Perhaps it had to happen, given the temper of the times. But the California Supreme Court’s 4-3 ruling last month saying the constitution of the nation’s most populous state gives homosexual couples a previously invisible right to marry nevertheless is a striking instance of how arrogant unelected judges can impose an anti-child view of marriage on society. Marriage, in this understanding, isn’t about children. Its fundamental purpose is to gratify two adults who enter into a contractual union in order to please themselves.  Though some homosexual couples raise children through adoption or other means, this is the exception and not the rule.  The same-sex relationship is intrinsically non-procreative in itself. 

The California bishops issued a statement deploring the May 15 ruling. The decision of the State Supreme Court, they said, “opens the door for policymakers to deconstruct traditional marriage and create another institution in its place.” Five years ago we saw this happen in Massachusetts thanks to that state’s highest court. 

Looked at in its socio-political dimension, the most alarming thing about legalizing homosexual marriage is precisely this — that the state in this manner bestows its blessing on the proposition that marriage is a one-to-one arrangement entered into by  two adults of the same or different sexes for what they perceive as their private benefit.  This is the logical extension of our narcissistic and self-absorbed culture.  Children, if any, are beside the point of marriage. If two adult partners do choose to make room for them, it’s only to make them feel good.

But the rational for homosexual marriage doesn’t stop there. A further assumption arising from totalitarian liberalism, is that marriage is a creature of the state, subject to being defined however Big Brother chooses. Hence we see the consensus of ordinary people expressed by democratic means is irrelevant. It matters little to the California Supreme Court that 61 percent of the voters there in 2000 backed a ballot initiative defining marriage as a union between one man and one woman. Just four unelected judges were needed to brush aside the will of the people and send the message, “Marriage is what we say it is.” In other words, marriage belongs to “Caeser” and not to God. 

The decision in California has set the stage for a crucial showdown in November. State constitutional amendments defining marriage in heterosexual terms will be on the ballot in California, Florida and perhaps in Arizona. Twenty-seven states already have such language in their constitutions. Of the two presidential candidates for this November’s election, only Sen. John McCain supports the idea of leaving the decision to amend the constitutions to each state. 

Part of the case for legalizing homosexual marriage is that it’s no threat to anybody or anything else. But it is. The legal acceptance of same-sex marriage legitimates the anti-child, anti-procreation notion of marriage that is already disturbingly widespread today. Most importantly, do courts have the right to undermine what God has set in place as the basic building block of stable societies? Marriage was given by and defined by God and “Caesar” has no right or authority to undermine it.

 
Scott Bute

Alden