. . . on Marriage
The effects of the redefinition of marriage are even now being felt. What do you think should and could be done about this?
Share your views on this important subject.
The following essay was moved from a separate section of this website and added to this section on November 15, 2007. Since it is related to the marriage question, it seems to belong here, and in its new position may stimulate some comment.
A Proposal for Solving a Contentious Problem
The following essay was written prior to the Canadian government’s law changing the definition of marriage. It is presented here, with minor changes, because the change in marriage definition in the offending legislation must be revisited. I realize that the solution presented here is not one that all social conservatives will agree on, but I present it as a topic worth discussing.
The sound and the fury has echoed and reechoed across Canada. Homosexuals demand that they should be officially granted the right to the word “marriage.” Defenders of traditional marriage object to the misuse of a word, which for time immemorial has been used to designate a particular union between a man and a woman. The sound and fury is not without substance. Real issues are at stake. Pro-homosexuality activists demand rights which they say are associated with marriage. Defenders of traditional marriage say the state should not, by changing the legal definition of marriage, proclaim that same-sex unions are to be affirmed or put its stamp of approval on such unions.
All the while there has been a possible solution to the problem which would grant all the rights which can legitimately claimed without proclaiming same-sex unions as marriages. That solution has been called “domestic partnerships.” Such partnerships would grant every legitimate claim of non-married people living together while answering the objections of those who contend for the exclusive nature of marriage as a union of a man and a woman. A legally recognized “domestic partnership” would acknowledge that two people had decided to set up a legal partnership with differing roles. This legal relationship would be available to a variety of people. Two people raising children together, where one partner withdrew from the general work force for a number of years in order to better provide for the nurturing of children—that could be designated a domestic partnership. Or a son or daughter might stay home to care for an aged parent, and could have the relationship designated a “domestic partnership.” Domestic partners such as this might be granted special pension rights in view of the valuable service they provide.
It will be noted from the two examples given that a “domestic partnership” as such has nothing to do with sexual relationship. This should please liberal followers of Pierre Trudeau, who declared that the state had no business in the bedrooms of the nation. It should also please the defenders of traditional marriage, who will note that it does not touch the time-honoured definition of marriage.
Pro-homosexuality activists have demanded that members of same-sex unions should have the same rights as members of opposite-sex unions. Social conservatives could agree if basic rights were recognized as belonging to the individual. Why should married couples have special rights anyway? The only special rights that the state needs to grant are those which can be vested in those who are “domestic partners.”
All legitimate rights required for the relationship of couples may be granted either by the designating domestic partnerships or by the creation of simple contracts or legal declarations. Inheritance rights can be stipulated by private agreements and wills. Pension rights, provided they did not involve subsidization by outside parties or the state, could be granted in view of individual legal declarations.
The present writer has simply sought to explain the outworkings of a solution. The solution I cannot claim as my own, and the term “domestic partnership” is not my invention. It is a term and a concept that I first knew as the proposal of a conservative Roman Catholic Bishop.. At this present juncture it seems important to point out that there is a just solution to the marriage problem which now rends the nation. In a spirit of goodwill and with a common concern for justice, should we not give fair consideration to such a solution?
--Ted Hewlett
posted by Ted Hewlett | Post Page
22 comments
22 Comments:
Now that our politicians, including some from the Conservative Party, have let us down, where do we turn? What do we do?
Well, not all is lost. God is (still) sovereign, these things are no surprise to Him, and He will not ignore this affront. Those politicians who are Christian and vote against God certainly do not understand the Christian world view, nor the necessity to live out what they say they believe. Their ultimate "fate" is up to God alone... but their political fate will be up to the voters that they insult.
I am a member of the Conservative party - and, I say it is our duty to vote against any member who will not stand up for traditional Canadian Christian values. Who cares if the CPC loses the next election - that is their own fault.
As culpable as the MPs are, the churches are moreso. Few pulpits are ringing with the strong Word of God these days - especially on big social/cultural matters. Shame on those who call themselves "men of God" but are really just getting paid to be professional churchers.
CH Spurgeon said, "Nowadays, the Truth that God has revealed seems of less account with men than their own thoughts and dreams… When you see revealed Truth, as it were, wandering about in sheepskins and goatskins, being destitute, afflicted, tormented, and no man saith a good word for it, then the hour has come to avow it because it is Christ’s Truth, and to prove your fidelity by counting the reproach of Christ greater riches than all the treasures of Egypt.
