Church Members Mistreat Homeless Man in Church Unaware It Is Their Pastor in Disguise

Seeded by The WOPR on 18 September 2013.

Pastor Jeremiah Steepek transformed himself into a homeless person and went to the 10,000 member church that he was to be introduced as the head pastor at that morning.

He walked around his soon to be church for 30 minutes while it was filling with people for service, only 3 people out of the 7-10,000 people said hello to him.

He asked people for change to buy food – no one in the church gave him change.

He went into the sanctuary to sit down in the front of the church and was asked by the ushers if he would please sit in the back.

He greeted people to be greeted back with stares and dirty looks, with people looking down on him and judging him.

As he sat in the back of the church, he listened to the church announcements and such.

When all that was done, the elders went up and were excited to introduce the new pastor of the church to the congregation.

“We would like to introduce to you Pastor Jeremiah Steepek.” The congregation looked around clapping with joy and anticipation.

The homeless man sitting in the back stood up and started walking down the aisle. The clapping stopped with all eyes on him.

He walked up the altar and took the microphone from the elders (who were in on this) and paused for a moment then he recited,

“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.

“For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

‘The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ [Matthew 25: 34-45]

After he recited this, he looked towards the congregation and told them all what he had experienced that morning. Many began to cry and many heads were bowed in shame.

He then said, “Today I see a gathering of people, not a church of Jesus Christ. The world has enough people, but not enough disciples. When will YOU decide to become disciples?”

He then dismissed service until next week.

Following in the footsteps of Jesus Christ should be more than just talk. It ought to be a lifestyle that others around you can love about you and share in.

Link: http://the-wopr.newsvine.com/_news/2013/09/19/20572264-church-members-mistreat-homeless-man-in-church-unaware-it-is-their-pastor-in-disguise

Baby Boomers: Egocentric Comes With A Price

By Yvonne Roberts. Published by The Guardian on 29 June 2013.

To some, it must have been a very long time coming but here it is at last. That smug, gold-plated, bloated slice of the population whose main preoccupation appears to be, on the one hand, continually bragging about their unique birthright of rock'n'roll, flower power, feminism and the sexual revolution while on the other grabbing jobs, income and bread from the mouths of their young, are running into trouble.

As newspaper headlines told us last week: "Baby boomers face a lonely future." According to Who Will Love Me When I'm 64?, a report published by the relationship charity Relate and the New Philanthropy Capital consultancy, the over-50s, unsurprisingly, rate health, financial security and strong relationships soundly – but many are ill prepared for the significant transitions that ageing brings. These include retirement, loss of income, loss of status and ill health. And these changes, in turn, have an impact on spouses and friends resulting, for some, in an isolated and difficult older age.

For my generation, as we all know, counter-culture Cupid fired his arrows in a variety of directions. Among those born between 1946 and 1964, divorce flourished for the first time; cohabitation became the norm and fidelity was for many no longer seen as an essential part of a relationship. In addition, women could earn a living and pay their own way while the stigma attached to being either a divorcee or a thirtysomething spinster evaporated. The bars on the matrimonial cage were removed, and many a canary fled.

But, according to Ruth Sutherland of Relate, that also means now, in later life, baby boomers face "a looming crisis … totally overlooked by government". They may have fewer intact relationships and a thinner financial cushion on which to look for support when they become vulnerable.

According to the Relate-NPC report, while the number of divorces is falling in every age group, the number of "silver splitters" is rising. In the late 1970s, a third of marriages ended in divorce before the 50th wedding anniversary. By 2005, that had risen to more than 45% while cohabitation has an even higher rate of attrition. One in three children will see their parents separate. "Blended families" including step-relationships add to the complication. Sons and daughters, second wives, husbands and partners – all of mature years – can still behave like children when family ties turn into Chinese knots. Add to that the inevitable loss of bereavement, and for those aged over 70, in particular, even the most gregarious, will see their circle of friends shrink.

So what is to be done? Relate offers recommendations, including a minister for ageing; health checks on relationships (depends upon who is wielding the stethoscope) and greater efforts in later life to add to the circle of friends (although one Ipsos-Mori poll shows that only 4% of the over 50s rate making new friends).

What the report irritatingly fails to point out is that an attitude of mind is crucial. Predict a pessimistic "looming crisis" and it will undoubtedly happen. A minister for ageing would have no budget, no clout and no seat in cabinet. Instead of encouraging each ministerial department – housing, health, communities to consider ageing as a natural continuum of its brief – it would allow them all to continue in their Peter Pan position and park any concerns on the secretary for senior citizens' very small and wizened desk.

What the report also omits is that the baby boomers are nothing if not inventive. The plot of 50 shades of silver grey has yet to unfold. So far, that has consisted of developing every kind of device known to man to deny that ageing is even taking place. But there is more to come.

Ageing is no longer a process tied to chronological age – the 60-year-old first-time father springs to mind. But it does trigger a physical and mental change of mind that eventually impacts on even the most ardent of age-deniers as time runs out. Because the baby boomers are "the pig in the python" according to demographers – a large group of people of similar age causing a bulge in population statistics that moves through the demographic cycle – they have left an impact in each decade through which they passed by the sheer weight of their numbers and financial clout. How they meet the challenge of ageing well – with or without a partner, in or out of love – is therefore of interest to us all.

Last year, Al and Tipper Gore divorced in the US after 40 years of marriage. Forty years is no mean feat. And still time for a second go. Why do people separate after a lifetime together? The reasons are as diverse as they are well rehearsed. Once the children are gone, silence may set in and boredom creep from the closet. Or it might be a case of: "Is that all there is?" And good enough is no longer strong enough; or one partner wants adventure and the other prefers more of the same. "It's not just about what you want to do," says Penny Mansfield of the relationship charity One Plus One. "It's also about what you are scared of changing."

In his 2003 book Aging Well, George Vaillant, an American psychiatrist, drew lessons from three longitudinal studies that followed 824 people – the parents of the baby boomers – for more than 60 years. He was fascinated by why some became "sad sick" as the years progressed and others "happy well". One of the studies selected a Harvard group for their soundness of mind. Yet a third had suffered mental illness by their 50s. "They were normal when I picked them," one researcher told Vaillant, "It must have been the psychiatrists who screwed them up." Childhood isn't decisive. How you start out, Vaillant learned, is no indicator of where you will end up.

He looked at those people, male and female, who had fared well emotionally as octogenarians and saw patterns in their 50s that gave signals. They were in a stable relationship, did not smoke, drank little, exercised, had a normal weight and had the maturity to handle emotional issues well, "and make a lemon into lemonade". Comfortable in their own skins, they would not have mouthed the words of Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman: "I still feel kind of temporary about myself."

It is this "social aptitude" or emotional literacy that Vaillant discovered, not intellectual brilliance, or income or parental social class or genes that leads to successful ageing – that is being rich in well being and not alone.

