Truemors
is reporting from
Member
NP Rank:
NP Rank:
Some Mormons see split coming over endorsement of gay rights
Share:
by Susan Marie Kovalinsky | November 13, 2009 at 12:56 pm
269 views | 6 Recommendations | 2 comments
Some members of the Mormon Church are seeing the recent endorsement of the gay rights bill in Salt Lake City, Utah - hailed by many Mormons and by the gay community as a milestone in progress - as a sign that the Mormon Church may be about to undergo a complete division.
In one of the most paranoid-sounding and shrill Mormon-to-Mormon emails in recent events - and yet with a curiously poignant and oddly moving urgency - Peter LaBarbara sounds the warning alarm that the recent passage of a gay rights bill in Utah which received endorsement from the official Mormon church is not a sign of progress but of senility.
"And where will the gay rights train stop?" LaBarbara asks, and then answers his own question: It won't. It will heap up ever new agendas which ask for ever new special rights. And then, the Mormon Church will stand indicted as having been decadent and bent to the PC program of liberal Democrats.
We may be witnessing the “official” split of the American pro-family movement against homosexuality into two camps: the principled groups and churches that oppose all efforts to recognize and approve homosexuality as normal (AFTAH is in this camp); and “soft” family organizations and churches that oppose homosexual “marriage” (and sometimes “civil unions”) but which support other parts of the homosexualist agenda. Below is a version of an e-mail I sent yesterday to pro-family leaders across the United States upon learning of this misguided decision by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) to support special legal “rights” based on homosexuality and gender confusion.
The letter goes on to say the following, slightly paranoid and hysterical assertions:
The pro-”gay” decision by the LDS Church to back a local “sexual orientation” law —widely reported by the media — is very bad news for our side. The proliferation of newfangled laws granting special protections based on objectively disordered sexual/gender behaviors created the basis for punishing dissenters and people of faith long before the “gay marriage” debate became the dominant issue that it is in the “culture wars.” I think I speak for us all in saying that we are very grateful to the Mormon Church for all it has done to defend against same-sex “marriage” (I personally am astonished by the LDS’ huge contribution to the cause). But “protecting marriage” while legitimizing government-backed preferred status based on changeable, wrong, and very unhealthy (even deadly) behaviors is a Pyrrhic victory if there ever was one.
Moreover, allowing homosexual special rights will only be used by liberal judges to rationalize their imposition of “gay marriage,” anyway (as has already happened), so what’s to be gained by such concessions? [See Gary Glenn's article on this pointHERE]
Surely, much is to be lost. Once we give up the principled argument, we torpedo our moral authority — which is our greatest and most precious asset. If homosexuality (sodomy) is truly a crime against nature (and implicitly nature’s God), as Noah Webster defined it in 1828, and liberties truly come from God as I trust we all believe, then how can we possibly acquiesce to “rights” based on sin and perversion and keep our credibility as truth-tellers? Are special homosexuality-based legal protections “civil rights” or a mockery of same? If churches back “gay rights” (and the LDS is hardly the first), is there some truth to the idea that those of us who remain opposed to ALL aspects of the “GLBT agenda” are “bigots” or somehow extreme in our worldview? And let’s be honest: our movement has already begun to ostracize its most principled warriors: I notice that everyone [in the pro-family movement] loves to use Brian Camenker’s and Amy Contrada’s indispensable, firsthand research but strangely some fail to credit MassResistance for their work. (They’re too “homophobic,” I guess.)
And where does the gay “special rights” train stop? Is there some legal “right” to be homosexual parents? Are school “sexual orientation” nondiscrimination codes legit (and even noble)? Once you begin to cave, it’s hard to stop — while our cultural foes heap praise on us for every defection to their bogus “civil rights” approach. Naturally, at the same time, the GLBT groups and their liberal allies will escalate their attacks against uncompromising pro-family groups as representing “extreme hate,” the fringe, etc. Their goal is to marginalize us, and this certainly makes it easier. As we damage our pro-family/truth “brand,” we boost their spurious “equality” brand.
I fear some in the “pro-family” movement are dumbing and defining “victory” down so that we can proclaim it even as we lose the much harder and real culture war against normalizing homosexuality and gender confusion. This is a conversation our movement needs to have — because it appears there are two “missions” emerging from our once-unified coalition: one dedicated solely to preserving marriage (hopefully without allowing “civil unions” but sometimes even making that huge concession); the other dedicated as always to fighting every attempt to normalize homosexuality and using the government (and corporations) to sanction and celebrate homosexuality-based relationships. AMERICANS FOR TRUTH
Advertisement
NowPublic on Facebook
What is NowPublic?
NowPublic lets people work together to cover news events around the world.
Most RecentMost Recommended Comments (2)
at 13:38 on November 13th, 2009
Why did the Morman move West originally?
They were being persecuted and run out of their homes in states like Missouri where they where being harrassed and even killed because of their religious beliefs that included pologamy. Between 1840 and 1870 500,000 Mormans moved West to escape having their civil rights compromised.
It's ironic that in California they financially sponsored the legislation that toppled gay marriage when their own history of "marriage" was considered unexceptable, and for which they were forced into, what at the time would have been described as, exile.
If they are experiencing some tension within their ranks, at least its in favor of civil rights. If some view this as a "special rights train," perhaps they should look back at the reasons their emigrant wagon train took them along the Great Platte River Road that delivered them to Utah in the 19th century.
at 14:33 on November 13th, 2009
Polygamy has been used by some societies where there are fewer women or men, or combining households addressed the issues of limited resources. I just read a book called Ancient Futures that examines the culture of the Ladakh in the Western Himalayas who practiced polygamy, and sometimes it meant a woman taking two husbands usually brothers or sisters might take one husband. Also, it was expected that a male in the family would become a Monk.
I personally would not favor polygamy, and that was not the main purpose of my comments.
Although, I understand what you are saying and the anthropological reasons as well. Its also been suggested that prehistoric women were promiscuis with good reason because it ensured that all the males would provide her and her offspring with food and shelter, as the paternity of the children was unknown. Their societies functioned like communes where everyone cared for and supported the children, and the females were the ones who maintained the cohension of the group. There are other theories that support male domination through their strength and food gathering, but women did have some ancillary power, though not discernable by the males.