Californians’ Vote for Traditional Marriage Threatened
- Jan 12, 2010 -
The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission has filed a friend-of-the-court brief in what is expected to be a landmark case addressing same-sex “marriage.”
The U.S. District Court for Northern California in San Francisco will seek to decide, in Perry vs. Schwarzenegger, if Proposition 8, the 2008 California constitutional ballot initiative which defined marriage as only between a man and a woman, violates the equal protection and due process clauses of the U.S. Constitution.
Proponents of same-sex “marriage,” who were outraged when California voters embraced the initiative that banned the practice, were turned back last May in the California Supreme Court, 6-1, with the court asserting the state ban did not violate the state’s Constitution. The U.S. District Court case is reportedly the first time a court will hear witnesses in a case involving same-sex “marriage.”
Whatever the district court judge rules, there is little doubt the decision will eventually end up in front of the nine justices of the U.S. Supreme Court.
This issue is so critical for the future of our families and our nation that the ERLC had no choice but to file this friend-of-the-court brief in support of California citizens who by their vote established that “only marriage between a man and a woman is valid and recognized in California.”
The institution of the family has served for all of history as the bedrock of society. God intends for the critical values that sustain us to rise up from the firm foundation of lifelong commitment to a heterosexual marriage.
The support for traditional marriage is not motivated by animus toward homosexuals but by deeply held religious convictions of many faiths, including tens of millions of people over several millennia.
The God of the Bible loves each and every member of the human race, seeks to redeem each of them in Christ from the ravages of his or her sin nature, and helps each of them to fulfill the unique plan and purpose that He has for their lives. Scripture compels us to minister to homosexuals in the same way: to speak the truth, but always in love; to condemn individual behavior, but never the individual.
If the court were to rule that opposition to same-sex marriage is de facto animus toward homosexuals, it would in effect seek to negate and nullify the First Amendment, free-exercise religious rights of all Americans of faith guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution.
This case is now not just about same-sex marriage but about whether or not Americans are free to bring their deeply held religious convictions to discussions of public policy in the public square. All Americans of religious faith and those of no religious faith should have a profound interest in this case’s outcome.
The ERLC’s friend-of-the-court brief in this case states clearly why Americans have the right to defend traditional, heterosexual marriage as the only relationship defined as marriage and why it is wise and prudent of them to do so.
Further Learning
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