Some of the wealthy in his studies died alone, prematurely and miserably just like a number of the poorest.

As you age, Vaillant advised: "Don't try to think less of yourself … try to think of yourself less." That, of course, may mean breaking the habit of a lifetime for some of the baby boomers. But it's worth a try.

Read more here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/29/baby-boomers-old-age-lonely

GE13: Malaysian BN regime retains 56-year hold on power

I love Malaysia, that's why I mourn.

The Bible & Homosexuality: Part 2

By Greg Downes. Published by Christianity Magazine in February 2013.

Link: http://www.christianitymagazine.co.uk/sexuality/gregdownes2.aspx

The issue of homosexuality and the Church is rarely out of the news.

It seems that ‘the love that dare not speak its name’ will now not keep quiet. The government’s plans to redefine marriage have dominated the news recently. However, this article is about the Bible and homosexual practice – surely the starting point before we get into any debate about ‘gay marriage’.

As I looked at today’s news, one feature was about a vicar in New Zealand who has caused offence by putting up a poster outside his church in Auckland that claims Jesus was gay. ‘It’s Christmas. Time for Jesus to come out’, the sign proclaims, with an image of baby Jesus as a toddler in a manger, surrounded by a halo coloured in the gay rainbow motif.

I remember clearly the one and only time that I met Sir Ian McKellen. It was at a set of traffic lights in Trafalgar Square. I happened to be passing by as a protest rally was ending. As we waited for the light to turn green, he turned to me and said, ‘Today will be the day when justice will be done.’ Not quite knowing what he was on about, I nodded in agreement, thinking that whatever it was sounded good. As I walked away, I realised that the rally had been a protest in favour of gay rights and later, that Wednesday 23rd February 1994 was the day the government lowered the age of consent for homosexual acts from 21 to 18.

Justice: that is what the issue of homosexuality has become for many people in our secular society. To many, to suggest homosexuality might not be the moral equivalent to heterosexuality is tantamount to racism.

These assumptions have permeated the Church, too, and there are even those from the evangelical tradition calling for a reappraisal of the traditional Christian understanding of homosexuality.

A Common Argument

A common argument we hear today is: ‘The Bible approves of slavery and the subjugation of women and the Church has moved on from these issues; surely it is consistent and logical to now champion gay rights?’

While the Bible does not repudiate slavery directly, as the book of Philemon reveals, the biblical view of humanity inevitably leads Christians to abolish slavery and find other ways to deal with debtors and prisoners of war (Philemon 1:15-16).

Likewise the Bible’s view of women, emerging from the misogyny of the prevailing cultural norms, culminates in the radical equality we see in the New Testament (Galatians 3:28).

With homosexual practice, we see no such development, nor does the Bible allow for the possibility of one. The Bible is uniformly negative about it. What’s more, unlike the issues of slavery and gender, it does not relate to a person’s God-given worth but is a prohibition against a lifestyle that is chosen (even though same-sex attraction is clearly not).

In October’s edition of Evangelicals Now, the rector of St Ebbe’s Church, Oxford, Vaughan Roberts, gave an interview entitled ‘A Battle I Face’ in which he spoke about his own struggle with unwanted same-sex attraction and his decision to be celibate. He was asked whether giving pastoral counsel to those who themselves struggled with same-sex attraction had affected his decision to be more open. ‘Certainly,’ he said. ‘I pray for them every Monday from a list that is divided in two: Those who continue to seek to be faithful to the Bible’s teaching that the only right context for sexual intercourse is in a marriage between a man and a woman and those who have moved away from that view. Sadly, the second group is growing.’

It is no surprise that the numbers are growing as we live in times where there is a theological paradigm shift happening in the Church on the issue. It is more than a coincidence that this theological shift is mirroring a massive cultural shift in society at large, where in the space of one generation attitudes to homosexuality have gone from prohibition to tolerance, and now to celebration.

What’s more, the relativist society in which we live ensures that there is an absolutism in this new sexual ethic, one in which there is very little tolerance for any dissenting voices. So how do we know what is true when there are conflicting voices from people who command our respect within the evangelical constituency?

The American Methodist scholar Albert C Outler examined John Wesley’s work and recognised that while Wesley (1703-1791) believed in the primacy of scripture, he also used tradition, reason and experience in discerning truth. 

While looking primarily at scripture, we will utilise the ‘Wesleyan quadrilateral’ to wrestle with this thorny issue.

Scripture

Many of the voices calling for a reappraisal of the Church’s historic teaching are revisionists. Revisionism is distinct from liberalism in that old-fashioned liberalism (in essence) argued ‘the Bible says this – the Bible is wrong’. Revisionism (in essence) argues ‘properly understood– the Bible says this’.

I remember talking with a theology student who told me confidently, ‘Nowhere in the Bible does it say that homosexual practice is wrong.’ This is the bold assertion of a revisionist. But is this new hermeneutic (interpretation) warranted?

There are 12 references to homosexuality in the Bible (nine in the OT, three in the NT).

Five of the OT references refer to homosexuality in the context of cult prostitution (Deuteronomy 23:17-18; 1 Kings 14:23-24, 15:12-15, 22:46; 2 Kings 23:6-8).

We will consider the remaining seven thematically in three distinct groups:

1. The Lifestyle of Unbelievers Outside of the Law (Genesis 19:5; Judges 19:22)

Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 19:5) has an obvious parallel with the story of Gibeah (Judges 19:22) so we will consider them together.

In 1955, Derrick Sherwin Bailey became the first theologian in modern times to re-evaluate the traditional orthodox view in his book Homosexuality and the Western Christian Tradition. He suggested that the sin of Sodom (and Gibeah) was in fact a breach of hospitality and not homosexuality. He argued that the demands of the men of Sodom regarding Lot’s guests – ‘Bring them out so that we might know them’ – was in fact not sexual but flouted the ancient rules of hospitality.

This is not good exegesis for a number of reasons; for one, Lot’s gratuitous offer of women instead indicates it was sexual. Also the Hebrew word for know (yada), used 943 times in the OT, can refer to sexual intercourse, and of the ten occasions it does, six of these are in the book of Genesis.

Perhaps the most convincing argument is the NT interpreting the OT, as Jude 7 teaches that ‘Sodom and Gomorrah…gave themselves up to sexual immorality’.

2. The Lifestyle of Believers Under the Law (Leviticus 18:22; 20:13)

‘Do not have sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman; that is detestable’ (Leviticus 18:22) has been seen as a classic verse clearly prohibiting homosexual activity.

A new Bible translation, the Queen James Bible claiming to be the world’s first gay Bible, has been published (in the words of the editors) ‘to resolve interpretive ambiguity in the Bible…in a way that makes homophobic interpretations impossible’

When it comes to the Leviticus texts, the Queen James Bible translates Leviticus 18:22 as ‘Thou shalt not lie with mankind as with womankind in the temple of Molech: it is an abomination.’

