Monte Neil Stewart (President, Marriage Law Foundation) deals with this argument here (p. 344 / 32nd page). To summarize his argument:
- Marriage is society’s mechanism to regulate and ameliorate the consequences of passion (that is, children). Even in our contraceptive culture there are many unintended births. Marriage law isn’t to make all sex procreative, but only seeks to encourage that man-woman sex occur within marriage as a protection when it is procreative.
- There is no procreation requirement of marriage because government has not felt that it was their place to ask.
- During centuries marriage has encompassed the central facts of child-bearing and child-rearing and laws have been designed to regulate entry into and continuation of the child-centered institution. This has continued without a specific request that parents declare any intentions about children.
Regardless of the claims that no harm would be done with same-sex marriages, there would be significant harm to the understanding and nature of marriage and to the usefulness of that institution for society’s goals.
Regardless of the claims that no harm would be done with same-sex marriages, there would be significant harm to the understanding and nature of marriage and to the usefulness of that institution for societies goals.
Society’s goals? Since when did society have unified, indisputable goals?
Those arguments strike me as totally irrelevant to the question of gay marriage. Especially since the Church hasn’t expended nearly (or any of?) the effort to get a constitutional amendment outlawing homeosexual couples from adopting or otherwise having children.
So, while marriage is awesome and wonderfully helpful and ideal for raising children, the government has not seen fit to take that into account when forming laws regarding who may have and raise children, and their relationships to others while they do so.
These arguments are irrelevant when applied to those who do not share our religious beliefs. Allowing gay marriage will not destroy society.
Actually, I think this is probably the best non-religious argument in favor of the defense of marriage that I have read. That being said, the first comment still holds for me, society is very ununified in this topic, particularly LDS society. Quite frankly, we have always, and even still continue to eschew the authority of marriage in the broader society. Even heterosexual married couples who join our Church must again be remarried according to the Priesthood/Temple.
To beat an old horse, I think we can debate the efficacy of the former female child bearing/rearing compounds of polygamy that had to take turns on the husband circuit, in the context of this paper. Someone may argue that actually many cultures even today effectively employ polygamy and with great success in the child rearing realm. I would just respond that at this point in time you won’t sell that to most of the conservatives behind the defense of marriage act.
Once upon a time, it was shameful for children to be born out of wedlock. Inheritance laws made it hard for illegitimate children to be a part of gentile society. Social stigma relegated them to near outcast status. It’s pretty clear that in most parts of the western world, it is no longer a problem for children to be born out of wedlock. It appears the government really doesn’t care any longer whether there is an intact mother/father pair to either bring life into the world or to raise that life to maturity. It appears that No. 3 may need some revision – if anything, government regulation about parentage has become so relaxed that it is nearly nonexistent.
LRC, I agree with your statement. I think the issue is tied specifically to your comment. Are these changes better or worse for our society? What are the effects on children, social behavior and the cost to our society? Is gay marriage a step in the direction of weakening marriage or a step in the direction of increase tolerance? With any legislation there are costs and ramifications. What will be the social effect of this change? I don’t know if we have anyone smart enough to predict the out come. It’s just one opinion against another.
When we’re not smart enough, my faith tells me to follow a prophet. Unfortunately, many people both inside our church and outside, believe any one who follows a prophet has been duped, is intellectually inferior or naïve. My experience along with others tells me it is the exact opposite. It is the process of affirmation of the truth that enlightens our mind and expands our thoughts. My faith is based on this affirmation and now is the time I have to decide if my actions will obey this affirmation or not.
“Unfortunately, many people both inside our church and outside, believe any one who follows a prophet has been duped, is intellectually inferior or naïve.”
Duped is probably the wrong sentiment for a lot of us who disagree with the “when in doubt just follow the prophet” philosophy. Experience has shown many of us that President Monson has no greater insight than anyone else when it comes to matters of civil rights. The Prophets have not always been free from error in this matter, and right now they are not willing to address the Mormon intracacies of marriage within the historical/doctrinal context, outside of the obligatory PR response – “Through Joseph Smith the Lord commanded the Church to practice polygamy, in 1890 through Wilford Woodruff the Lord commanded that that practice be stopped”.
sorry “intricacies”
Cowboy,
“Experience has shown many of us that President Monson has no greater insight than anyone else when it comes to matters of civil rights.”
Is there a specific incident with President Monson that your are referencing or is this just a general statement “prophets make mistakes and share their opinions which isn’t revelation from the Lord”.
I too agree with the general statement about prophets, they are men and do not speak for the Lord every time they utter a word. So now we have a problem when do they speak for God and when is it just an opinion. When do I need to follow, when do I not?
We are specifically taught the pattern to revelation, that it requires 2 or 3 witnesses. This is a guide that changes a statement from opinion to revelation. The Family: A Proclamation to the World was released Sept 23, 1995 by the First Presidency and Council of the Twelve Apostles. This meets the criteria of 2 or 3 witnesses.
