[...] please stop labeling the other side of the argument as “hate speech” and bigotry. It’s not. It is a working out of deep convictions and a particular understanding of sexuality as a good gift from a good Creator, to be used within certain boundaries.

I originally responded with a riff off a previous post, because I’m not convinced that these “deep convictions” are anything more than unreflective conservatism combined with some proof texting. But I really like Ari Kohen’s response to a Glenn Loury and Ann Althouse bloggingheads talk:

Religions aren’t monolithic; if people really are involved in deep spiritual reflection on the matter of homosexuality, then they will surely be able to find an interpretation of their religious texts that allows for the kind of evolution that President Obama described. This doesn’t mean I’m not serious about practicing Judaism; it means I’m serious about finding a way to reconcile my belief in the teachings of Judaism with my belief that people should be treated equally. But, obviously, one must actually have both of these beliefs.

What do we call someone who either fails to consider the alternative teaching of his or her religion or rejects that teaching because it doesn’t lead to continued condemnation of gays and lesbians, someone — in other words — who doesn’t actually have both a religious belief and a belief in equality?

With apologies to Loury and Althouse, I think I have to call it bigotry.

I really like this response, because it recognizes that religions are variegated things that allow the individual more control than most folks acknowledge. We’re fond of treating religion as something you’re born into and stuck with barring deconversion. We don’t often talk about the streams of tradition within the religion that an individual must accept or reject.

Look around you: in our culture the chances are you’re going to see someone who is a Christian but holds to different interpretations of what Christianity means. Every sect has a tradition that explains how they’ve come to understand their religion the way they do. Every permutation has an argument as to why their tradition is legitimate. And this is fractal: every community has within it different streams of tradition that emphasis and interpret the components differently.

Perhaps you’re an evangelical who places high importance on the words of the Bible. But why do you take this passage at face value, while interpreting that passage in its historical context? Why is this verse intended only for that time and place while that verse is immortal and internal? Why do you interpret this passage in light of that passage instead of the other way around?

More ink has been spilled writing biblical commentaries than writing Bibles. Many of these interpretations are reasonable and the arguments sensible. How do you decide which is the “right” interpretation? Different members of your community have honestly looked and yet come to differing conclusions.

Kohen offers one way out of this mess: certain principles are non-negotiable. With Kohen, one of these principles is that all humans are equal. If you’re thinking leads you to the conclusion that some people have rights that others do not have, then it’s time to think again.

This is an old, old method. Rabbi Hillel is supposed to have said that the golden rule is the core of the law, and that all the rest is commentary. If your interpretation of the law leads you towards treating someone in a way that you would find hateful if the situation were reversed, then your interpretation is wrong. Supposedly his followers expanded this to say that the love of one’s neighbor is the core of the law, and any interpretation that leads you away from that love is flawed.

This should be natural for Christians, since Jesus spelled out the two most important commandments in Matthew 22:36-41, one of which was to love your neighbor as yourself. If your interpretation of the Bible leads you towards treating your neighbor as if their love, vows and relationships are less real than your own, then – as we say on the interwebs – “ur doin’ it wrong.”

And, as Kohen concluded, if your only guiding principle seems to be that gays are icky and less than equal with heterosexuals, then we have to conclude that your principles are bigoted. No matter how prayerfully and deeply you hold to a bigoted principle, it does not stop being bigoted, nor do you.

As long as we’re talking about “marriage” we’re going to continue to see a stalemate on this issue as those who believe in a traditional, biblical view of sexuality and those who want the basic rights afforded to others all around them each refuse to give an inch.

So what’s the solution?

The State needs to get out of the “marriage” business. It should recognize that as long as it uses that term, and continues to privilege certain types of relationships over others this issue is going to divide us as a nation, and is only going to become more and more contentious. We need to move towards the system used in many European countries where the State issues nothing but civil unions to anyone who wants them, and then those who desire it may seek a marriage from the Church.

Let me be clear that I don’t oppose this suggestion. There are problems, like the fact that “civil unions” are not treated as equal to marriage. We might be able to fix some of that with legislation, but I suspect the lingering taint of “not real marriage” will persist for generations.

But for other reasons as well I’m reluctant to accept such a compromise. Part of my response has to include a little history. Here’s a snippet from Gary Wills:

The early church had no specific rite for marriage. This was left up to the secular authorities of the Roman Empire, since marriage is a legal concern for the legitimacy of heirs. When the Empire became Christian under Constantine, Christian emperors continued the imperial control of marriage, as the Code of Justinian makes clear. When the Empire faltered in the West, church courts took up the role of legal adjudicator of valid marriages. But there was still no special religious meaning to the institution. As the best scholar of sacramental history, Joseph Martos, puts it: “Before the eleventh century there was no such thing as a Christian wedding ceremony in the Latin church, and throughout the Middle Ages there was no single church ritual for solemnizing marriage between Christians.”