The problem is, the translators have achieved this lucidity by changing the very text of scripture, by conflating the verse with the previous one (Leviticus 18:21) which is a condemnation of the practice of child sacrifice in the temple of Molech.

They were, in fact, part of the holiness code prescribing how God’s covenant people were to conduct themselves in distinction to the surrounding nations. This flagrant distortion and twisting of scripture in an attempt to make the text say what it patently does not will fail to convince anyone committed to the authority of the Bible.  

Another way of circumventing these verses it to suggest that they no longer apply in the new covenant. I chatted to a well-known OT scholar once, who stated, ‘There will come a day when evangelical Christians have to repent of their attitude to homosexuality; it is no more sinful than wearing polycotton shirts.’

He was pointing out that the Levitical prohibitions against homosexuality are part of the same law code which condemns many things, such as the eating of pork and the wearing of garments that are woven with two kinds of material.

These Levitical rules no longer apply in the new covenant, it is argued.

The Reformation theologian John Calvin (1509-1564) rightly distinguished between the ritual and moral law, arguing that though the ritual law is fulfilled in Christ (and therefore abolished), the moral law still applies. If there is any doubt that this is the case, it is further evidenced by the fact that the prohibition against homosexuality resurfaces in the new covenant (NT), and is articulated in three new separate prohibitions. While the NT makes it clear that the ritual requirements of the law are now superseded in Christ (Acts 10:9-15), the moral law remains intact, and in fact is reiterated forcibly.

3. The Lifestyle of Believers in Christ and Under Grace (1 Timothy 1:8-10; 1 Corinthians 6:9-10; Romans 1:26-27)

There are three Pauline prohibitions in which the apostle argues that homosexual practice is incompatible with Christian discipleship. In 1 Timothy 1:8-10 ‘practising homosexuality’ is one example among many of the lifestyle of those who break the law of God. The Greek word that is used is arsenokoites, which literally means ‘male in a bed’ and (as the linguistic connotation infers) refers to a person who engages in homosexual sex – particularly the active partner.

In 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 Paul includes those who practice the homosexual lifestyle among those who will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Here there are two words for homosexuality used, the same one as in the Timothy passage, but also the word malakoi which literally means ‘soft to the touch’, and refers to the passive partner in homosexual sex.

There are some who argue that these verses clearly speak of pederasty (the practice of keeping a catamite – a boy kept for sexual relations with a man), and therefore have nothing to say concerning the current debate as to whether consensual, monogamous gay relationships are an acceptable Christian option. The fact is, this is not clear – especially with reference to the Timothy passage, which uses a singular word to describe homosexual activity and is therefore unlikely to refer to this practice.

What is clear from the graphic words used is that what is being prohibited here are actions – homosexual  behaviour not orientation.

In Romans 1:25-27, Paul writes:

‘They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshipped and served created things rather than the Creator – who is forever praised. Amen. Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones.  In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.’

The context is non-believers in general and the vocabulary used does not lend itself to referring to pederasty (as some have argued 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 does)

This also is the only passage which seems to expressly prohibit lesbianism. Surely, then, this is a blanket prohibition of homosexual practice of any kind for all God’s people? Not so fast, argue the revisionist exegetes.

Since the passage states women ‘exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones’ and men ‘abandoned natural relations with women’, does it refer to something else?

Some have interpreted this as a condemnation of perversion rather than inversion. Perversion is where a heterosexual chooses to experiment sexually with their own gender, but inversion is where a person has a homosexual orientation that he or she cannot help – that is innate to them. This interpretation is mistaken, as the Bible authors knew nothing of the modern distinction between homosexual orientation and practice.

The historian Michel Foucault argued that homosexuality as an identity did not emerge until 1870 – before that, the terminology referred to practices alone and not identity.

We have already noted that for Paul it is the behaviour that is prohibited, so any mention of men ‘abandoning natural relations’ cannot refer to heterosexuals going against their natural orientation – but rather that the practice of homosexuality contravenes natural law; it is not how the creator intended us to live.

The sobering fact is that out of all the Bible references to homosexuality, every one is negative regarding its practice.

The Big Picture

John Stott said that the most convincing argument, however, is not these sets of verses to be used in a proof text manner, but rather the single affirmation of heterosexual marriage to be found in Genesis 2:24 – ‘That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh.’

It is sometimes said that Jesus said nothing about homosexuality (as if this cancels out all the other verses), but Jesus squarely condemned sexual immorality in general (Mark 7:20-23) and quotes the Genesis 2:24 verse in his teaching as an expression of his Father’s will in creation (Matthew 19:5; Mark 10:7)

Further to this, the whole sweep of scripture is, without exception or deviation, a heterosexual narrative from the creation of Adam and Eve, through the poetic affirmation of heterosexual love in the Song of Songs, right up to the finale of the book, when Revelation concludes using a heterosexual metaphor to speak of the return of Christ (Revelation 22:17).

Those who try to argue that the intimate relationship of David and Jonathan was homoerotic simply fail to understand the Jewish cultural context, and retroactively visit the assumptions of our own highly sexualised culture on the text, in an attempt to make the Bible say what it does not.

Those who say the Bible does not teach homosexual practice is wrong are simply engaging in hermeneutical gymnastics, in which they embrace a revisionist interpretation which is completely alien to the original meaning of the text.

Since the scriptures are crystal clear on the issue, my fear is that any shift to embrace this new interpretation is nothing short of a denial of the authority of the Bible itself.

Tradition

It is important to remember that we stand in a spiritual tradition that is 2,000 years old, and longer if we include our Jewish heritage. We stand on the shoulders of giants – men and women who have been theologians, pastors, prophets, apostles, mystics, teachers, evangelists and writers. When seeking to ascertain if something is true, we need to ask ourselves, ‘Is there an unbroken tradition which seems to argue in a particular way?’

Applying this to the issue of homosexuality, there is a near-unanimous tradition that the only two possible Christian vocations with regard to our sexuality are marriage and celibacy. Added to this, there has been a remarkable ecclesial consensus on the issue.

The three great traditions of the global Church (Eastern Orthodoxy, Roman Catholicism and Protestantism), though they diverge on many things, agree on this. 

Surely we would need very compelling reasons to come up with a new hermeneutic that is at variance with this ecumenical consensus and also the ‘silent majority’ (as GK Chesterton would say) of so many brothers and sisters who have gone before.

Reason

One of the reasons Roman Catholics oppose a revision of the historic teaching of the Church is that they believe homosexual acts contravene natural law.

