Backlash is growing to gay-marriage efforts
By John H. Adams, The Layman Online, August 1, 2003
From the White House to the Vatican to Minneapolis, there’s a growing backlash against increasing worldwide initiatives by homosexuals who want the church and state to allow them to marry.
Episcopal News Service
Friday, August 1, 2003
Committee endorses
ratification of gay bishop
Anglican group prepares to respond
Interview with bishop-elect
Mixed reaction to bishop’s election A Gallup poll, taken after the U.S. Supreme Court invalidated sodomy laws, showed a surge in opposition to government sanctioning homosexual marriages.
In a news conference this week, President George W. Bush said, “I believe a marriage is between a man and a woman, and I think we ought to codify that one way or the other.”
The Vatican weighed in with an even stronger statement, calling on lawmakers to offer “clear and emphatic opposition” to such measures, which it said were contrary to human nature and ultimately harmful to society.
“Legal recognition of homosexual unions or placing them on the same level as marriage would mean not only the approval of deviant behavior, with the consequence of making it a model in present-day society, but would also obscure basic values which belong to the common inheritance of humanity,” the Vatican said.
In the United States, Episcopalians, meeting in Minneapolis, began this morning what was expected to be a bitter debate whether to approve the ordination of a homosexual bishop and to allow Episcopal congregations to conduct services to bless same-sex unions. The Presbyterian Church (USA) is one of a handful of denominations that permits the services, but it does prohibit the ordination of church officers who are practicing homosexuals.
A hearing was held this morning at the Episcopal General Convention on whether the church should confirm the election of the Rev. V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire. If confirmed, Robinson would become the first openly gay bishop in the 2.2-million member denomination. The debate on same-sex unions is scheduled tonight.
Delegates to the national meeting, which runs through Aug. 8, will vote on Robinson and the proposed ceremony later in the next few days. Some conservatives warn that they will break away from the mainline denomination if it approves Robinson’s election and gay unions. The worldwide Anglican community strongly opposes ordaining homosexuals and blessing or marrying same-gender couples.
Some political conservatives are seeking to settle the issue with a constitutional amendment, but Sen. Tom Daschle, D-S. Dak., says it’s already clear. He noted that in 1996 President William Clinton signed the congressionally enacted Defense of Marriage Act that denied federal recognition of same-sex marriage and allowed states to ignore same-sex unions licensed elsewhere.
During a news conference, Daschle read from the act: “The word ‘marriage’ means only a legal union between one man and one woman as a husband and wife, and the word ‘spouse’ refers only to a person of the opposite sex who is a husband or a wife.”
“You can’t get any clearer than that,” said Daschle, adding that he supports the law.
But that law could soon come under constitutional scrutiny. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court is weighing whether to legalize same-sex unions, and could rule any day, and a Superior Court judge in New Jersey is considering a similar case.
With those cases in mind, Rep. Marilyn Musgrave, R-Colo., wants the Constitution amended to read, “Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman.” Her proposal was referred on June 25 to the House Judiciary subcommittee on the Constitution.
In June 2002, the 214th General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA) considered a similar proposed constitutional amendment and narrowly (272-227) voted it down.