ONLY BEFORE GOD
Forty years ago Peter Tatchell, the gay rights campaigner, founded the Gay Liberation Front with the specific aim of destroying the family. The attack on the family has been a feature of legislation and public policy over the last twenty years. The past few days have seen proposals by the Government in regard to marriage that will further undermine the status and integrity of the family, and it is all being done in the name of equality.
Equalities minister, Lynne Featherstone, has produced proposals which would allow, though not compel, churches, mosques and synagogues in England and Wales to perform civil partnership registrations. The Equalities Office of the Coalition Government has also indicated that it will “formally look” at redefining marriage so that homosexual couples can get the same certificate as married people.
In response to these proposals a joint statement was issued by five leading evangelical groups - Affinity, The Christian Institute, Christian Concern, Reform and the Fellowship of Independent Evangelical Churches. What they said included a very valuable definition of marriage and the place of children.
“Marriage was ordained by God for the good of all people and is a holy institution. It was also designed to represent something of the relationship between Christ and His church. There are two partners to a marriage because there are two sexes. Marriage is a complementary covenant involving the bringing together of the two sexes not only for the purposes of procreation but also to reflect more fully the image of God.”
“We are also concerned about the effect of declaring that the institution in which children are raised does not require both a mother and a father.”
It has not only been evangelical groups that have found these proposals to be unacceptable. Newspapers and political and social commentators, plus other religious groups, have all raised concerns. One leading senior Conservative politician, Edward Leigh, has also spoken out very strongly. He observed that, “same-sex couples already have all the rights of marriage in the form of a civil partnership. Why must they also have the language of marriage? No doubt because it is an important symbol to them. But it is also an important symbol to many other people.”
He continued with this telling question - “Must the religious and cultural heritage of the whole nation be overturned to suit the demands of a minority even of the gay community itself?” He also pointed out that given the track record of equality legislation it was quite likely that clergy who refused to perform same-sex marriages would face litigation “sooner or later”.
This illustrates the unavoidable fact that the concept of equality is an elusive goal. In a society of diverse views and values to grant equality to some is to deny the beliefs and ideals of others. This same difficulty in regard to equality also showed itself over the issues of prisoners being allowed to vote and paedophiles being given the right to appeal against being on the sex-offenders register. In these cases the desire to treat all equally cuts across the popular conception of what is just and reasonable. In seeking to grant some sort of equality to a small minority the dearly-held values of others are being disregarded and even dismissed. That means they then are treated unequally.
We are dealing with moral choices and ethical values. The “equality agenda” wants to set aside differing moral standpoints and find some sort of level playing field for all. But what in fact is happening is that a conscious moral judgment is being made. A gay lifestyle has been defined as being ‘normal and acceptable’ and those who differ must accept that or pay the price. Christian Registrars, Counsellors and Bed-and-Breakfast owners have all been forced to pay. The concept of marriage is being redefined and its sacred origins and family significance is being removed. That is being done in the interests of a very small minority because their right to be equal is seen as more important than the moral and religious perspective of others.
G K Chesterton once put onto the lips of Father Brown, that most self-effacing of all detectives, the unavoidable truth that “when people stop believing in God, they don’t believe in nothing, but rather they believe in anything.” So marriage is removed from its foundations as a ‘creation ordinance’ and redefined as a social convenience. And, as has been observed by a number of commentators, the proposals open the door to sisters being able to ‘marry’ and polygamy to be justified. So in the name of equality we will get utter confusion. And the implications for children’s well-being are largely disregarded, even though the statistics give ample ground for concern.
The fact is there is only one true form of equality – “all men are equal before God”. His standards are clear and just and they lead to equality, but they are not acceptable to our society. So we face either the growing moral chaos of our society or the totalitarianism of other nations governed by different ideologies or religious values. For Christians this is a demanding time. We are called to live by the two great absolutes of loving God and loving our neighbour. If we do that and if we exemplify godly family life and the beauty of Christian marriage then we can testify to our confused generation about the only real alternative.
But let us not be shy to remind our generation that “all men are equal before God” and we must all account to Him for how we have kept His just laws. Of course, by this standard we are all equally guilty and condemned. Thank God then that we are all equally called to trust in Jesus Christ and find forgiveness for sin and righteousness that makes us acceptable to God. Praise God there is equality in salvation.
Roger Hitchings
19/02/11