At the conclusion of the text is this statement, “we warn that the disintegration of the family will bring upon individuals, communities, and nations the calamities foretold by ancient and modern prophets. We call upon responsible citizens and officers of government everywhere to promote those measures designed to maintain and strengthen the family as the fundamental unit of society.”
I have received personal affirmation of the truth that these leaders are Prophets, Seers and Revelators; in addition I have made a public sustaining of this truth. Now is the time I decide my actions; will I sustain this affirmation of truth or won’t I.
Debate and discussion are very important in understanding issues and making the best informed decision possible. Once the Lord speaks and I know He has spoken, there is no longer a debate, it now becomes a choice of what I will do or follow. This is the faith part, this is the humble part. If I choose well, I will receive more faith and enlightenment in matters of the Lord. If I don’t choose well, I will start to loose faith and enlightenment and be left to my own wisdom.
Isn’t same-sex marriage just like couples that don’t have children?
Isn’t being a fireman just like being an arsonist? Both watch fires.
There is a parable there somewhere…
“Is there a specific incident with President Monson that your are referencing or is this just a general statement “prophets make mistakes and share their opinions which isn’t revelation from the Lord”.”
No, I regret having mentioned President Monson by name, as I was only intending to refer to Prophets in general. Part of my logic was that President Monson was a member of The Twelve pre- 1978.
I have contributed countless comments on this site as to why I disagree with the general “law of witnesses” arguments for determining when a Prophet is right. I will spare the rehash except to say that their is historical precedent for even unified error among the Brethren, particularly with the civil liberties issues. That causes me to conclude that Prophets are sometimes right and sometimes wrong like the rest of humanity. In other words it provides no evidence that God is the author of their wisdom, so leaning to my own understanding is more attractive then giving them the luxury of determining right and wrong for me.
Cowboy, Thanks for the clarification about President Monson.
“so leaning to my own understanding is more attractive then giving them the luxury of determining right and wrong for me.”
I see that we have a fundemental difference in our approach to faith. It appears from the statement that you view your reasoning separate and complete and no addition is needed.
I do believe that faith is NOT the absence of my own understanding and reasoning, but rather increasing my understanding and reasoning to include a higher source. I do not see faith as an either or situation. I believe faith adds to my reasoning and increases my intellect. The Spirit touches both the mind and the heart. The more work I do to increase my own knowledge through education, study, experience and the more humble I can become will allow me to have greater enlightenment through the witness of the Spirit.
I wish you well.
Thank you for the courteous response. I would like to make it clear however that I am not asserting the traditionally percieved argument that those who choose faith in the Prophet are somehow brainwashed or otherwise incapable of thinking for themselves. Quite to the contrary I would agree (having been on both sides of the fence) that having faith in the Prophet still requires a fair amount of rationalization (I mean that in a positive way) and cognitive processes. So I would never imply that faith is “the absence of my own understanding and reasoning”, and consider it foolish to characterize the faith of others in such a way. Furthermore, by suggesting a desire to “lean to my own understanding” I do not intend to imply that I am either atheist, or beyond the need of divine influence. I am suggesting that I am not convinced that the Brethren have any more claim on divine intelligence than myself or any other well intentioned person. Given that, I do think I am perfectly capable of struggling for myself, like everybody else, to understand divine ethics and God’s will without following a Prophet with uncertainty. In other words, what I am politely trying to say is that I cannot help but have a great deal of respect for the Church and ultimately culture that brought me up, and by virtue of which I have been a part of my entire life, yet I am at a personal stage where I no longer believe that it is “the” true Church. With the influence that the Church has had in/on my life I also cannot resist taking a very personal interest in Church history/doctrine/issues/etc, though I try to do so without assuming license to take personal offense. That is why I prefer to participate here rather than on RFM and other similar boards, where the prevailing groupthink culture precludes interesting and engaging dialogue.
What about some form of civil union that permits the same basic federal rights of marriage but isn’t called marriage?
We do live in a secular society and I suppose that until the theocracy of Christ’s rule is made manifest in our midst we must allow for those whose lifestyles we disagree with to excercise their freedoms of association (contractual included) guaranteed in the constitution.
Stillaninvestigator,
“What about some form of civil union that permits the same basic federal rights of marriage but isn’t called marriage?”
Great thought, and given the churches statement in the divine institution of marriage about not apposing these rights you might think they would agree.
“The Church does not object to rights (already established in California) regarding hospitalization and medical care, fair housing and employment rights, or probate rights,”.
It is very interesting that the contrary seems to be true when we watch what is happening with the Common Ground bills being introduced in Utah right now.
The church has not taken an overt role, but if you watch groups closely allied with the church such as meridian magazine, Southernland institute, and Eagle Forum it makes you wonder how sincere these words are.
