Daily Verse | Galatians 6:10
Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.
Friday’s Reading: Ephesians 1-6
Saturday’s Reading: Philippians 1-4
I really wish I could send us all into the weekend with good, positive, cheery news about how the country is functioning as intended, at least in some small quadrant of some region of our vast fruited plain. Unfortunately, it’s not to be.
Max DePree says the first task of a leader is to define reality, even if — maybe especially if — it’s unpleasant to hear. A leader must be ruthlessly honest about the current situation if there’s to be any meaningful change. If you can’t define the current situation in brutally honest terms, then the people you lead remain blissfully unaware of the whole truth. They may have parts of the truth, but if they think it’s mostly sunny when, in fact, it’s mostly cloudy, you’re going to have a hard time developing a sense of urgency to make a change.
I don’t see myself as a leader per se (someone said if you think you’re a leader but you don’t have anyone following you, you’re just taking a walk), but defining America’s cultural and political reality is what I’ve been trying to do with this blog. I believe that most conservative Americans (and even some ordinary liberal Americans) are not aware of what is happening in the upper echelons of our ruling class, and my efforts are aimed at raising that awareness in the hope that it motivates readers to get involved at some level.
One of the brutally honest reality checks we need to make is the continuing devolution of marriage as an institution.
This month, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer introduced the Respect for Marriage Act on the Senate floor. It would effectively require nationwide recognition of same-sex marriages even if the Supreme Court were to overturn Obergefell.
There’s a lot more to it when it comes to “recognition of same-sex marriages,” however. The bill seeks to codify what the Supreme Court ruled already exists: a right to same-sex marriage. Along with such a “right” come several threats to those who disagree with that perspective.
The same-sex marriage bill, according to Blake, asks lawmakers “to codify state and federal recognition of a right that the Supreme Court has ruled already exists.” In other words, the rights of every individual American citizen are defined by law, as passed by Congress, signed by the president, and enforced by the Court …
For liberals, government is the source of individual rights, and that means government defines those rights and has the power to redefine them as desired by whoever happens to be in control at any given time.
This obviously flies in the face of how our Founders understood the source of individual rights. As they wrote in the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed …”
And since liberals are in control of the government, they intend to do precisely that—define the right of religious expression and practice so as to exclude from the public square all of those whose sincere faith requires them to reject same-sex marriage.
Simply put, the liberals are saying to millions of Americans that they have no right to disagree in the public square with same-sex marriage and the state can and indeed soon will take their property via taxes and use them to support the enforcement of same-sex marriage as a political right.
You will be made to support the official narrative, or at least not publicly oppose it (same thing), that same-sex marriage is a right. If you stray from the government’s position, you will be made to pay. You will be punished financially for transgressing official policy.
That enforcement is the second element here that commands attention. The bill includes provisions that authorize the IRS to jerk the tax exemption of any church or non-profit that opposes same-sex marriage. The bill also encourages litigation to be brought against those same institutions in the court system to enforce the right to same-sex marriage.
Here’s what that means: Soon after Biden signs the bill into law, there will begin to be same-sex couples demanding to be married in evangelical churches they know to be opposed to the practice.
If the pastor refuses to perform the ceremony, the church will be sued and it will lose in court. That litigation will then be used by the IRS as justification for ending the church’s tax-exempt status, as well as the tax-deductibility of congregants’ tithes and contributions.
The Respect for Marriage Act will also repeal the Defense of Marriage Act (passed by Bill Clinton in 1996 as a means of protecting marriage as a union between one man and one woman). This is, of course, tyranny, and the only way it could be any worse is if any Republicans helped pass the bill. Which they did.
The House on Tuesday passed the Respect for Marriage Act, which would repeal the Defense of Marriage Act and enshrine same-sex marriage into federal law.
The bill passed the House with 47 Republican votes. Now the Senate is seeking GOP support to codify same-sex marriage into federal law and garner 60 votes to avoid the filibuster.
So far, four Republican senators stated that they would support the bill, eight said no, sixteen were undecided, and twenty-two did not respond, according to CNN.
Among those reported by CNN to show support for the bill were:
Susan Collins of Maine
Lisa Murkowski of Alaska
Rob Portman of Ohio
Thom Tillis of North Carolina
Mitch McConnell was among those who refused to comment.
That was written back in July. Fast-forward to two days ago and here’s what actually happened in the Senate:
The Senate on Tuesday night approved historic legislation that provides federal protections for same-sex marriages, moving the measure closer to President Biden’s desk for his signature in the final weeks of the Democratic-controlled Congress.
The bill, called the Respect for Marriage Act, passed the evenly divided upper chamber 61 to 36, with 12 Republicans joining their Democratic colleagues in support of the proposal. It needed 60 votes to pass. The legislation garnered support from a wider margin of GOP senators after it was amended to include provisions protecting religious liberty.
Can you say “UniParty”? The 47 House Republicans and 12 Senate Republicans are simply Democrats with the word “Republican” stamped on their forehead. They’re not “conserving” anything, least of all a traditional, historical understanding of marriage.
Why even have the two parties when there’s no firm opposition to the most radical law-making?
Now the legislation goes back to the House for a final vote, then heads to Brandon’s desk for signature. Here’s what his writer’s had to say on his behalf:
“With today’s bipartisan Senate passage of the Respect for Marriage Act, the United States is on the brink of reaffirming a fundamental truth: love is love, and Americans should have the right to marry the person they love,” the president said in a statement.
“Love is love … should have the right.” So government is going to hand out a right based on what someone thinks a certain segment of our population “should” have based on a philosophical “virtue” that says all that matters are your feelings. It doesn’t matter what God says, it doesn’t matter what children need, it doesn’t matter what civilizations have thought about homosexuality for millennia — all that matters is your emotional attachment to another person, whether or not they are a complementary sex.
“For millions of Americans, this legislation will safeguard the rights and protections to which LGBTQI+ and interracial couples and their children are entitled. It will also ensure that, for generations to follow, LGBTQI+ youth will grow up knowing that they, too, can lead full, happy lives and build families of their own.”
Meh, safeguarding the rights and protections of “interracial couples and their children” is a red herring. Where is that supposed threat being made? Show me the data.
Also, I didn’t know that marriage being set aside for one man and one woman left homosexuals and other sexual deviants feeling like they couldn’t “lead full, happy lives.” What they really mean is that they don’t want to be left outside the mainstream.
What Brandon’s handlers don’t say is that this legislation turns millions more Americans than the alphabet people into pariahs and exposes them to the loss of their freedoms of conscience and their freedom to be left unmolested by the government.
The wire has been slipped over our head and it won’t be long before it’s pulled tight around our necks.
Have a good weekend.