The great Western theologian Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) expounded on natural law in his Summa Theologica. He wrote: ‘…all things partake somewhat of the eternal law, in so far as…its being imprinted on them, they derive their respective inclinations to their proper acts and ends.’

In other words, for Thomas, natural law was closely aligned to divine law; or, put another way, theology and biology belong together – we can get an inkling of the creator’s intension for a thing by assessing how it was created to function. This is the idea that freedom is rooted in design; a thing is most free when it is functioning as it was designed to function.

We can reason that homosexual practice is not the creator’s original design, since male and female are anatomically and biologically made to complement one another.

Experience

The 1998 Lambeth Conference for the Anglican Communion affirmed the Church’s historic teaching. It also stated, ‘We commit ourselves to listen to the experience of homosexual persons.’ It is important in the current debate that we engage lovingly with those with whom we disagree, and listen attentively – especially to those who are working out what it means to be a disciple of Christ and have same-sex attraction.

There are many voices in the current debate that speak about the pain and rejection gay people have experienced through the Church. There is no doubt that genuine homophobia does occur, and evangelicals perhaps have been guiltier than most at perpetuating it. Where there has been homophobia we need to repent. It is vital that the Church is true to its biblical DNA in being an inclusive and redeeming community.

We need to remember that homosexual practice is no worse than other sins, and given the standards of heterosexual holiness in today’s Church, beware of jumping to hypocritical judgement.

One concern is that many of the vocal comments in today’s Church on the issue are from Christians who have embraced the gay lifestyle and are very much advocating a change of theology.

There are many Christians who struggle with same-sex attraction who have embraced another path – the counter-cultural and costly teaching of the Bible, and perhaps for obvious reasons, choose, by and large, to remain anonymous.

They too have a story to tell, and often it is one of discovering that applying the teaching of scripture to their lives has become Good News to them. This is not to say it has been without pain and sacrifice, but in the midst of this, they have come to discover a redemptive gift. We need to salute these brothers and sisters as the courageous overcomers they are, and examples to all of us of sacrificial obedience.

Most of my ministry I have worked with students and on several occasions have had individuals confide in me pastorally about their struggle with same-sex attraction. I share the testimony of two of them (not their real names):

‘The celibate life – although with its challenges – can be a very “royal” one of depth and fulfilment. I wish this was mentioned much more often: celibacy is no “option two”. Beyond the issue of sexual orientation, it’s a lifestyle worth living, expressing oneself in creative and pastoral skills. The life of prayer that I have been offered by the Lord shows to me, in profound ways, that in Christ I can own the world and may make the world his own.’ John

‘During my teens I experienced same-sex attraction, and for periods of time felt that I was destined to be homosexual. Nobody really talks about that stuff, until they have experimented and made a final decision to embrace what they thought was the only option – come out as “gay”. But I ended up speaking about it to a chaplain who carefully guided me through the options, and what he felt the Bible taught. As I looked at the issue myself, I recognised that the traditional biblical view pointed to same-sex practice as wrong, and less than God’s best for my life. I made a tough decision not to pursue that lifestyle, and I’m so hugely thankful that I did. ‘I’m now married to a beautiful woman who sharpens, challenges and inspires me, and we have amazing children who I totally adore – to think that they would not exist if I hadn’t made that choice is unthinkable. I’ve now experienced a considerable change in sexual orientation through prayer, discussion and decision, and feel so incredibly blessed by the life I am living.’ Dave

I conclude with a testimony from one of my close friends. I’ve known James for over 20 years, after he became a follower of Jesus while we were at university together. He came to accept the orthodox Christian perspective not because he was convinced by scripture, tradition or reason, but by experience. His experience, like that of John and Dave, is that embracing the truth, while not without cost, has set him free.

‘I was a man who was perfectly content with being gay – and a vehement gay activist at that. I was also wholly faithful to my long-term male partner. However, it was while attending a well-known London evangelical church that I came into a deep personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Soon enough, my ex-boyfriend came to Christ, and he and I, as well as being lovers to each other, became lovers of daily prayer and of God’s word.

‘I had spent my entire adult life affirming others in their gay identity. Imagine therefore what happened when, some time later, after a dozen or so appointments with a good but pretty regular therapist, and some incredibly accurate and powerful sessions of healing prayer, I rapidly began to find resolution around areas of my past where I had become stuck and my “fixed, always felt gay” identity began to unravel.

‘In brief, I came to discover that God’s word, which I had learnt to interpret as pro-homosexual practice, was the opposite. God doesn’t judge anyone’s same-sex attraction. I have come to learn, however, that it is not the way he has created us to be. I meet people nearly every day who are leaving behind the gay lifestyle and embracing Christ, not sexual attraction, as their true identity. [Now], 15 years on, I’m married and a dad, and my ex…a great man, is dead. I believed I was living a fulfilling and happy life as a (so-called) gay man. I now live a wholly amazing and much more deeply contented one having…matured into a fuller expression of what I stumbled across “by accident”…my…true sexual identity.

‘Many of us are discovering God’s word as interpreted over the centuries to be true, even in the face of incredible hostility from society and, more sadly, from other Christians.’

Greg Downes is Christianity magazine’s theologian in residence and director of the Centre for Missional Leadership: http://www.cml.uk.net/ 

For a further resource that reflects the traditional evangelical stance, go to: 

www.eauk.org/church/resources/theological-articles/resources-for-church-leaders-biblical-and-pastoral-responses-to-homosexuality.cfm

UK Same Sex Marriage Policy: Ministers Are Barking Up The Wrong Tree

Published by BBC News on 26 December 2012.

Sir Paul Coleridge told the Times same-sex unions are a "minority issue". His comments come after the Roman Catholic Church's leader in England and Wales denounced the plans.

Archbishop of Westminster Vincent Nichols told the BBC the government had no mandate to push through same-sex marriage laws in England and Wales. And in his Christmas Eve sermon he said that marriage between men and women shares in "the creative love of God".

Sir Paul told the Times newspaper: "So much energy and time has been put into this debate for 0.1% of the population, when we have a crisis of family breakdown. While it is gratifying that marriage in any context is centre stage... but it [gay marriage] is a minority issue. We need... a more focused position by the government on the importance of marriage." Sir Paul last year launched independent charity Marriage Foundation to support married couples but said the charity did not take a stance on gay marriage. He added the breakdown of marriages and its impact on society affects 99.9% of the population, which is where more investment and time should spent.

'Strongest attack'

During his BBC interview, Archbishop Nichols said of the gay marriage plans: "There was no announcement in any party manifesto, no Green Paper, no statement in the Queen's Speech. And yet here we are on the verge of primary legislation. From a democratic point-of-view, it's a shambles. George Orwell would be proud of that manoeuvre, I think the process is shambolic." He claims during a "period of listening", those who responded were "7-1 against same-sex marriage".

