Gay Marriage

Jinxiboo’s blog reports on Saint Sergius and Bacchus, officers in the Roman army exposed as secret Christians and martyred in the fourth century: A Kiev art museum contains a curious icon from St. Catherine’s Monastery on Mt. Sinai in Israel. It shows two robed Christian saints. Between them is a traditional Roman ‘pronubus’ (a best man), overseeing a wedding. The pronubus is Christ. The married couple are both men. … Prof. John Boswell, the late Chairman of Yale University’s history department, discovered that in addition to heterosexual marriage ceremonies in ancient Christian church liturgical documents, there were also ceremonies called the “Office of Same-Sex Union” (10th and 11th century), and the “Order for Uniting Two Men” (11th and 12th century). ...

Last Sunday, Rick Warren recorded a video for his congregation in which he denies ever comparing gay marriages to incest or pedophilia: I have been accused of equating gay partnerships with incest and pedophila. Now, of course as members of Saddleback Church, you know I believe no such thing, I never have. You’ve never once heard me in thirty years talk that way about that.But Rachel Maddow shows that he made exactly that comparison: I’m opposed to having a brother and sister be together and call that marriage. I’m opposed to an older guy marrying a child and calling that a marriage. I’m opposed to one guy having multiple wives and calling that marriage. Q. Do you think those are equivalent to gays getting married? Oh, I do!Rick Warren has been caught lying, in addition to being anti-gay and anti-evolution. He should ask to be taken off the agenda for the inauguration, and if he doesn’t, Barack Obama should just withdraw his invitation to speak. ...

The latest ApostAZ podcast is now available: Episode 011 Atheism and Feces-Free Thought in Phoenix! Go to meetup.com/phoenix-atheists for group events! Shyness, Group News,Election Post-Mortem, Email from Shawn of Tough Questions Podcasts, Winter Solstice, Musings on Rhetorical Debate Styles, Ridiculous Marriage Amendment.My comments: Duane Gish was vice president of the Institute for Creation Research. Nice listener email on the FLDS members pretending to be truck stop hookers–I like the listener feedback. Obama opposes same-sex marriage. On proving a negative, please see this and/or this.

Good: Washington joins Oregon in allowing doctor-assisted suicide, South Dakota rejects further abortion limits, Michigan allows medical marijuana and stem cell research, California rejects further abortion limits, Colorado rejects the definition of person as beginning at conception. Bad: California, Arizona, and Florida ban gay marriage with constitutional amendments, Arkansas bans gay couples from adopting children. (Results at CNN.) UPDATE: Ed Brayton notes at Dispatches from the Culture Wars that the California result on gay marriage was evidently due to religious bigotry: In California, exit polls showed that those who attended church regularly voted against marriage equality 83-17%. Those who attended church only occasionally voted for marriage equality 60-40%. Those who do not attend church at all voted for marriage equality 86-14%.The same was true in Arizona, where exit polling found that: Protestants generally supported the measure but that Catholics were fairly evenly divided. Nonreligious voters were solidly against it. … Proposition 102 had slight leads among Whites and among Hispanics. … The youngest voters were split for and against, with support for Proposition 102 increasing among voters in older age groups. Voters age 65 or over were solidly for the amendment.Prop. 102 will ultimately be overturned as the older generation dies off. ...

Arizona will now have a majority of Democratic Representatives in the House, as Rick Renzi is replaced by Ann Kirkpatrick in District 1 in a close race. The other close race is District 5, where Harry Mitchell has defeated David Schweikert. This means the Arizona delegation will be Senators John McCain and Jon Kyl (both Republicans), and Representatives Ann Kirkpatrick (D-District 1), Trent Franks (R-District 2), John Shadegg (R-District 3), Ed Pastor (D-District 4), Harry Mitchell (D-District 5), Jeff Flake (R-District 6), Raul Grijalva (D-District 7), Gabrielle Giffords (D-District 8). Bad news: Andrew Thomas was re-elected as Maricopa County Attorney, and Joe Arpaio was re-elected as Maricopa County Sheriff. And Arizona went for John McCain as president, though he has graciously conceded to Barack Obama. Some bad results on the propositions: Prop. 102 is passing, amending the Arizona constitution to ban same-sex marriage, Prop. 101 on medical choice is failing. But there’s also good news: the payday loan industry-backed Prop. 200 is failing (that would add barriers to entry to new payday loan companies, as well as prevent the current payday loan legislation from sunsetting), and Prop. 100’s ban on additional home transfer taxes is passing. UPDATE (November 5, 2008): Prop. 101 is still too close to call, with “no” votes leading by 2,195 votes (867,924 no, 865,729 yes). There should be a conclusive result tomorrow. UPDATE (November 6, 2008): Still counting on Prop. 101–it’s now a 2,944-vote lead for no, 887,821 to 884,877. UPDATE (November 12, 2008): Prop. 101 has been defeated, 961,567 no votes to 950,440 yes votes. ...

