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Title: Pastors Prepare Pulpits for 'Marriage Protection Sunday'
Source:
The Christian Post
URL Source: http://www.christianpost.com/articl ... rriage.protection.sunday/1.htm
Published: May 24, 2006
Author: Pauline J. Chang
Post Date: 2006-05-24 09:28:59 by Red Jones
Keywords: None
Views: 308
Comments: 28
Pastors Prepare Pulpits for 'Marriage Protection Sunday' Christian and pro-family groups are creating a ''groundswell of support'' for traditional marriage among pastors and conservative churchgoers. Wednesday, May. 24, 2006 Posted: 7:01:31AM EST WASHINGTON – With less than two weeks remaining before the Federal Marriage Amendment hits the Senate floor, Christian and pro-family groups are creating a ''groundswell of support'' for traditional marriage among pastors and conservative churchgoers. The Ethics and Religious Liberties Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention has dubbed June 4 “Marriage Protection Sunday,” and is requesting pastors to preach about gay marriage and encouraging Southern Baptists to tell their senators to vote for the amendment. “Supporters of traditional marriage need to bombard their senators’ offices with e-mails and phone calls,” ERLC President Richard Land told Baptist Press, “and preachers across America need to let the pulpit ring forth in clear and no uncertain terms on Marriage Protection Sunday, June 4, and help create a groundswell of support for this amendment. “I can assure you the opponents of traditional marriage are doing their best to let their voices be heard in the corridors of the Senate. It is up to us to let our voices be heard loudly as well,” he said. The 16-million-member Southern Baptist Convention is among a host of familiar players in the same-sex marriage debate that has amplified the voice of “values-voters” in Washington. The denomination is working with a powerful pro-marriage amendment coalition that includes groups like Focus on the Family and the Family Research Council to foster support for the Senate resolution through mass-mailing, conference calls, and internet outreaches. The Washington-based Family Research Council has already collected nearly 38,000 names in an online petition calling on U.S. Senators to preserve traditional marriage in America. The group hopes to gather 50,000 names by the week of June 5, when the Senate is slated to take up the measure. Meanwhile, Focus on the Family Action has promoted a postcard campaign to get pastors involved in the effort. James Dobson, chairman of FOFA, joined with the Southern Baptist’s ERLC in sending an Apr. 12 letter to mobilize 43,600-plus Baptist churches around the issue. Since the Massachusetts Supreme Court legalized gay marriage in that state in 2004, pro-family leaders rallied for a national constitutional amendment that would protect traditional marriage in other states and overturn the notorious Massachusetts court decision. They warn that without such an amendment, states would be powerless to protect its laws from being overturned by “activist judges.” They also call the issue “the most important” in the effort to protect families and preserve God’s will for mankind. “Very few issues threaten the foundation of our culture as deeply as the same-sex marriage issue,” a statement from the ERLC read. “Help preserve God's design for marriage in the United States by supporting the Marriage Protection Amendment.” Some recommendations for Marriage Protection Sunday include preaching about the issue on June 4 and distributing information on same-sex marriage. Lay Christians are encouraged to email, call, or hand-deliver mail to their senators, telling their representatives to pass the amendment. The Senate Judiciary Committee on May 18 approved the Marriage Protection Amendment in a 10-8 party-line vote. The Senate is slated to discuss the amendment on June 5, and will likely vote on it by June 6 or 7. Ratification of an amendment to the Constitution requires passage by two-thirds of both the Senate and the House, as well as approval by three-fourths of the states. Neither houses of Congress came close to a two-thirds majority when a similar amendment was placed on the floor in 2004. Traditional marriage supporters are hoping that the new Republican-majority Congress will garner enough votes to pass this time around. "We certainly don’t see any reason why we wouldn’t have more votes this time than last time,” Duke Barrett, vice president of the ERLC told BP. “The Senate is decidedly more conservative, certainly more Republican, than it was the last time. We believe that if enough senators hear from their constituents, the MPA can be passed. "It’s obvious that a significant majority of Americans throughout the country do not want same-sex marriage," he said. "If that significant majority will communicate their convictions to their senators, the amendment should be passed.” > Pauline J. Chang pauline@christianpost.com
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#2. To: Red Jones (#0)
I don't believe in gay marriage either, but I think these preachers should also be preaching against no fault divorce and living together without getting married and having kids out of wedlock. To be fair, those things are more hurtful to the institution of marriage and society in general than gay marriage.
I wholeheartedly support marriage between any consenting adult. Government has no right to dictate who people love and who they wish to bond with. Heterosexual marriage is a train wreck - has been for decades - with divorce, marginalization through contract marriage, and other problems endemic to it that have reduced it's value and impact as a bond to use as a foundation for relationships and families. These people picking on others in a wedge issue fashion for their own power base building purposes need to worry first about their own problems before they worry about those they perceive in others. I know several couples - mostly women couple as Eugene is a Mecca for lesbians on the West Coast - and if they consider themselves married, I do to. And I am proud to do so.