BBC religious affairs correspondent Robert Pigott said this was Archbishop Nichols's strongest attack yet on the government's plans for gay marriage.

In the past, the head of the Roman Catholic Church in England and Wales has likened committed gay relationships to "profound friendships". Pope Benedict XVI reiterated his opposition to gay marriage last week in a pre-Christmas address, saying it was destroying the very "essence of the human creature". "People dispute the idea that they have a nature, given to them by their bodily identity, that serves as a defining element of the human being. They deny their nature and decide that it is not something previously given to them, but that they make it for themselves."

The UK government has previously announced that the Church of England and Church in Wales will be banned in law from offering same-sex marriages, with other religious organisations able to "opt in" to holding ceremonies. The government plans to allow gay marriage but says it will not force religious bodies to perform services.

Link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-20842884

Related report:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-20840531

Archbishop of Westminster Vincent Nichols told the BBC the government had no mandate to push through same-sex marriage laws in England and Wales. And in his Christmas Eve sermon he said that marriage between men and women shares in "the creative love of God"...

Meanwhile, the outgoing Archbishop of Canterbury, in his final Christmas sermon in the role, admitted that the Church of England's credibility had been damaged by the recent vote against women bishops...

Speaking in his sermon at Westminster Cathedral, Archbishop Nichols said "the love of husband and wife, which is creative of new human life, is a marvellously personal sharing in the creative love of God who brings into being the eternal soul that comes to every human being with the gift of human life".

He added: "Sometimes sexual expression can be without the public bond of the faithfulness of marriage and its ordering to new life. Even governments mistakenly promote such patterns of sexual intimacy as objectively to be approved and even encouraged among the young."

Why C.S. Lewis Was Wrong on Marriage (and J.R.R. Tolkien Was Right)

Posted by Christianity Today on 5 December 2012.

You won't find a more apt example of an excerpt that is contradictory to an author's broader writings than this bit from C.S. Lewis' Mere Christianity:

Before leaving the question of divorce, I should like to distinguish two things which are very often confused. The Christian conception of marriage is one: the other is quite the different question—how far Christians, if they are voters or Members of Parliament, ought to try to force their views of marriage on the rest of the community by embodying them in the divorce laws. A great many people seem to think that if you are a Christian yourself you should try to make divorce difficult for every one. I do not think that. At least I know I should be very angry if the Mohammedans tried to prevent the rest of us from drinking wine. My own view is that the Churches should frankly recognize that the majority of the British people are not Christian and, therefore, cannot be expected to live Christian lives. There ought to be two distinct kinds of marriage: one governed by the State with rules enforced on all citizens, the other governed by the church with rules enforced by her on her own members. The distinction ought to be quite sharp, so that a man knows which couples are married in a Christian sense and which are not.

This argument provoked a strong response from Lewis' friend and fellow Inkling, J.R.R. Tolkien. Tolkien drafted a response to Lewis sometime in 1943 but never sent it. After Tolkien died, the letter was found folded up inside his copy of Lewis' "Christian Behavior,"which would be republished as part of Mere Christianity. (I've added the emphasis.)

My dear L.,

I have been reading your booklet 'Christian Behavior." I have never felt happy about your view of Christian "policy" with regard to divorce. …

[Y]ou observe that you are really committed (with the Christian Church as a whole) to the view that Christian marriage—monogamous, permanent, rigidly "faithful"—is in fact the truth about sexual behavior for all humanity: this is the only road of total health (including sex in its proper place) for all men and women. That it is dissonant with men's present sex-psychology does not disprove this, as you see: "I think it is the instinct that has gone wrong," you say. Indeed if this were not so, it would be an intolerable injustice to impose permanent monogamy even on Christians. If Christian marriage were in the last analysis "unnatural" (of the same type as say the prohibition of flesh-meat in certain monastic rules) it could only be imposed on a special "chastity-order" of the Church, not on the universal Church. No item of compulsory Christian morals is valid only for Christians. … I do not think you can possibly support your "policy," by this argument, for by it you are giving away the very foundation of Christian marriage. The foundation is that this is the correct way of "running the human machine." Your argument reduces it merely to a way of (perhaps?) getting an extra mileage out of a few selected machines.

The horror of the Christians with whom you disagree (the great majority of all practicing Christians) at legal divorce is in the ultimate analysis precisely that: horror at seeing good machines ruined by misuse. I could that, if you ever get a chance of alterations, you would make the point clear. Toleration of divorce—if a Christian does tolerate it—is toleration of a human abuse, which it requires special local and temporary circumstances to justify (as does the toleration of usury)—if indeed either divorce or genuine usury should be tolerated at all, as a matter of expedient policy.

Under your limitations of space you have not, of course, had opportunity to elaborate your "policy"—toleration of abuse. … A Christian of your view is, as we have seen, committed to the belief that all people who practice "divorce"—certainly divorce as it is now legalized—are misusing the human machine (whatever philosophical defense they may put up), as certainly as men who get drunk (doubtless with a philosophic defense also). They are injuring themselves, other people, and society, by their behavior. And wrong behavior (if it is really wrong on universal principles) is progressive, always: it never stops at being "not very good," "second best"—it either reforms, or goes on to third-rate, bad, abominable.

The last Christian marriage I attended was held under your system: the bridal pair were "married" twice. They married one another before the Church's witness (a priest), using one set of formulas, and making a vow of lifelong fidelity (and the woman of obedience); they then married again before the State's witness… using another set of formulas and making no vow of fidelity or obedience. I felt it was an abominable proceeding—and also ridiculous, since the first set of formulas and vows included the latter as the lesser. In fact it was only not ridiculous on the assumption that the State was in fact saying by implication: I do not recognize the existence of your church; you may have taken certain vows in your meeting place but they are just foolishness, private taboos, a burden you take on yourself: a limited and impermanent contract is all that is really necessary for citizens. In other words this "sharp division" is a piece of propaganda, a counter-homily delivered to young Christians fresh from the solemn words of the Christian minister.

Tolkien understood the stakes. The debate strikes at the heart of what it means to confess that the Christian faith is "true." As Tolkien wrote, no article of Christian morality is intended exclusively for Christians. Rather, the faith teaches us that submitting to the laws of our creator is the surest way to live reconciled lives with his creation. This is what we ought to mean when we say Christianity is true. We don't simply mean that it provides factually accurate information about the world or that it offers an authentic path to spiritual fulfillment for those who choose to follow it. We mean that Christianity gives an accurate accounting of the world in its fullness and that it instructs us in how we ought to relate to the world.