A parent complained about Sarah Brannen’s book, Uncle Bobby’s Wedding, about same-sex marriage, that was in the children’s book section in the Douglas County Library system in Colorado. Librarian Jamie Larue wrote an excellent, kind, and thoughtful response to the library patron about why the library is not going to move or remove the book.

The Presidential Prayer Team has called for supporters to “Pray for the President as he seeks wisdom on how to legally codify the definition of marriage. Pray that it will be according to Biblical principles. With any forces insisting on variant definitions of marriage, pray that God’s Word and His standards will be honored by our government." A piece of unattributed email has been going around in support of this proposition, with the following suggested Constitutional amendment to put that into effect: Marriage in the United States shall consist of a union between one man and one or more women. (Gen 29:17-28; II Sam 3:2-5) Marriage shall not impede a man’s right to take concubines in addition to his wife or wives. (II Sam 5:13; I Kings 11:3; II Chron 11:21) A marriage shall be considered valid only if the wife is a virgin. If the wife is not a virgin, she shall be executed. (Deut 22:13-21) Marriage of a believer and a non-believer shall be forbidden. (Gen 24:3; Num 25:1-9; Ezra 9:12; Neh 10:30) Since marriage is for life, neither this Constitution nor the constitution of any State, nor any state or federal law, shall be construed to permit divorce. (Deut 22:19; Mark 10:9) If a married man dies without children, his brother shall marry the widow. If he refuses to marry his brother’s widow or deliberately does not give her children, he shall pay a fine of one shoe and be otherwise punished in a manner to be determined by law. (Gen. 38:6-10; Deut 25:5-10) In lieu of marriage, if there are no acceptable men in your town, it is required that you get your dad drunk and have sex with him (even if he had previously offered you up as a sex toy to men young and old), tag-teaming with any sisters you may have. Of course, this rule applies only if you are female. (Gen 19:31-36)For some reason Len Munsil’s Center for Arizona Policy organization hasn’t pushed this amendment in Arizona, instead preferring the unbiblical idea, not even widely recognized yet at the time of Charlemagne, that marriage should only be between one man and one woman.

Dennis Prager writes, regarding the California Supreme Court’s decision to strike down a ban on same-sex marriage, that: The sexual confusion that same-sex marriage will create among young people is not fully measurable. Suffice it to say that, contrary to the sexual know-nothings who believe that sexual orientation is fixed from birth and permanent, the fact is that sexual orientation is more of a continuum that ranges from exclusive heterosexuality to exclusive homosexuality. Much of humanity - especially females - can enjoy homosexual sex. It is up to society to channel polymorphous human sexuality into an exclusively heterosexual direction - until now, accomplished through marriage. It sounds like he thinks that female heterosexuality is so tenuous that it must be enforced by the power of law. Does he also think this is a justification for denying civil liberties and rights to women? Ed Brayton gives a good fisking to Prager’s entire crazy essay on this subject, showing that his arguments are very similar to arguments that were made against integration and interracial marriage in response to Supreme Court decisions. ...

The Arizona House has passed SB 10242 and sent it on to the Senate. This would put a measure to the voters to amend the Arizona Constitution to ban same-sex marriage. A similar proposal was voted down in 2006, but that measure included a provision that would have prohibited state benefits to domestic partners–this one doesn’t. Unfortunately, I think this has a good chance of passing. Arizona already bans same-sex marriage by statute, but not in its Constitution.

A bill in the Arizona legislature to amend the state constitution to ban gay marriage (which failed via initiative petition in 2006, being rejected by voters) died in the state House after it was similarly amended to ban domestic partner benefits. That’s the same reason the initiative, Proposition 107, failed. Historical Comments Tim and Louie (2008-04-07): Hurray!!! Finally some good news for us minority LGBT Arizonans! A far cry from other states' progress on LGBT equality, but progress nonetheless. ...