Also, if we are going to have civil unions in which the government gives the rights of marriage, why don’t we just leave marriage to the churches? This would make marriage a religious rite and let churches define it how they want, and the government could just bestow civil rights.
“Let your women keep silence in the churches; for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but THEY ARE COMMANDED to be under obedience, as also saith the law.” Why isn’t this Church policy — it seems to be spoken as commandment with the same force as “laws” prohibiting homosexuality. I returned to the Church seven years ago after twenty-five years of excommunication for being a militant queer. I love the Church and support its leaders as best I can — I raise my hand to confirm this — and yet I also support gay marriage. This mentality of “protecting” traditional marriage seems, to me, utterly absurd. Protect from what? Will straight people cease to marry if my kind are allowed this freedom? I know many gay families who are real families, loving families with homes that are founded on love and morality. I love being queer as much as I love being LDS. I’m extremely confused about choice — I have never chosen to be gay, quite the opposite when I was young. I had to chose to accept my natural God-given sexuality. I’ve been celibate for many decades, out of personal choice, but I will always identify as queer. It’s so much more than boring, tedious sex. Sexuality is as much a mental state as it is a physical action. I know that God lives and that I am His child. I have a hunch that He is homophobic because He seems really obsessed with his Plan of Salvation. I hope there is a place in heaven for freaks such as myself. But no matter. I am here to try to keep God’s commandments — to love Him with all my heart and soul. But I also need to love myself — every fabulous fiber of my male/female psyche. Amen.
wilum pugmire,
You are right there is no danger to opposite-sex marriage. In fact if you look at what has happened in Northern Europe since same-sex marriage was legalized they experienced the opposite. After a long decline of opposite-sex marriage and a long raise of opposite-sex divorce after same-sex marriage was legalized those figures started to turn around. Now opposite-sex marriage is on the raise and opposite-sex divorce in on the decline.
“We have nothing to fear but fear it’s self.” Our policies on homosexuality and gay marriage are completely based on cultural fear. Most policies you the church has is clearly rooted in the scriptures or in modern day revelation. In fact the only one I can currently think of is homosexuality and gay marriage.
I believe we are a church based on revelation not on the leader. We disagree with the Catholics on the interpretation of Christ’s words “upon this rock I will build my church” The Catholics believe he was refereeing to the Man Peter “the Pope”. This has very distinct theological implications. This implies anything said or done by the current leader comes from God.
We interpret this that the Rock is not the man but revelation. This implies that the leader has the authority to receive revelation and yes has a responsibility to make policy, but revelation and policy are two very distinct and different things. As we look throughout history the leaders of the church have said and done things that have been a result of culture not revelation. This does not make them any less of a prophet. It just means they are people too. We could list a plethora of examples here, but I will just point out a few. Abraham kept slaves and even slept with one. As wilum pugmire points out Paul said women should vale their faces and not speak in church. Brigham Young said that mixed race couples should be shot. I believe that at these times these prophets were speaking from their culture and not from revelation. The other thing I believe is that progress on any of these issue such as slavery, women’s rights, or civil rights would not have been made if people from with in a culture did not speak out loudly and courageously. Thank you wilum pugmire for speaking out.
I think if we look more specifically the example of Blacks being with held temple blessings and the priesthood we can see some important things. In 1978 the brethren brought fourth a revelation indicating that all worthy members could attend the temple and all worthy men could hold the priesthood. We know this was revelation because all the brethren felt secure enough to call it such. Please note that although previously many general authorities had made very vocal statements about why black members where not to have the full blessings of the church not one said it was revelations. This policy of the church was not clearly established in the scriptures. I have heard people use vague references from the Peal of Great Price, but none of this ever was clearly established from either scriptures or revelation.
Most members that I talk with are not willing to even consider that homosexuality is part of God’s plan. They seem to be afraid that if this were true it would falsify the gospel. I first say the Lord will yet reveal many great and important things. Also, we do not always comprehend the things of God. Please do not cast out these ideas with unbelief. Alma taught us how to tell if it is a good seed.
First let us look to the scriptures. At one time I assumed that the Lords will was clearly established in the scriptures on the matter of homosexuality and by extension gay marriage, but let us look.
Let us point out that Christ never teaches against homosexuality. Also, The Book of Mormon, D&C, or The Peal of Great Price never teach against homosexuality. Homosexuality is not forbidden in the Ten Commandments.