In writing to Lewis on these matters Tolkien would have been preaching to the choir. Which is precisely what makes this oft-quoted section of Mere Christianity so baffling. If it came from any other pen, the natural thing would be to point out that the presuppositions behind the author's analogy are faulty. The argument simply assumes that religious dogma is strictly personal and, therefore, ultimately relative. You have your practices and I have mine. In this view, religious teachings are not a true description of how to live well and justly in the world, they are just a set of suggested behaviors that followers of a religion should consider practicing. There is no necessary connection between a religious command and human flourishing. This is simply the modern view of religion: Religion consists of private devotional beliefs and (empty) public ritual.

Of course, there was no greater debunker of that entire system of thought than C.S. Lewis. To read him is to come face-to-face with a man who, according to one friend, was "the most thoroughly converted man I ever knew." Few people wrestled with the absolute, pervasive nature of Christ's lordship more capably and intelligently than Lewis.

Consider the social critique in That Hideous Strength as one example of this "thoroughly converted" mind. In that book, Lewis is not merely defending an article of faith or a specific political platform. He's defending an entire orientation toward the world. To borrow a phrase used by Doug Wilson to describe his debates with Christopher Hitchens, the conflict between St. Anne's and the NICE in Lewis' novel is not an academic exchange of mutually exclusive beliefs. It is a collision of lives and worlds. The world of St. Anne's is for Christianity. The NICE is for applied science, modernity, and industrialization.

St. Anne's Christianity is worth describing in more detail: The home is defined by an integrated way of life directed toward creational flourishing. Some of the less appreciated aspects of this life will be recognizable to many younger evangelicals with broader social interests. St. Anne's is an agrarian home where they grow most of their own food, where animals come and go as they please, and where the boundaries between "mine" and "yours" are quite a bit fuzzier than they are in our own experience. It's a place where the land is valued as such and is not buried under the growing burden of human abuse. If it calls to mind scenes from Wendell Berry's Port William, you are on the right track. In all these ways, That Hideous Strength is extremely friendly to those of us concerned by the abuses of creation perpetrated by industrialization.

But we mustn't stop there in our analysis of Lewis' social imagination. If we reduce Lewis' critique to ecology, we have missed his point. Lewis' ecological views flow out of something more basic and essential. What Lewis is describing is an orientation toward the world. As such, it encompasses an ethic toward the land, but it is not limited to that.

To discover the bedrock of the book's social vision, one need look no further than the book's first word: "Matrimony." At its roots, That Hideous Strength is a book about marriage. The book begins with Jane Studdock contemplating the love poems of John Donne. The story ends with a chapter titled "Venus at St. Anne's." In that chapter, nearly every major character is paired off, including Ransom, who returns to the planet Venus. More on that shortly. Significantly, Mark and Jane are finally reunited, this time sans contraception with the expectation that their child will be the Pendragon, the one who saves England.

And if you scratch a little deeper, you find that this book actually dovetails marvelously with the planetary themes of Lewis' work discussed so marvelously in Michael Ward's Planet Narnia. St. Anne's, by the book's end, has come to represent the alliance of Venus and Jupiter. In fact, it isn't even that subtle. Jupiter's viceregent, Ransom, is whisked off to Venus. And that is not coincidental. Lewis didn't choose Venus based on whim. Venus, in Lewis' work, denotes beauty and fertility. Jove, meanwhile, signifies a secure and satisfied kingly joy. Their union signifies creation at its apex, as the beauty and fertility of creation (Venus) is brought under the wise, joyful lordship of its creator king (Jupiter). If you remove marriage, you are removing the beauty and the joviality that animate all of St. Anne's. If you lose the larger worldview implied by marriage's design, you lose the entire social vision of That Hideous Strength.

This brings us back to the oddness of Lewis' concession in Mere Christianity. Certain aspects of the Christianity articulated at St. Anne's are very much en vogue right now. Evangelical Christians are talking about how to build deeper ties to our local communities by shopping local. We're attempting to respect and sustain creation by being less wasteful with our resources. Some of us have a renewed interest in agrarian communities.

We've had many conversations at my church, a broadly reformed evangelical college-aged congregation, about these sorts of issues. My pastor and I recently attended the Prairie Festival at The Land Institute. At Grace, we're trying to articulate a broadly Christian social imagination that encompasses all of life. And we aren't alone in that pursuit. The growing number of evangelical publishers releasing books dealing with Christianity and ecology suggest a broader trend. So far as they go, these are all desires and ambitions that Lewis and Tolkien would warmly commend.

But Lewis—in the majority of his work—and Tolkien would say we must look more closely at the underpinnings of our social ethic. The dominant metaphor for all those commendable activities described above is that of marriage. The ecological, communal, and creational (a far superior word to "environmental") goals are all understood through the metaphor of marriage, by which we mean a permanent, communally recognized, community-sanctioned relationship characterized by affection and fertility. That's the best description you'll find for Lewis' ethic toward the land, but it flows out of his ethic of sexuality. In much of his writing, and especially in That Hideous Strength, that is quite clear. So understood, we can now see that Tolkien's letter is simply Tolkien's attempt to help his friend see that his concession in Mere Christianity actually undermines his larger social vision. That's why Tolkien pushes so hard in the letter above. In staking out his odd position on divorce, Lewis was giving away much more than a single law on the books of a single nation. Rather, he was giving away the metaphor that shapes all elements of the Christian worldview.

On a note more relevant to contemporary evangelicals, this is why we need to be crystal clear on what the defining themes of our social vision actually are. Matt is fond of saying that the problem with the culture war for evangelicals wasn't necessarily the "war" part, but the "culture" part. We were defending certain values in the absence of a culture that can sustain those values. Now younger evangelicals are reacting against that and are attempting to develop a robustly Christian social ethic that holds all of creation accountable to the claims of Christ. It's an undeniably positive and most welcome development.

However, it is important to understand that evangelical commitments to both the pro-life cause and the preservation of traditional marriage are not contrary to those broader counter-cultural concerns. Rather, they fit into that social agenda quite neatly. More than that, if Lewis and Tolkien are correct, the heart of that social vision is not an ethic of the land or economics or sustainability. It's marriage, understood as both the private union of a man and woman and the larger social vision implied by the imagery of marriage; of a community united together in formally-recognized union and relating to one another in an affectionate, fertile way. Such an ethic is good for all areas of life, but it is premised on a certain understanding of marriage. And if we move away from that, we're moving away from far more than sexual norms.

Jake Meador blogs at Notes From a Small Place. This article first appeared at Mere Orthodoxy and is reprinted with permission of the author.

Love Scam Syndicates

Published by The StarOnline on 4 December 2012.

Love scam syndicate members are trained in the art of sweet-talking potential victims into parting with their cash in the name of love. They select their targets, especially lonely women, and flirt with them online for several months before conning them.

Federal CyberSecurity and Multimedia Investigation Division director Asst Comm Mohd Kamaruddin Din said these syndicates would train new recruits on how to ensure victims fall in love with them. “These syndicates comprise mostly African students who recruit members from their homeland to enter Malaysia with the promise of easy money. These recruits speak fluent English and are trained for about a week or two on how to make their victims fall in love with them in just a few months,” he said.

