Posted: May 07, 2012 4:58 am
Crocodile Gandhi wrote:Q & A Round
Q. Can Lion confirm that he now believes not everyone has the freedom to practise and observe their religion or belief?
If not, can Lion explain how making it illegal for people to practise and observe the sacrament of marriage according to their religion or belief gives them the freedom to practise and observe their religion or belief?
Thanks for the question. In point of fact, I have NOT argued – vehemently or otherwise – for the right to exercise religion.
The Apostle Paul never pleaded for the "right" or asked "permission" from principalities or powers. (See Romans 8)
That right is asserted by and enshrined in constitutions, customs and declarations by man-made organisations because
homo sapiens has, for 50,000 years (+/-) had an innate human culture of religiosity. My observation of that plain fact does not amount to rights advocacy – unless of course atheists are willing to concede the existence of God as Creator who endows certain inalienable rights.
I raise it in the debate because the same-sex marriage lobby (a global minority) is in a head-on collision course with religious culture (a global majority) and that is a matter of fact which cannot be swept under the carpet. And it will CERTAINLY come before the courts in the form of…”my rights and customs should prevail over yours” litigation.
There will be jurisdictions consisting of entire countries which simply wont recognise the legitimacy of same sex marriage and whose (religious) population, in the majority, would find “homosexual marriage” an oxymoron. They would regard the claim to Marriage Equality as a “right,” a religious, biological and legal anathema. People claiming the right to religion, including that percentage of the world's population which adheres to Abrahamic monotheism (50% to 60% +) will claim the commensurate “right” to discriminate against homosexual marriages and they won’t recognise SSM as valid just because some Judge in California says it “ought” to be permitted (experimentally permitted to be more precise.) Nor will they accept so-called “marriage equality” as sufficient grounds for them to violate their own (religious) conscience in matters like adoption, surrogacy, commercial law, etc.
Such people are more likely to think of Marriage as a “rite” rather than a “right” and would use the political/legal processes of law and government to defend their own preferred position.
It’s a brute reality that the (religious) opponents of same sex marriage, as a constituent majority in many jurisdictions, would be glad to say..."hey, if you want gay marriage/adoption, move to California or Norway and don’t come back."
Is Julia Gillard really going to say to Indonesia (a predominantly Islamic jurisdiction,) “would you mind legalising same-sex marriage please.”