask: Which is more important - electing a man on the basis of race or upholding the integrity of the faith and what the Scriptures say about marriage? Citing Genesis 2:24, Jesus said in Matthew 19:5: “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”

This actually is about much more than marriage. It’s about truth. Mr. Obama is asking us to put into law a requirement for us to recognize as a marriage something that is not a marriage. When you do that, you create the sinews of tyranny, which stretch out to strangle freedom of speech, freedom of association and, eventually, freedom of religion. The virtue of tolerance is strangled, too, morphing into the vice of mandatory celebration.

With this wicked move, Mr. Obama is insisting that we bow down and worship the false idol of sexual anarchy. That’s what his wealthy supporters in Hollywood demand. On Thursday, they ponied up a reported $15 million to his campaign at George Clooney’s pool party. When you accord more respect to liberal film stars and gay billionaires than you do to the Creator of the universe, you’re not leaving much doubt about what you really worship.

Jerry Newcombe of Truth in Action Ministries said that Obama’s announcement is “another nail in the coffin of the American Family”:

With this statement, America’s self-proclaimed Christian leader has professed a clearly non-biblical belief that further weakens the moral fiber of our nation. “This could be another nail in the coffin of the American Family, if we don’t stand up now” says Jerry Newcombe, spokesman for Truth in Action Ministries. “Same sex marriage is wrong on many fronts—especially by codifying immorality into law. Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of the president’s position is to put the government’s sanction on something God has clearly revealed to be sin. Thankfully thousands of homosexuals have been freed from their sin through the power of Christ and continue to be freed every day.”

Christians in America must speak the truth on this issue— before it’s too late. Please help us make a difference. We, as God’s people, must speak out against anything that contradicts His Word — including the radical homosexual agenda. We must oppose it now — or apologize, in the years to come, to the children and grandchildren whom we have left to be its victims.

Ken Hutcherson reaffirmed his pledge to the Christian Post to “take back” the word “gay”:

"The most important thing is that there is no way in the world that I would vote for, regardless who it is, regardless how white they are, regardless how black they are, there is just no way I am ever going to vote for someone who believes in same-sex marriage and abortion," Hutcherson said in an interview with The Christian Post on Thursday.

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"God hates the killing of innocent life, and God hates divorce, and God hates the whole effeminate aspect of man going after man or woman going after woman. You can't get around that – it's in the Bible. And what we need to understand as Christians, is that this is America. We stand on our biblical views regardless," he noted.

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"We have given up so much territory; we are confused about how to take things back. Just like the word 'gay.' I am not homosexual, but I am gay – I am happy. And we've lost that word – we've given it up. We need to take back the rainbow, and we need to take back the word of God," the pastor concluded.

Enraged and energized by President Obama’s support for marriage equality, conservatives have begun to speak out not only against Obama but also against anti-discrimination laws, not just marriage, for gays and lesbians. Terry Jeffrey of CNSNews, an outfit of the Media Research Center, told American Family Association’s Tim Wildmon and the Family Research Council’s Tony Perkins on Today’s Issues that anti-gay discrimination is not “morally wrong” and asking people not to discriminate against gays would violate natural law:

Jeffrey: It’s worth noting that the Obama Justice Department has gone out into the courts and taken the position that discrimination against homosexuals is identical or ought to be identical in law to racial discrimination. Fact of the matter is, racial discrimination is morally wrong, I think Tony you were mentioning the natural law before. Racial discrimination is a violation of natural law, that was the point Martin Luther King made, it goes against the very principle laid out in the Declaration of Independence. The fact is, homosexual behavior goes against the natural law, as well as being specifically condemned in Scripture.

So if you have a federal government that is going to force Americans to treat homosexual behavior as if it’s a moral right, you basically have a federal government that is asking the American people to overturn the entire moral order on which our society depends. Personally, I believe people who stand up and fight for that and articulate the truth are going to have the r argument resonate with people because quite frankly God wrote the law on people’s hearts and people know that’s true.

James Dobson, the founder of Focus on the Family, weighed in on Obama’s remarks by arguing that he is defying God and lamenting that America is emulating Sodom and Gomorrah:

Dobson: I can just tell you from my point of view I will be praying even harder about this upcoming election because there is so much at stake. Marriage must be maintained, it’s been in existence on every continent on earth since the Garden of Eden, not just in Christian countries but wherever mankind has taken root, marriage as a relationship between one man and one woman has been honored in law and in practice. Obviously homosexuality has flourished in many places, in Rome, in Greece, in Sodom and Gomorrah, but it has been relationships between one man and one woman because we’re made that way, we’re designed that way. To throw it on the ash heap of history at this stage of our existence and defy the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, which I believe this does, has got to be considered by all of us.