Link:
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2012/12/4/nation/20121204071530&sec=nation

Related report:
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2012/12/4/nation/20121204071448&sec=nation

She had not met him in person but she was willing to give him RM1mil after he told her sob stories about being in financial difficulties. Sarah (not her real name) met John Smith, who claimed to be an offshore engineer in Terengganu, online. Both hit it off right from the start.

Months later, John claimed he was in financial difficulties. His family's construction business in Texas was not doing well due to the global economic slowdown and his company in Malaysia was downsizing. Being “in love”, Sarah, 40, agreed to help him by wiring more than RM400,000 to an account which he claimed was in his mother's name.

Call for ban on disability abortions after Paralympics

By John Bingham. Published by The Telegraph on 19 September 2012.

The success of the Paralympics should trigger a rethink of Britain’s abortion laws to make it illegal to terminate a pregnancy because a child will be born disabled, a coalition of campaigners and charities argues today. An alliance of pro-life campaigners and religious groups is launching a new push to restrict the 1967 Abortion Act, to prevent doctors terminating pregnancies on the grounds of physical abnormality.

In a letter to The Daily Telegraph, they describe the practice of aborting foetuses on physical grounds as a form of “eugenics”. The letter, signed by leading figures from groups such as Life and the Pro-Life Alliance, as well as the Catholic Bishops Conference of Scotland and a number of evangelical Christian groups, argues that the current law enshrines a form of disability discrimination.

Also among the nine signatories is Peter Elliott, a businessman who founded the Down Syndrome Research Foundation UK, after the birth of his son, David, in 1985. The signatories say that while pregnancies can be terminated even up to 40 weeks on physical grounds in certain circumstances, the moment the child is born a “moral volte-face” is performed and the official approach is “full of compassion”.

“The recent Paralympics made this contradiction yet more glaring,” the letter says. “The athletes produced such astonishing examples of courage and triumphs over disability that we now have to rethink what we mean by ‘disabled’ and ‘able’.”

The 1967 abortion act, as it is currently applied, allows terminations up to 24 weeks if two doctors agree that the physical or mental health of a pregnant woman is in jeopardy. After that, however, abortion is possible in cases in which there is a “substantial risk” that the child will suffer from a “serious handicap”. It is also permitted in cases where the life of the mother is judged to be at risk from the continuation of the pregnancy.

The most recent figures available show that there were 146 abortions after the 24-week limit in 2011 in England and Wales out of a total of almost 190,000. But overall there were more than 500 abortions after screening for Down’s Syndrome. The campaigners argue that this amounts to a form of eugenics – the belief that a society can be “improved” through controlled breeding to increase the occurrences of desirable characteristics.

But supporters of abortion reacted with anger saying that the term – with its Nazi connotations – was an “insult” to women who had faced agonising choices.

“Eugenic abortion is bad medicine,” the letter states. “Killing people with disabilities, rather than striving to support and care for them, is contrary to the high principles of medicine.” They insist that the “positive and civilised” approach is exemplified by the work of baby hospices and greater research into fetal conditions rather than allowing terminations.

Prof Jack Scarisbrick, founder of the anti-abortion group Life, said that the group is hoping to mobilise pro-life MPs to bring forward a private members bill in the Commons to amend the act. A simple two-clause bill could make it illegal to terminate a pregnancy after screening for conditions such as Down’s syndrome, he said. “We are very hopeful that now we can make a move from a new direction, that rather than focusing on weeks and grounds for abortion we can tackle this particular aspect which we believe we can win.

“That would send a wonderful signal across the world.”

But Darinka Aleksic, campaigns coordinator at the Abortion Rights group, said: “Every year about one per cent of abortions are carried out on the grounds of fetal abnormality. “A diagnosis of this sort places families in an extremely painful and difficult situation, which requires privacy and support as they decide whether to continue with the pregnancy.

“We believe that the decision is a matter for the parents and their doctors alone. It should not be used as a political football. “Using terms like 'eugenic abortion' is an insult to people who are faced with this difficult choice. “Pro-choice supporters respect the rights of all women, including those with disabilities, to make their own reproductive choices. We believe women are best placed to make the right decision for themselves and their families."

A Department of Health spokesman said: "There are some circumstances where the law permits an abortion beyond 24 weeks - for example where there is a substantial risk of serious physical or mental handicap. "This decision is not taken lightly. Two doctors must agree on the seriousness of the handicap, while also taking into account the facts and circumstances of each individual case.

"The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists' guideline on abortion and foetal abnormality is clear that a woman needs sufficient information and time to help her understand the nature of the foetal abnormality and the probable outcome of the pregnancy so that she is able to make an informed decision about the options available to her."

Read more:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/9551305/Call-for-ban-on-disability-abortions-after-Paralympics.html

http://davidalton.net/2012/09/19/new-calls-to-end-eugenic-abortions-in-the-week-a-judge-handed-down-a-sentence-of-8-years-for-the-death-of-an-unborn-child/

In the same week that a  Judge handed down a sentence of eight years to a woman who killed her unborn baby at 39 weeks gestation, calls have been made to end eugenic abortions in Britain. There is a link between these two stories because if the convicted mother had been able to claim that her baby had a disability – such as cleft palate or Down’s Syndrome – she would legally have been able to kill the baby right up and even during its birth.

There is also a link, as the article below points out, between our celebration of the achievements of people with disabilities and our discriminatory abortion laws which single out babies with disabilities for “special” treatment – that is, their death. This is cold blooded eugenics – for which no sentence of years in jail is handed down to those who legislated to make it legal or those who end these babies lives.

More British women aborting their children over financial worries, say UK doctors

BY HILARY WHITE, 

ROME CORRESPONDENT.

http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/more-british-women-aborting-their-children-over-financial-worries-say-uk-do

LONDON, August 14, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A survey by a market research firm has found that the global economic crisis may be influencing more British women to abort their children. The research by Insight Research Group found that about one-fifth of GPs are reporting more women requesting abortion for financial concerns.

Seventeen percent of GPs surveyed felt there was an increase in patients who “were specifically requesting terminations due to financial concerns.” Fifty-four percent of those GPs said they believed the biggest increase was among women ages 26-35. Another twenty-three percent believed the biggest increase was among single women with no previous children, while twenty-one percent said they believed it was among single women living with a “partner” with 1 to 3 previous children.

Thirty-four percent of all the GPs surveyed said that they are seeing women putting off having children “until their financial security improved.”

The findings echo those of Russian demographers who fear that recent gains in the country’s abysmally low fertility rate will be lost as more women turn to abortion to ease financial worries http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/international-life-and-family-roundup1 . 

Although pro-life observers say that they have no argument with the study’s findings, they question the reaction of GPs who endorse abortion for financial reasons.

Anthony Ozimic, the communications manager for the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, said that for authority figures like doctors to affirm with their actions that an abortion is an acceptable solution to financial anxiety sends a profoundly negative message to the culture at large.

“Whatever the merits or otherwise of this study, Western society will continue in its moral and demographic declines as long as the message goes out that women should abort their children or significantly postpone conceiving because of financial concerns,” Ozimic said.

The UK should follow the lead of other EU countries who are offering financial, tax and other incentives to increase the financial security of families and encourage couples to marry earlier and have children, Ozimic said. Instead, the myth is being promulgated that there is such a thing as a “perfect” economic condition in which to have children, when the reality is that such conditions will not exist while the European fertility rate continues to decline.

“While prudence in planning a family is necessary, optimal economic conditions for raising children are illusory.”

Ozimic confirmed that the law does not technically allow for abortions for financial or “social” reasons, but said that doctors have been granted enormous latitude in deciding what factors in a woman’s life constitute a threat to her “mental health”.

This is acknowledged even by the courts to be the case, despite voluminous research demonstrating that abortion has a serious, long-term negative impact on women’s mental health and increasing skepticism http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/new-study-says-pregnancy-is-safe-even-beneficial-for-women-recovering-from/  among the psychiatric community of the existence of any mental health benefits of abortion.

Why Gay Marriage Is More Than a Legal Issue

Published by Christianity Today on 27 July 2012. 

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2012/july-august/why-gay-marriage-is-more-than-a-legal-issue.html?paging=off

The marriage debate shouldn't drive us to outrage or panic.

The gay marriage debate continues to boil over, tempting our nation to inaugurate a new era of McCarthyism. Back in the 1950s, anyone suspected of communism became a pariah. Now that seems to be true of anyone who supports traditional marriage.

Chick-fil-A president Dan Cathy, in answer to an interview question about the principles of the popular fast-food company, said, “We are very much supportive of the family—the biblical definition of the family unit.” This set some people’s teeth on edge. But the heat rose when some discovered Cathy said a couple of weeks earlier, “I think we are inviting God’s judgment on our nation when we shake our fist at him and say ‘We know better than you as to what constitutes marriage.’”

That may be prophetic, but in our culture it is impolitic to say this. Cathy’s comments raised the ire of Chicago alderman Joe Moreno, who said he would block the company from building a restaurant in his ward. He was supported by Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel, and, from a distance, Boston mayor Thomas Menino, who wants Chick-fil-A to vacate the premises of his town ASAP. As Menino put it, he’s “angry” about such “prejudiced statements.”

And this, even though Chick-fil-A followed up with a statement saying it strives to "treat every person with honor, dignity and respect—regardless of their belief, race, creed, sexual orientation or gender.” And then there’s this not unimportant fact: There is absolutely no proof that Chick-fil-A has ever practiced prejudice of any sort.

So apparently how you actually treat homosexuals is not a sufficient test of one’s Americanism. Now you need to think right to get into the good graces of government. This has struck even some pro-gay marriage advocates as a bit over the top--some would say Stalinist. As the Chicago Tribune’s Eric Zorn put it, “Don’t ask The Man to do the dirty work of attempting to marginalize and silence your opponents.”

Back in the spring, there was a similar dustup over the issue. On May 8, North Carolina citizens voted to ban gay marriage by a hefty margin of 61 to 39 percent. The next day, President Obama said on national television, "I think same-sex couples should be able to get married."

The comments following both events were predictable. From gay marriage advocates, there was talk about civil rights and history being on their side. Proponents of traditional marriage, meanwhile, resonated with this statement from Cardinal Timothy Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops: "We cannot be silent in the face of words or actions that would undermine the institution of marriage, the very cornerstone of our society."

To sum up what we at Christianity Today have said before: We believe gays and lesbians should not be denied fundamental rights granted to every other American, nor should they suffer slurs or intimidation in any shape or form (and neither should those who oppose gay marriage). Further, we continue to believe that marriage should be defined in our nation as a moral and legal bond between a man and a woman. For, among other reasons, societies that fail to shape themselves by the most basic and universal of divine laws and institutions cannot have a happy future (Cathy is right to be concerned). This seems built into the very order of creation by our loving Creator.

Careful readers will notice that we do not get panicked or outraged when gay marriage sometimes gets the upper hand in the ebb and flow of national debate. As much as we want the state to recognize and protect traditional marriage, we're not depending on the state to do so. In fact, the state has already done plenty to undermine traditional marriage—no-fault divorce law being perhaps the most egregious example. Since its advent in 1970, this policy has destabilized marriage like no other.

Nor do we think that the future of marriage or the American experiment hinges on how we as a nation decide the gay marriage debate. The on-the-ground understanding of marriage was weakened long ago. While the formal conversation around marriage is often about making a commitment to love and serve another for life, in practice it is clear that the cult of self-fulfillment drives many if not most of today's marriages.

It is impossible to find accurate numerical data that report the reasons for divorce, due to states having different requirements, terminology, and reporting methods for divorcing couples. But reasons commonly cited on legal and counseling websites include infidelity, communication breakdown, sexual incompatibility, boredom, and differences in priorities and expectations. The clichéd response, "We grew apart," is not a bad summary of all these reasons. It strongly suggests, "I'm not interested in pursuing this relationship if you're not interested in what I'm interested in."

Far more than the protection of the legal definition of marriage, what our society needs is a fresh understanding of marriage. One does not have to be a Christian to see how much richer and deeper marriage can be if it is primarily entered into for the sake of others, certainly the spouse but especially for the offspring of a marriage.

Nor does one have to be a theist to recognize that there is something fitting, unique, and precious about the sexual union of a husband and wife. For the Christian, of course, marriage is more than all this (a sacramental witness to God's covenant with his people, for example). But we can happily join hands with people of other faiths or no faith who recognize the tangible, natural dimensions of marriage that seem to be built into the very order of things.

While we continue to strive to convince our nation of the value of traditional marriage, we must not get discouraged on the legislative front, and should take in stride the prejudice against those who publicly support traditional marriage. While proponents of gay marriage will make it sound like history is on their side, in fact, history keeps surprising us. Not long ago, many thought that communism was the inevitable future, others, that religion was on its last legs. No, our nation's formal definition of marriage still hangs in the balance.

But rather than put all of our eggs in the basket of constitutional amendments or judicial opinion, we Christians would be wise to shore up marriage in our churches. Doing this would be both an act of repentance for our narcissism (for we Christians succumb to this temptation as much as the next sinner) and a witness to what marriage at its best can be. That calls for continued efforts by church and parachurch ministries to strengthen marriages, and to offer winsome public arguments for a deeper and richer understanding of marriage than our culture can possibly imagine.