The most famous place we look to condemn homosexuality is the storey of Sodom and Gomorrah. After all was not gay sex named after this place? Well I encourage you to reread this story if you think it tells us anything about homosexuality. I think this story is dubious for many reasons. Even if we ignore facts like this story talks about a Lord that is not all knowing, it talks about angels that have no physical power, it condones incest, it would lead you to believe that being part of a mob perusing gang rape is a good recommendation for marrying your daughter. All these facts aside I believe there are two very important points here. One, the story never tells us that the sin of Sodom or Gomorrah is homosexuality. We just infer that based on the definition that was later placed on Sodomy. There is no implication at all that homosexuality was being practiced in these community. Second, gang rape is a very different thing than consenting sexual activity.
Out side of the storey of Sodom and Gomorrah and references to it there are only two other sources that condemn homosexuality. The two places in all of the scriptures that actually preach against homosexuality are the writings of Paul and the Book of Leviticus.
Leviticus actually calls homosexuality an abomination. This sounds pretty harsh. It is important to note that abominations are things like pork and shell fish. These are all things that are ceremonially performances of the Law of Moses, none of which we actually continue condemn today, only in the case of homosexuality. Also, when you read the Book of Leviticus I challenge to find anything the church accepts and teaches today. There are a had full of things a few times one of the Ten Commandments are quoted out side of that they only thing we as a church accept into practice today is the condemnations of homosexuality.
Paul also condemned homosexuality. He actually taught that if we did not have enough faith in Christ we would be plagued with homosexuality. This is not at all what the brethren are teaching today. In fact teaching that the feelings of homosexuality are not sin seems in direct contradiction with Paul’s view. It seems Paul’s teachings on sexuality in general are also in direct opposition to the brethrens’ teaching of today. Paul taught that you serve the Lord better if you remain celibate like he did. He also taught that the only reason for marriage is if you were unable to control you sexual impulses. It seems that today we are taught that marriage helps you serve the Lord better, given higher calling such as Bishop, marriage is a requirement. Also, rather than the only reason to marry is if you can’t control your sexual desire, we are taught marriage is essential to exaltation. Given that the brethren disagree with Paul on our core beliefs on sexuality, why would we choose to use him to support our position?
Seeing that there is no clear support in the scriptures for our position on homosexuality the second place to look is modern revelation. There is nothing that the brethren are willing to call a revelation. I ask on an issue of such importance that the church encouraged members to donate millions of dollars on, if we do not have clear direction from the scriptures why has the Lord not given a revelation? We can see what they do use to support their position is the Proclamation on the Family. This document is constantly quoted to defend the church’s political actions on gay marriage as well as our teachings on homosexuality. Understand that the 12 and the first presidency apparently do not feel the same way about this document as they did about the 1978 declaration 2 because they are not willing to call it a revelation.
President Ballard at the world wide training on the family did say the Proclamation was the best source to look to about homosexuality. So our best source is not the scriptures, it is not a revelation; it is the Proclamation on the Family.
So let us look at what the proclamation says about homosexuality and gay marriage.
The first line reads:
We, the First Presidency and the Council of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, solemnly proclaim that marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God and that the family is central to the Creator’s plan for the eternal destiny of His children.
Marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God is repeated several more times. We can infer that this is important. Note that it never says that any other type of marriage is condemned by God. It also gives me pause when thinking about how the last part of this line applies to my family. If family is central to the Creator’s plan, than in my family understand that the best way for my wife and I to function as partner parents and remain a cohesive family is not to have a traditional husband and wife relationship. I do not believe God condemns this even though it is not the relationship mentioned here in the Proclamation to be ordained by God.
The next line from the Proclamation we see used to defend the churches position on homosexuality is this:
Gender is an essential characteristic of individual premortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose.
I ask what this says about homosexuality. Gender is how masculine or feminine you are. Gender is not something directly effected by orientation. There are very masculine men that are gay and very feminine men that are straight. This may say something about Tran gendered individuals, but what? Does it say that if your eternal spiritual gender conflicts with your physical gender you should change the physical to match the eternal?
Also similar to the first line:
We further declare that God has commanded that the sacred powers of procreation are to be employed only between man and woman, lawfully wedded as husband and wife.
So where does God command this. I do believe the brethren believe that God implied this some how, but unless this here is the Lord’s words himself I am unaware where he Commands this.
Again very similar to the first line:
Marriage between man and woman is essential to His eternal plan.
And again stating that this is essential to his plan does not speak to anything else being eliminated or not part of his plan.
I find this line very interesting:
Further, we warn that the disintegration of the family will bring upon individuals, communities, and nations the calamities foretold by ancient and modern prophets.
In European countries that had seen many years on decline of traditional marriage and a rising rate of divorce found both these statistics turn around once gay marriage was legalized. Therefore gay marriage has been shown to turn around the disintegration of the family.
Similarly I believe the last line of the proclamation calls us to save families with gay parents:
We call upon responsible citizens and officers of government everywhere to promote those measures designed to maintain and strengthen the family as the fundamental unit of society.
As we see given that the proclamation is the best source to teach us about homosexuality and gay marriage it really does not teach us that these things are wrong.