Talk show host Janet Parshall responded to the news by blaming the “Father of Lies” (Satan) and describing it as man “raising his fist” at God:

Yesterday, Janet Mefferd even said that because of Obama, the country is “swirling down into the sewer”:

Perkins told Mefferd today that marriage equality is “not about rights” but “fundamentally changing America,” even suggesting that “nobody lost any rights” as a result of North Carolina passing Amendment One, even though unmarried couples, both gay and straight, could lose partnership rights. Perkins later lamented that Obama’s support for LGBT equality is “beyond comprehension”:

Perkins: This is not about rights. Nobody lost any rights when North Carolina amended their constitution on Tuesday. What was preserved was the ability of parents the way they want to, the ability of religious organizations to associate based upon their shared faith and not be forced to change that because of someone’s sexual orientation, public accommodations are not wide open to whoever wants them based upon what gender they feel like for the day. This issue as it’s beginning to unfold now not theoretically but in very practical ways as people are losing jobs, churches are being forced into certain things, people realize this is not about two people living together and loving each other, it’s about fundamentally changing America.

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The administration when George Bush was president, it did not deal with the marriage issue and the social policies surrounding homosexuality I would say not even, maybe ten percent, a tenth of what this administration has done on it. It is every day it is some new revelation. It is beyond comprehension.

Following President Obama’s remarks supporting marriage equality, the Religious Right is now moving from expressing its anger to rallying the base for Mitt Romney. 

American Family Association spokesman Bryan Fischer on Focal Point yesterday said that Obama is “toast” and “just handed the election to Mitt Romney” because he favors “behavior that will kill you if you don’t catch yourself in time”:

President Barack Obama has officially come out in favor of homosexual marriage, he has officially come out in favor of unnatural marriage, he has come out in favor of giving society’s highest recognition to behavior which is immoral, which is unnatural and which is unhealthy, behavior that will kill you if you don’t catch yourself in time. Be encouraged, because this is going to be decisive in this campaign. This thing right here is decisive in this campaign. President Barack Obama just kicked away his re-election chances, they’re gone, toast, out the window, stick a fork in Barack Obama, he stuck a fork in himself, he’s done, he’s toast, if Mitt Romney will hold the line. Mitt Romney just got handed this election. Ladies and gentlemen, do not underestimate what just happened, Barack Obama just handed the election to Mitt Romney.

Peter LaBarbera of Americans For Truth About Homosexuality talked to Janet Mefferd yesterday where he derided Obama’s mention of the Golden Rule in his announcement as “preposterous,” calling Obama’s endorsement of marriage equality an “appalling blasphemy”:

It’s appalling, Janet, it’s just appalling. He’s distorted the Bible from the get-go, remember, he sort of dismissed Romans 1, I can’t remember the adjective he used but ‘not very important’ because that got in the way of his embrace of homosexuality. The Golden Rule, as I think we both understand it, is that you don’t want somebody to practice sin; you want them to experience Jesus Christ, to be forgiven through Jesus Christ and live a Godly life. So helping somebody embrace homosexuality, especially with state recognition of so-called homosexual marriage, which is actually a blasphemy, you’re taking a perversion, what God calls an abomination, the practice of homosexuality, and you’re attaching it to one of the most noble institutions that mankind can experience, which is marriage, it’s an appalling blasphemy. For Obama to say that’s the Golden Rule to advocate that is just preposterous and I hope that most Christians, people of faith, even those who aren’t Christians, can see through what this is, that he’s just trying to justify this pandering act to his left-wing base.

Not to be outdone, Randall Terry accused Obama of being “courageous for evil” and “bold for iniquity,” urging pastors to “demand Obama’s ouster from office” for “his betrayal of God’s Law regarding marriage”:

The moment of Truth has arrived for Catholic Bishops and Evangelical Superstars: Will they demand Obama's ouster from office because of his betrayal of God's Law regarding marriage, or will they equivocate, excuse, or just remain silent? Their souls are now weighed in the balance.

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Obama has been courageous for evil, bold for iniquity. Will Christian clergy rise to the challenge, and at least show equal valor for the Truth, and for the Lord God whose laws they have sworn to uphold? If they do, they are made of the stuff of saints and prophets. If not, they show they are hirelings, not shepherds; false prophets, not watchmen on the wall.

Gary Bauer of the Campaign for Working Families emailed members alleging that Obama revealed his “disdain and disrespect for anyone in this country who believes in Judeo-Christian values”:

When President Obama publicly declared his support for same-sex marriage yesterday he was displaying his disdain and disrespect for anyone in this country who believes in Judeo-Christian values. Obama thinks that the same-sex marriage movement is so powerful and that we are so weak that his attack on normal marriage will actually help him win a second term.

I need you to help me show him just how wrong he is. Thirty-one states have voted in favor of normal marriage. Tuesday's vote in North Carolina was a landslide for our side. But if he wins a second term our votes may not matter as his appointed judges overrule us and eventually restrict religious liberty in the process.

I don’t think there is anything else I can say. If we won’t stand up now, when will we? Please give whatever you can to help us defeat Obama and his congressional socialist cronies.

Family Research Council president Tony Perkins even released a video message saying that Obama’s stance will rally Religious Right voters to back Romney: