Gay marriage: Armageddon in California

If history points to a turning point in the cultural war over same-sex marriage, said Laurie Goodstein in The New York Times, it will probably be next week’s vote on California’s Proposition 8. The ballot amendment would reverse a California Supreme Court ruling in May that legalized gay marriage, leading to thousands of “exultant” gay weddings. Although similar amendments are before voters in Arizona and Florida, religious conservatives view California, with its reputation for setting national trends, as a potential bulwark against a rising tide. So gay-marriage opponents from across the country are pouring “time, talent, and millions of dollars” into California, with some saying this fight is more important than the presidential election. “This vote on whether we stop the gay marriage juggernaut in California,’’ said Charles W. Colson, a prominent evangelical, “is Armageddon.”

Armageddon might be stating it a little strongly, said Pastor Rick J. Cole in The Sacramento Bee, but gay marriage is not a positive development for society. The primary purpose of marriage is to provide a loving, secure, and healthy environment for children, and children need the balance of “male and female guidance in their life.” Why should society endorse some strange new experiment in which kids conceived through artificial insemination are raised by two mommies or two daddies? Marriage is not a private act, said Maggie Gallagher in Realclearpolitics.com. It is a “shared social ideal.” So if government determines there is no difference between gay unions and traditional marriages, the effects will ripple through society. Public schools will teach our kids that homosexuality is normal—and that any religion that disagrees is bigoted and wrong.

If gay marriage continues, said Randy Triezenberg in The Sacramento Bee, we’ll be teaching our children only that “marriage is important”—society’s way of recognizing, and supporting, loving partners who commit to each other. How is that a threat to marriage? Let’s not forget that 60 years ago, interracial marriage was also considered a “sin” by religious conservatives, and it was illegal in many states. Norms change. Institutions evolve. My views evolved, too, said Ruben Navarette Jr. in The San Diego Union-Tribune, after “a gay family member helped me see that the issue wasn’t as complicated as I was making it.” Look at it this way: More than 11,000 gays have already married in California, and so have thousands more in Massachusetts and Connecticut. And guess what? “Civilization has not crumbled.”