But they can never have one of these.
Posted on 04/20/2013 4:46:19 AM PDT by markomalley
Here’s how same sex marriage will lead to a police state: First this article on Slate calls for the legalization of polygamy. The call for polygamy sort of springboards from the argument for same sex marriage. The piece argues from various viewpoints, but the underlying principle is the same: “Let us decide what marriage is.” Here is the defining last paragraph:
The definition of marriage is plastic. Just like heterosexual marriage is no better or worse than homosexual marriage, marriage between two consenting adults is not inherently more or less “correct” than marriage among three (or four, or six) consenting adults. Though polygamists are a minority—a tiny minority, in fact—freedom has no value unless it extends to even the smallest and most marginalized groups among us. So let’s fight for marriage equality until it extends to every same-sex couple in the United States—and then let’s keep fighting. We’re not done yet.
Here is the real philosophical issue, and it lies beneath the same sex marriage debate–indeed beneath virtually every debate in our society. The proponents of polygamy (in this case) argue that marriage is “plastic”. In other words, its elastic. Its rubbery. It stretches. Its jello. It conforms and adapts and changes according to your needs.
Furthermore, marriage is only plastic and elastic because everything else is too. In other words, there is no such thing as Truth. This is what B16 and Pope Francis call “the dictatorship of relativism.” Nothing is secure or certain because nothing is revealed as Truth because if there were such a thing as revealed Truth there would have to be an objective source for that Truth. There would have to be TRUTH and TRUTH must be something which is reasonable and able to be articulated, and how can there be a source for a Truth that is reasonable unless that source is, itself reasonable and if reasonable then able to reason, and if able to reason, the intelligent and if intelligent then self aware and if self aware, then existent.
For the Catholic everything is connected. If marriage is plastic and elastic, then everything is plastic and elastic. We are “on the edge of a grimpen where there is no foothold.” Everything is up for grabs, there is no certainty and if no certainty, then no security. This is the philosophical and theological wilderness in which our culture if foundering.
However, people cannot live together in society with complete plasticity and elasticity. In a society where anything goes everything goes…downhill fast. Where moral disintegration exists societal disintegration soon follows. Everything starts to come apart at the seams. Societal chaos threatens.
Now here’s where I begin to really get the creeps: When there is no certainty in a society–no moral absolutes and no reason and no rules, then something must be done. People demand security. As disorder and chaos increase people demand order and control. However, without any greater moral absolutes, with a rejection of a greater lawgiver and a higher code of behavior the only force left to bring about order in society is the government, and the only laws the government will see fit to put into effect are the laws which help to preserve and consolidate the government’s already existing power and wealth.
The laws will have to be arbitrary because society will have already decided that all laws are arbitrary. Likewise the enforcement of the laws will rely merely on brute force because there will be no reason for the laws and therefore no reason (apart from force) to obey the laws, and there will be no justice because justice is based on reason and equity and a rationale that assumes there is such a thing as Truth. Law and justice will be the rule of force and nothing else.
Thus the ultimate irony that those who wanted a society “completely free” from absolutes where everything was plastic will end up with a police state where nothing is plastic and the total control is drastic.
It’s no stretch and it makes logical sense. It’s fundamentally what liberalism is all about - destroying the moral underpinnings of society. Each liberal is a god.
My concern is how many catholics will vote for God? I was stunned when my very active, very religious Greek Orthodox friend recently came out in favor of SSM. We’re really behind the curve on this.
There’s also this aspect...in a culture where anything goes and people feel insecure and demand order, the government is a huge threat, yes, and it does become arbitrary, yes, but here’s the other threat: Radical Islam. Sharia law. Western culture devoid of Judeo-Christian morality is fully ripe for takeover by Radical Islam. As unspeakably horrible as that ideology is, it WILL provide standards and order.
“Nature abhors a vacuum”.
That’s why polygamy, same sex marriage and other such evils are in fact barbarism- they tear at the foundations of civilization itself.
They get very uncomfortable very quickly. I point out that they do have a limit I just draw mine where God draws his. Then I ask why they feel they know better than God.
You are correct. And people brought up in watered down Christianity or no Christianity at all are ripe for tbe picking.
But they can never have one of these.
The problem here is not morality, but authority. That is, the religions have allowed the state to take over authority in what is both a biological and religious necessity.
And the state has promptly fouled up on both counts, by allowing or encouraging non-biologically optimal associations and calling them “marriage”, and by using this authority to subvert the religious sacrament of marriage.
The way to redeem the situations is for all Orthodox religions to band together to reach the agreement that the *only* marriages they recognize are sacramental, performed by one of them in full compliance with the agreement.
Likewise, they will only recognize divorce (if they permit it at all) based in the agreement. In either case, they may add restrictions based on their faith, but they may not diminish them, and still perform recognized sacramental marriages or divorces.
Essential to this idea is that it is *exclusive*. It excludes and does not recognize “liberal religious” or secular marriage, any more than it would recognize a pagan marriage rite as genuine.
All members of these churches may choose or not to also have a marriage certificate “to appease Caesar”, but that is unimportant and put in the same light as a tax document. It does not mean that they are married, just that they have paid the “marriage tax”.
This also strips any religious association with homosexual, polygamous, bestial, or pedophile “marriages” that the state permits. As well, it is one in the eye to liberal religions that permit such deviance.