"Oh, scorn on those who only believe what everybody else believes, just because they must be in the swim with the majority. These are but dead fish borne on the current, and they will be washed away to a shameful end. As living fish swim against the stream, so do living Christians pursue Christ’s Truth against the set and current of the times, defying alike the ignorance and the culture of the age. It is the believer’s honor, the chivalry of a Christian, to be the steadfast friend of Truth when all other men have forsaken it."
And, I agree.
Jim Christian
Halifax, NS
I've been married 25 years. A couple of years back homosexuals were able to get married too. I haven't noticed any change in my marriage.
And to Jim Christian. You beieve in a nasty god.
Wayne Fowler
No, Wayne, I have not noticed any change in my marriage of nearly forty years, either.
However, the effects on what children are taught about marriage, and hence on children's ideas about marriage, are likely to be felt rather soon. Already it is being argued that because the Canadian parliament has recongnized same-sex marriage, therefore that recognition is a basic Canadian value, and children must therefore be taught that such unions are equivalent to marriage as we previously defined it.
Well, Wayne, first of all, people with homosexual inclinations have always been able to get married. However, ever since God created this world, "marriage" has always been between a man and a woman. No other "arrangement" would be a marriage. There have been other forms of human relationships over the years, but only a life-long covenant of man and woman can be called a marriage.
Some relationships defy not only the natural order, but defy the law of God. And, His laws are for our own good, not to spoil our fun. You might think it fun to play out on the highway, but it's not really good for us. Homosexual activity has been shown, medically and pychologically, to cause great harm. Those who know God's Word also know that such sins also result in grave spiritual consequences.
When people bring up such topics they are told they follow a "nasty god". Tell me, what kind of a "god" would you rather have? A god of unbridled hedonism that results in suffering and death? Or a God who cares for us enough to warn us away from harmful behaviour; a God who loves us enough to offer His own Son on the cross to save us from our sins? I think the choice should be clear, for anyone who is willing to see the difference.
Just because the current government doesn't have the courage to correct the errors of the previous Lieberals does not mean that real marriages could EVER include those of the same sex. But, hopefully, before too long, a new set of MPs will have a more reasonable and Christian point of view.
As for our 30-year marriage; it's great, and getting better. Hope yours is too. But, I grieve for the younger generation that is being sold a bogus bill of goods. The "marriage" that this secular humanist culture is selling will never give the happiness, health and fulfillment of a real mariage as understood in the Judeo- Christian worldview.
Jim Christian
Hi editor,
Yes the affects of what children are taught can have quick effets. So hopefully we will teach them to not worry about any couple that are both able to make personal commitments to love and honor each other. Marriage is just a word. A word that can have important meanings if it is about love, commitment, respect. It becomes meanigless when people defend the right of Donald trump to get married for the umpteenth time but deny two men who have lived together for half a century the right to make the ultimate commitment to each other. You want to protect marriage lobby the government for a three strikes you're out law.
Ultimately if we can get over this foolish prejudice then our kids will learn to be less hate filled and more open to diverstiy. I have a 17 year old and an 11 year old. I teach them gay marriage is a step forward. I'm not worried.
Wayne Fowler
Wayne, if the public schools are used to teach children there is nothing to worry about in a relationship that their parents regard as wrong, the parents' rights are interfered with. That is what the pro-homosexuality activists want, and that is a cause for concern
I would not defend anyone getting married and divorced "for the umpteenth time."
You do not want the government to mandate recognition of the traditional form of marriage as between a man and a woman, but you want the government to limit divorce. We do have a problem: Just how much do we want the government to legislate morality--and according to whose ideas?
It is possible--though I admit it poses problems--that the government should get out of the marriage-regulating business and leave the recognition or non-recognition of it to private agencies (churches and others). Right now in Canada we have had the government put its stamp of approval on a form of union which is against our traditional norms of morality, and logically there is no reason why if that is right, the government should not go on to recognize polygamy and all sorts of other unions as marriages.
Ted, I'm not the one asking government to legislate moral behaviour. I'm suggesting a path that makes more sense if you feel marriage needs protecting as you do.
If a parent wants me to teach that one religion is superior or that all races are not equal then I'm not going to do it. Anti-homosexuality is one of the last bastions of semi-acceptable discrimination. Parents are shepards but not gods.
Rather than government getting out of the marriage game I think it should do as was originally done. All marriages should occur with a government ceremony and those who want to, and are allowed to (churches choice), can have a ceremony where the church blesses their union.