Only in the twelfth century was a claim made for some supernatural favor (grace) bestowed on marriage as a sacrament. By the next century marriage had been added to the biblically sacred number of seven sacraments. Since Thomas Aquinas argued that the spouses’ consent is the efficient cause of marriage and the seal of intercourse was the final cause, it is hard to see what a priest’s blessing could add to the reality of the bond. And bad effects followed. This sacralizing of the natural reality led to a demoting of Yahwist marriage, the only kind Jesus recognized, as inferior to “true marriage” in a church.

The church fathers ranged from men who thought that marriage was a lesser good than celibacy (St. Augustine) and those who thought it a lesser evil than fornication (St. Jerome). Most seemed to agree with St. Paul that “It is well for a man not to touch a woman.” (1.Cor 7:1)

The Church came to marriage late and grudgingly. Only in the twelfth century did Aquinas add an Aristotelian spin on marriage and make it a sacrament. Note that this is not a biblical argument but a natural law argument. Protestant founders like Luther and Calvin seemed to reject it when they left marriage as a civil institution.

Which raises the question: exactly what claim does Hyatt think Christianity has over a civil institution that predates the religion, and which the religion resisted for centuries?

So here’s a counteroffer for Hyatt: let’s leave “marriage” as a civil institution. It has an extremely long history of being a civil institution, and for most of its history the Christian church was happy to leave it as such. Perhaps the Church could use a more theologically loaded word like “covenant,” since that already has some legitimacy among conservatives.

This is a serious suggestion. Conservatives have claimed the word “covenant” as a way of reclaiming of the idea of marriage from the 15 min. in Las Vegas variety. Unlike civil unions, covenants will not be tainted as a kind of marriage lite. It stands a much better chance of working for everybody than the original compromise.

I grew up in North Carolina, the state currently at the center of this argument. My problem with this picture is that the creator assumes that most folks now accept interracial marriage. From my experience, the opposition isn’t dead, it’s merely gotten quiet.

But there’s something horribly, wonderfully inappropriate about Bristol Palin coming out for “traditional marriage.” There’s just something wrong with Palin, whose aborted courtship was practically a reality show, using this as a teaching moment.

Instead, I’ll just bring you this breaking news story from the able journalist Betty Cracker at Balloon Juice:

Worldwide Parody & Satire Industries Collapse

NEW YORK – May 11, 2012 – Roiled by a lengthy Republican primary that featured sickly-wife dumper Newt Gingrich in the role of family values advocate, prissy uterus invader Rick Santorum as a small government champion and multimillionaire vulture capitalist Mitt Romney shedding Armani suits in favor of mom jeans and “work” shirts as he positioned himself as a regular guy (with a car elevator), the global parody and satire industries utterly collapsed Friday.

The market sector had teetered on the verge of collapse this week following an accusation from thrice four-times-married drug addict Rush Limbaugh that President Obama had attacked the institution of marriage by coming out in favor of same-sex unions. But some analysts had thought the sector was positioned for recovery.

Those hopes were dashed early Friday when parody and satire futures were bludgeoned by the publication of an opinion piece by 21-year-old single mom Bristol Palin. The daughter of failed vice-presidential candidate and serial quitter Sarah Palin criticized the president for allowing his daughters to influence marriage equality policy, decried the persecution of conservative Christians and urged the president to direct his children since “dads should lead their family.”

“Parody and satire were already on life support thanks to Rush,” said analyst Seymour Butts of the Under the Bleachers Report. “But when Bristol let loose, even hard-bitten industry veterans who had survived the Nixon and Reagan years threw in the towel.”

Most experts were unable to articulate a scenario under which parody and satire could recover. However, at least one long-term analyst envisioned a resurgence contingent upon a direct asteroid strike on the earth that wipes out all existing life, after which single-cell organisms might once more emerge and evolve to acquire language skills.

Bring on that asteroid. It’s late, and we need it.

My birth state of North Carolina has been convulsed with arguments over Amendment One, AKA North Carolina Senate Bill 514, an amendment to the state constitution which declares that “Marriage between one man and one woman is the only domestic legal union that shall be valid or recognized in this State.”

The citizens voted on, and passed, the amendment on Tuesday. Chagrin, but no real surprise.

Amendment One is redundant and poorly written, but it is now the law of the state. But as an editorial in the Raleigh News and Observer points out, maybe it should really be called Amendment Two:

If Amendment One passes on Tuesday, it won’t be our first state constitutional provision regulating marriage. In 1875, we altered our charter to declare that “all marriages between a white person and a Negro or between a white person and a person of Negro descent to the third generation inclusive are, hereby, forever prohibited.”