The big value in this is evidenced in the creation of “covenant marriages” some years ago. It attracted many young couples who didn’t want either an easy path to marriage or divorce, who were serious about getting married and wanted everyone who knew them to know it.
The bottom line is that by retaking the sacrament of marriage, the Orthodox religions restore its value, and despise its corruptions.
The homosexuals aren't making their stunning social and political inroads by themselves. How could they? They only represent 2 - 3% of the population. They're making these inroads because they have huge numbers of heterosexual allies who agree with the LGBT premise: namely, that wedding and bedding aren't primarily about sacred procreative sexuality, but about adult satisfaction.
Let's face it: if marriage is about celebrating a relationship of mutual satisfaction and love between adults, there's no reason why it would have to be a man and a woman.
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I would say your friend is not a very religious Greek Orthodox practitioner if he disagrees with Christ’s teaching on marriage in Matthew 19:4-6.
“Let’s face it: if marriage is about celebrating a relationship of mutual satisfaction and love between adults, there’s no reason why it would have to be a man and a woman.”
Or just one man to just one woman.
Hi there; sorry I’m kinda coming in late on this one, but just to provide a bit of devil’s advocacy here:
This issue can be avoided by examining the base principles of the morality at stake. Basically, you have to ask “what is morality, and what does it do”.
There are a few basic moral principles that everyone tends to be able to agree upon: equality (in that no one has more rights than anyone else, not in that we’re all identical) & fairness, everyone ‘getting along’, and - most importantly - reduction and prevention of harm. It’s this last one which is crucial for an argument like this.
Basically, if you can say “the purpose of morality is to let all of us exist together without harming each other”, than you can reach the conclusions they do: does stealing harm another? Yes. Does killing someone do harm? Yes. Does allowing two people of the same gender to get married harm anyone? No. Does allowing multiple people of assorted genders to get married harm anyone? They would argue “no”.
You can go on to explore that “no” if it’s not satisfactory - for example, you can bring up the exploitative cases of polygamy in which you end up with one husband racking up wives essentially against their will, like in certain fundamentalist Mormon or Islamic sects. However, you could rebut this by bringing up the idea that by making it legal and regulated (that is, like marriage is now), you can avoid environments that produce such exploitation.
The key argument that allows someone to avoid the slippery slope into relativism is that even if there is no objective morality, so long as you properly describe on a purpose for morality, you can objectively gauge how well or poorly a given moral system lives up to it. Arguably, this actually comes with an advantage - someone who doesn’t think morality is objective is able to better adapt to new data, reasons to value something more or less on a moral level.
Does that make sense?
I forget where I picked it up (FR?) but I once read that saying as:
“Power abhors a vacuum”
And with Islam being a political movement as well as a religious movement the muslims are also focused on power.
If Christianity has no power in the West then the muslims will see an opportunity where it presents itself.
The first polygamist mentioned in the Bible is Lamech, whose two wives were Adah and Zillah (Gen 4:19). Abraham's wives were Sarah, Hagar (Gen 16:3, 21:1-13), Keturah (Gen 25:1), and concubines (who are referred to as "wives" in other parts of the Bible) (Gen 25:6). Jacob's four wives are Leah and Rachel (Gen 29:28) and despite an oath with their father Laban to not take any additional wives (Gen 31:48-54), Jacob took Bilhah (Gen 30:4) and Zilpah (Gen 30:9). Moses' two wives were Zipporah (Ex 2:21, Ex 18:1-6) and an Ethiopian woman (Num 12:1). Interestingly enough, Aaron and Miriam were punished for disapproving of Moses' forbidden marriage. Gideon "had many wives" (Judges 8:29-32). Elkanah, Samuel's father, had two wives, Hannah and Peninnah (1 Samuel 1:1-2). An accurate list of David's wives would include at least five named wives: Michal (1 Sam 18:27, 19:11-18, 25:44; 2 Sam 3:13-14, 6:20-23), Abigail of Carmel (1 Sam 25:39, 1 Chr 3), Ahinoam of Jezreel (1 Sam 25:43, 1 Chr 3), Eglah (2 Sam 3:4-5, 1 Chr 3) and Bathsheba (2 Sam 12:24). David also took "more wives and concubines" in 2 Sam 5:13, 12:7-8, 1 Chr 14:3. Three additional women are mentioned, but we are not told if they are wives or concubines: Maacah (2 Sam 3:3, 1 Chr 3), Abital (2 Sam 3:3-4, 1 Chr 3) and Haggith (2 Sam 3:3, 1 Chr 3). Lastly, there are the ten concubines, or wives as they are referred to in 2 Sam 5:13, 15:16, 16:21-23, 1 Chr 14:3, bringing David's total to at least 22+ "wives/concubines". According to 1 Kings 11:3, David's son Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines.
In addition to the many examples of plural marriage, the Pentateuch also lists guidelines and rules concerning the taking of multiple wives, noting "If he takes another wife to himself, he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, or her marital rights"...
What about the 1st amendment prohibition against state establishments of religion (like Sharia law) - does that still have any power?
2nd amendment survey says.... Yes.
>>there’s no reason why it would have to be a man and a woman.
Reproductive social competition and biological / historical fact indicate otherwise.
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