Wayne Fowler
I certainly don't want a god who would sacrifice his son for my sins. What was the point? He is supposed to be god, if he wants to forgive he is perfectly capable of doing so. Why send someone down to suffer in agony on a cross for a few hours. I can understand sacrifice to do something meaningful and that can't be done another way, you know like free Europe from Hitler. But why did your god require a blood sacrifice? That is the god of goat herders that I rejected in Sunday School. A nasty, cruel god who inflicts suffering for no reason.
I understand you will find that offensive, but I'm not going to be politically correct when that god is used as a reason to deny a group of people equal rights.
Secondly, You can't prove that homosexuality is harmful in and of itself until you remove the prejudice and discrimination that exists in society first. That would be like saying that being black is harmful to your health because black americans have a shorter average life span than white americans. Lower incomes and poorer living conditions due to racism and poverty are the causes.
Finally, if the church or "God" wanted to keep the definition of marriage as you believe it should be it should have never let government set down laws on the subject. As governments did millenia ago it eventually became subject to the rule of law. In Canada that means the Charter of rights and Freedoms (Something I think Jesus would have no trouble supporting). Thank goodness the Supreme Court ruled that in Canada equal rights means equal treatment.
Give up the dogma Jim. Use the mind you believe God gave you. If your faith can't stand some hard questions then it isn't much of a faith at all.
Wayne Fowler
[edited comment]
I have no desire to stifle logical debate. The use of labels or naming terms is necessary for discussion, but some labels bear an emotional overload that makes them insulting to others, so that I will edit them out. I have decided to do this not only with names that refer to human beings but also to terms applied to God or Christ which many readers might regard as insulting or blasphemous.
While I disagree with censoring my view of the nature of the Christian God I do appreciate the fact that most of my post passed the blue pencil.
While I do understand that my comments could be read as blaspheming, I also believe Christians, especially legalist variants, need to here just how offensive their depictions of their god are to other people.
Wayne Fowler
There is a definition of marriage, and it must be upheld. A homosexual relationship can not be recognaized by society. It is plain and simple.
By recognizing gay marriage, it is sending out a message to other people saying that it is acceptable. This only encourages it. If we stand up and say no, many gays and lesbians will stay in the closet and we will have a pure society. The gay couples cannot be accepted, nor can the act.
Liberal-minded government impositions on the public are unacceptable !
According to Health Canada HIV and AIDS in Canada Surveillance Report for April 2006 on page 60, we read that eighty-five percent of AIDS in Canada is in MALES WHO HAVE SEX WITH MALES ! Not healthy is it ?
" Gay bowel syndrome " describes a well documented collection of bowel diseases that lead to a mechanical dysfunction of the lower bowel tract. However unknown to the Public because of a near total pro-homosexual media blackout, they include amebiasis, giardiasis, salmonellosis, shigellosis, hepatitis a and b, tuberculosis,sypilis. These are ENDemic to the homosexual population. Not healthy or normal is it ?
Why is the homosexual lifestyle and homosexual marriage promoted in our BC public schools as healthy and normal by the LIBERAL-minded when it's not? Has the BC voting public gone stark raving mad?
Professor C.S.Lewis has a book and tape series titled " THE FOUR LOVES. " Perhaps it's time for people to know what love really is?
Come and join the BC Unity Party and help us win the 2009 BC Provincial election.
Liberal-minded government impositions on the public are unacceptable!, is the title of my good friend Garry Sahl's political science paper. The anonymous posting is the exact conclusion of that paper.
Even in spite of the overwhelming empirical proof against the government promotion of homosexuality and homosexual marriage in our schools and universities.
Garry ran for office for the BC UNITY PARTY in 2001 when he was also a political science student.
Dr. Maria Crenshaw, asked 800 sexologists at the World Congress of Sexology, "If you had available the partner of your dreams, and knew that person carried the HIV virus would you rely on a condom for protection ?"
Not a single person raised a hand !
So she accused them all of giving irresponsible advice to youth.
Condoms have an overal failure rate for preventing pregnancy of ten percent and even a higher rate in the prevention of AIDS transmission because the virus is so small. Researchers at the National Institutes of Health did high-powered X-ray examinations of latex surgical gloves similar to condom latex and found lots of holes 5 microns in diameter. The AIDS virus is 0.1 microns, and can pass through such " protective " latex without even touching the sides of the hole.
Liberal minded BC politicians, judges, political parties and homosexual activists should not be developing curriculum and promoting homosexual marriage and lifestyle in BC public schools .
BC citizens our children are to precious to pervert and destroy.
It is high time for the BC citizens to toss all the liberal-minded politicians in 2009. If enough concerned citizens join the BC Unity Party we can win!