I have to disagree with you there. To me marriage is not just about a relationship between 2 people. It's the building block of an entire society. There is no societal value or benefit to two gay or lesbian people getting "married". It may make them feel good, but it has no real societal benefit. The need for marriage - why it exists - is to provide a stable framework for raising children and transmitting knowledge, information, and property across generations. That's why it exists. It doesn't exist to make people feel good, or for tax benefits, or for insurance - all of those things are definitely secondary and if you eliminated ALL of them, there would STILL be a need for some formal, communal recognition of marriage to promote a stable society based on families. I think when people support things like gay marriage, what they are really saying is that they no longer understand what marriage is or why it exists, or why it is important to society. It's part of the selfishness and short sightedness of our society that cannot see beyond the gratifications of its own immediate needs.
Happy people whose relationships are protected has incredibly high societal value. If two people build a life together, they deserve all the tool needed to access the benefits they have earned as employees and citizens. I see. Then people who are not able to bear young should not be allowed to marry then according to your premise. Many lesbian, gay and trans-gendered people have great skills and offer benefits to society and they should be allowed the human dignity to form a marriage with whom they chose. The APA did great research that shows people do not chose to be homosexual and are completely normal on all respects. The only difference being their gender preference. Those growing up imprinted with a preference for same gender sex deserve role models and mentors too. I see scapegoating and mean spirited bigotry when I see sentiment against a basic right like this being granted. It is selfish and myopic to oppress people and not allow them full expressions of themselves and their relationships, not the other way around.
Mike, you can rage on and on about the nonsense of gay marriage for days - it doesn't matter. In the scheme of any society, there is no purpose for gay marriage. The sole reason marriage exists at all is to provide a framework for raising children and transmitting property. That's it. That is ALL it's ever existed for. It has nothing to do with the happiness of individuals or tax benefits or insurance or anything else. The assumption, based on common sense and experience is that the vast majority of hetero couples will have children in the natural course of their relationship and so we recognize this and create a system that enhances and supports this. The same is not true for gay couples. Maybe there could be some kind of societal recognition of these relationships, but it is not nor will it ever be...marriage. THat's just reality. See while folks like you go on and on with your lovely bubble like theory of how life should be and how people should behave, reality comes in like a bear and bites us all in the ass. Reality is the declining demographics in virtually every western country that will eventually doom us to extinction because we are simply too foolish and silly to recognize what people have known for ages - that marriage is for raising children, not for self fulfillment. In our quest for self fulfillment and happiness we doom future generations to extinction. There is no future in gay marriage. It's a stupid and inherently meaningless concept.
In other words, marriage was created to recognize a need and serve a function - just like most other legal conditions. There is no function inherent in the concept of "gay marriage" other than making people feel good about themselves and feeling "equal" to others even though their relationships do not serve the same FUNCTION. We need to go back and assess why we have certain traditions or institutions or legalities in our society and determine what function they served or serve. We seem to have gotten away from the idea of functionality and purpose in our rush to make everyone equal. In a more minor key, we can see the same kind of thinking in say...allowing females to become fire fighters but not requiring that they fulfill the same tests. We are no longer thinking in terms of function, but in terms of theory and social correctness. The problem is - that inherently doesn't work, and reality inevitably asserts itself again.
"I love you...but...I CAN'T MARRY YOU....!" ;)
Don't forget...I live in Massachusetts and that may yet become...possible. After all, who can stand in the way of a love as great as that which I have for myself? Who could deny me my own happiness? :) Nice pic, btw.
Well, I know you're much better looking than that, but it was the only one I could find with a redhead in it... ;) (And also one of the few where the lady wasn't admiring herself in her birthday suit, more or less... :P Between the one I "pic"-ed and ones that implied you prance around nekkid---among other, less mentionable activities---in front of a mirror, I think I made the least offensive choice :P)
hmmm....how did you know I was a redhead? Did you have that camera installed?
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#3. To: mehitable (#2)
#5. To: Ferret Mike (#3)
#7. To: mehitable (#5)
"I have to disagree with you there. To me marriage is not just about a relationship between 2 people. It's the building block of an entire society. There is no societal value or benefit to two gay or lesbian people getting "married"."
"The need for marriage - why it exists - is to provide a stable framework for raising children and transmitting knowledge, information, and property across generations."
"I think when people support things like gay marriage, what they are really saying is that they no longer understand what marriage is or why it exists, or why it is important to society. It's part of the selfishness and short sightedness of our society that cannot see beyond the gratifications of its own immediate needs."
#8. To: Ferret Mike (#7)
#9. To: mehitable (#8)
#13. To: mehitable (#9)
From: mehitable
To: mehitable 
#15. To: Peetie Wheatstraw (#13)
#16. To: mehitable (#15)
Nice pic, btw.
#18. To: Peetie Wheatstraw (#16)
Replies to Comment # 18.