The 1875 amendment, too, was adopted shortly (two years) after an invigorated anti-miscegenation statute had been enacted by the legislature. Even more clearly than is the case today, the proponents could not have worried that an amendment was actually needed. No one fretted that a 19th century North Carolina court would invalidate the earlier separationist statutory rule.

The interracial amendment was apparently designed to serve other aims. It was constitutionalism by epithet, by exclamation point. No government structure or power or authority was actually altered. Instead, North Carolinians used the constitution to double down – to declare, in as potent a format as exists, their unyielding hostility to marriage between blacks and whites.

The amendment stayed in place until 1971, when the a new constitution was adopted. That’s about four years after Loving vs. Virginia made it problematic.

Hopefully, we won’t have to wait a century for amendment one to be repealed. But until then, tarheels, won’t you consider a relocation to upstate New York? As someone who grew up in the piedmont, I find the upstate most congenial. Cooler, but with similar landscape. Same depressed economy, but maybe if enough of you come north we can fix that. Just transfer your hatred of NC State to the Yankees and you’re halfway here.

It appears to be a cross between “found footage” horror films like Paranormal Activity and a Chick tract.

The kickstarter page has been sitting at $225 of a $12,500 goal for a while now. I might kick some money over there. Atlas Shrugged II is supposed to be out this year, and there should be some competition for the title of “Decade’s Worst Movie.”

Now we sit back and wait for the fundies to boycott reruns of Mr. Belvedere

Via Joe.My.God.

EDIT: And here’s a version that actually works from Friendly Atheist. Sorry about that.

Well, wrong, as Matthew Paul Turner is covering.

Driscoll is a big fan of sex, so long as it’s heterosexual married sex and the women folk remember to be responsive, submissive and don’t get any ideas above their God appointed station.

He’s a patriarch. Respect his authority and he’s fine. Reject his authority – by, for example, having differing opinions – and he’ll f’ck you up.

According to Peter Lumpkins, the trustees at Liberty University are of a different mind:

Sources say trustees took a vote, and the vote was unanimous indicating that Mark Driscoll is not welcome at Liberty University. In addition to Driscoll’s “potty mouth” approach to pulpit etiquette playing a role in their decision, his “Reformed” theology, Acts 29 Network, and the provocative hedonistic understanding of a___ s__ came up as well … Trustees were apparently flabbergasted that Driscoll was considered for an invitation in the first place.

These folks are puritans, desperately afraid that someone, somewhere is having fun, and then using old Saxon words to describe it.

But wait, now the Liberty U website is denying this claim:

On April 4, 2012, a Southern Baptist blogger, Peter Lumpkins, wrote an innacurate account of Liberty’s recent Board of Trustees meeting as it relates to the university’s invitation to Mark Driscoll to speak in Convocation. Lumpkin’s recent blog contains information that is defamatory and portrays Liberty University in a false light.

The Board of Trustees of Liberty University did not vote unanimously that Mark Driscoll is not welcome on campus, as the blog states, and, in fact, Mark Driscoll is still scheduled to speak in Convocation at Liberty University on April 20, 2012.

Meanwhile, Sophia at Mars Hill Refuge, a blog for recovering members of Mars Hill, is busy pouring kerosene on the flames:

So to raise curiosity about a problem (emotional and spiritual devastation coming out of Mars Hill church) that we have seen for years in our community and now spreading nationwide as Driscoll’s fame and Acts 29 church network grows, we need to spark curiosity about what is happening behind the scenes. If demand is created then news outlets will cover these devastating stories of people who were once on the inner circle of Mars Hill church. Since Driscoll is a national bestseller and getting lots of media attention we decided to petition Liberty University to rescind their invite for Driscoll to speak on their campus on April 20th. We think that would get the conservatives and fundamentalists engaged as well. Once the truth is brought to light then healing can begin, as any survivor will tell you.

I’m very curious to see how this plays out.

However, one of the most interesting memos details NOM’s plan to aid its cause by recruiting attractive but unintelligent celebrities. From GLAAD:

It sounds like a headline from the Onion, but strategy documents uncovered yesterday, from the nation’s most prominent anti-gay marriage group, the National Organization for Marriage (found by the Human Rights Campaign), reveal a novel approach to convincing Americans to vote against marriage equality: recruit glamorous but unintelligent celebrities. (p.19/20)

“Hollywood with its cultural biases is far bigger than we can hope to be. We recognize this. But we also recognize the opportunity – the disproportionate potential impact of proactively seeking to gather and connect a community of artists, athletes, writers, beauty queens and other glamorous non-cognitive elites across national boundaries. (This is applying the Witherspoon and IAV model to non-intellectual elites.)”

I just love the phrase “non-cognitive elites.” I wish NOM well in its attempts to enlist pretty dumb celebrities. There certainly are enough of them, but they’re going to have to fight the Scientologists for every one.