In Holland homosexual activists , politically correct liberal-minded politicians ,liberal thinking teachers groups,liberal-minded Unions and Judges ordered the homosexual lifestyle and marriage be taught in public schools to children as healthy and normal.
They also changed the age of sex consent to 12 thus legalizing pedophilia.
The Journal Of Homosexuality,a scientific homosexual journal, devoted a special issue to "The Pedophilia debate". This special issue reflects the substantial, influential, and growing segment of the homosexual community that neither hides nor condemns pedophilia ,and they argue it is an acceptable aspect of homosexual sexuality.
The North American Man-Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) actively promotes homosexual pedophilia.
Their platform also wants to lower the laws governing the age of sex consent in North America. Their slogan is:"Sex Before Eight,or Else It's Too Late!"
It is outrageous that our liberal-minded politicians march in pride parades with NAMBLA signs around them. Some know very well what this means,but others are ignorant.
In the Netherlands,the Dutch Paedika: The Journal of Pedophilia, an advocacy publication is highly recommended by Dutch liberals.
In British Columbia and the rest of Canada some Liberal thinkers know the corrupt values they are teaching our children in public school class-rooms while others are ignorant.
I do not want to see A Canadian Journal of Pedophlia selling in our stores,But with the laws the Liberal-minded Canadian Governments are making anything can happen. The age of sex consent is 14 in CANADA thanks to the liberal minded politicians and those who vote for them.
WAKE UP PEOPLE OF BRITISH COLUMBIA IF WE DON,T PROTECT OUR CHILDREN WHO WILL? You have been asleep long enough electing Liberal-minded Provincial Governments in BC! We ought to support Public School teachers like Dr. Chris Kempling, who is putting his job on the line to protect our kids from perversion being taught to them as healthy and normal in BC Public schools By The BC Liberal Parties and Liberal Judges.
The BC Unity Party is the only party to support,join and elect to VICTORIA. Lets take BC from the Liberal thinkers for our childrens sake!
The empirical data on health and safety of an act ought to be regarded before it is imposed on our children as safe and normal. If a government imposition is potentially harmful to society even if The Judges say it is not we have a problem.
In my university classes all the text-books said homosexuality is not harmful. I proved them all wrong empirically and passed,but no-one has changed the textbooks.
I will give you an example, my professor's hero James Rachels said in his textbook,"THE ELEMENTS OF MORAL PHILOSOPHY",page 50 he said,"If it could be shown that in pursuing their way of life homosexuals pose some sort of threat to the rest of society,that would be a powerful argument for the other side." I listed the Omega study, and the Health Canada HIV AND AIDS REPORT. After looking at my long list of referances the entire class agreed with me. The professor made a fool out of himself! Our society is braiwashed by our schools and universities that homosexuality is safe and normal.
A world of nice people,content in their own niceness and looking no further at empirical data can accept all manner of definitions for marriage.
But of course when the data for unhealthy acts is looked at the consequences of these acts becomes apparent.
In the long while I've been away I see many others have found the board. Scarey bunch. ZGraham wants a "purer society". Hmm that sounds familiar and not a little scary.
Others bring up points that may have legitimate points. Such as any group that promotes sex with children is wrong. However to take the step of banning, ignoring, (whatever it is you're saying)homosexuals is foolhardy. Most peadophiles are hetrosexual so perhaps you should ban, ignore, etc. hetrosexuals. Trouble with ultra conservatives is they don't know when to stop.
But what I find most humorous is the number of you who want governments to legislate so-called morality on the issues you care about but then say you want government to stay out of your lives.
Wayne Fowler
Welcome back, Wayne. Regarding your comment (received Monday, Nov. 12, 2007): You will find that social conservatives, like those of other persuasions, vary in their concepts of what government should and should not do. I do not think we are ever going to get a pure society by governmental measures, nor should we depend on government to do this, but we can try to make the society a safer one for the young, and that involves government measures. Personally, I distrust government intervention where it is not necessary; and, as I have written elsewhere on this website, would even be willing to see marriage made a matter not for the government but for the churches and various other private groups. But we still need the government to make decisions on a number of social matters, especially if we are to retain the level of government involvement we now have. For example, if the government has the final say on adoption, I think it should favour adoption by an opposite-sex couple publicly committed to a permanent relationship over adoption by same-sex couples. And if the government is involved in education it certainly should not promote the portrayal of same-sex unions as equivalent to opposite-sex marriage. Those who favour advocate putting children in homosexually-headed households and indoctrinating students in schools so that they have a favourable view of homosexual behaviour are scary to social conservatives.
Regarding your comment on the percentage of paedophiles who are homosexual versus hterosexual, I don't think anyone would deny that a paedophile can be both, but since there are far more heterosexuals than homosexuals, one would expect that there would be more paedophiles in the former group. (Incidentally, the formation of the Greek word from terms meaning love of a child is regrettable, but we can't do much about word origins once a word is established.)
If someone is headed off a cliff, the compassionate response is to try to stop him, not allow him to fall and then offer to treat his injuries.
According to Health Canada's HIV and AIDS surveillance report for April 2006 on page 60, we read eighty- five percent of AIDS in Canada is in MALES WHO HAVE SEX WITH MALES !
Legalizing homosexual marriage, promoting it, and teaching falsely that it is healthy and normal to our children in BC Public School Class-Rooms ought to be a criminal offence.
It is the hight of compassion for people to unite to oppose this societal disaster with its litany of pain and suffering before it is too late to turn this situation around.
We have already seen that the popular media's positive portrayal of homosexuality has enticed many young people into this harmful behavior. With Government sanction and promotion of homosexual marriage in BC Public Schools from kindergaten , many more will be drawn into this destuctive lifestyle.Government should promote public virtue not suduce its citizens into accepting unhealthy lifestyles!
Family advocates are worried that the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision not to take up the case of the Ontario boy who was granted the right to have three legal parents will only further weaken the family unit.
Focus on the Family Canada, the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, REAL Women of Canada, the Christian Legal Fellowship and the Catholic Civil Rights League had wanted to challenge the ruling of the Ontario Court of Appeal in January that allowed the boy to have two mothers his biological mother and her lesbian partner and a father.
As the Alliance for Marriage and Family,the organizations had sought the appeal on grounds that they had intervened in the case to block the request from the boy’s family. But the Supreme Court responded that because the Alliance “was merely an intervener in the Court it had no specific interest in the outcome of the litigation.”
The court said only the boy’s parents and the government of Ontario had the legal right to ask that the lower court’s decision be appealed and neither of them did.
The decision rewrites, without any input from elected MPs or the general public, Ontario’s 30-year-old Children’s Law Reform Act, which limited the number of parents a child could have to two. The Appeals Court said, "lawmakers back then could not have foreseen how today’s family has evolved as a result of the legalization of same-sex marriage and the advances in reproductive technologies."
But members of the Alliance warn that by allowing the ruling to stand, the Supreme Court has created a precedent that will result in countless similar cases being heard in courts across the country to the detriment of the two-parent family.
As the London Free Press reported, Quist noted that only the day before, “Statistics Canada released a Census report which showed an erosion of family across the country. And now t
The Courts have added to that erosion.”
“We cannot begin to imagine the impact this judgment will have on Canadian society,” said CLF executive director Ruth Ross in a news release. “Not only will the intact, two-parent family diminish but so will the security of children. It is children that will suffer the most.”
Canada'a liberal governments voted 167 to 99 and defeated Bill C313 to raise the age of sex consent from 14 years of age. 90 Federal Conservatives voted to raise the age of sex consent and from the rest of Canada's governments put together only 9 MPs voted to raise the age of sex consent. How our MPs voted on Bill C313 was on the Federal Govewrnment web site www.parl.gc.ca this vote says a lot about CANADA and its citizens. How will this law effect 14 year old children in Canada's new multiple parent families and anywhere else? Why didn't the Federal Conservatives fight the liberal Parties over this issue? Could it be that most Canadian citizens have bought into the impoverihed view of Humanism,which is also taught as a State Sponsored religion in our schools and universities protected by State Courts?
“How many legal parents may each child now have?” asked EFC general legal counsel Don Hutchinson in a separate news release. “What will determine the number of parents a child will legally have: sexual orientation of the parents, divorce and remarriage or the breakdown of a long-term relationship? Will the number of parents allowed per child now impact the number of spouses permitted in a marriage?”
The re-definition of marriage has opened a can of worms.
The lack of will to do what is right by the Conservative party will lead to the downfall of this once great nation. They abdicated their responsibility to follow the right course of action – according this important institution the debate it deserved.
Marriage has lost all meaning, and Canada unfortunately has the dishonor of being among the first few countries in the world to accept this nonsensical definition – first same-sex “marriage”, and possibly now, polygamy. Where will it end?
Conservative Canadians voted for the Conservative Party, but the party let us down. Political correctness trumped truth. Now, we will pay dearly for generations to come, for their lack of integrity to defend a most sacred institution that has stood us in good stead, up to now.
Political correctness will lead to Canada’s downfall. This is the beginning of total chaos.
Deanna Fernandes
Surrey BC
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