What happens
now? On Friday, June 26, 2015, the
United States Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that same-sex marriage is legal in all fifty states. The four liberal justices – Ruth Bader
Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan – were joined by the
swing vote of Anthony Kennedy to legalize same-sex marriage.
Justice Kennedy wrote the
majority opinion, which was full of statements such as the following: “No union is more profound than marriage, for
it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and
family…. In forming a marital union, two
people become something greater than once they were. As some of the petitioners in these cases
demonstrate, marriage embodies a love that may endure even past death.”
Four conservative justices dissented;
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. was joined by Justices Antonin Scalia,
Clarence Thomas, and Samuel A. Alito Jr.
Chief Justice Roberts’ comments clearly stated that he considered the
vote to be an unconstitutional, unprecedented `act of will, not legal judgment’
and that he considered the court to be unauthorized in trying to decide this
issue. “[T]his court is not a legislature…. Whether same-sex marriage is a good idea
should be of no concern to us. Under the
Constitution, judges have power to say what the law is, not what it should be.”
The Chief Justice, joined by
Justices Scalia and Thomas, continued, “Supporters of same-sex marriage have
achieved considerable success persuading their fellow citizens – through the
democratic process – to adopt their view.
That ends today. Five lawyers
have closed the debate and enacted their own vision of marriage as a matter of
constitutional law. Stealing this issue
from the people will for many cast a cloud over same-sex marriage, making a dramatic
social change that much more difficult to accept.”
Roberts ended with “Just who do
we think we are?”
Justice Scalia’s dissent, joined
by Justice Thomas, was the strongest when stating that the majority decision is
a “threat to American democracy” and lacks “even a thin veneer of law.” “A system of government that makes the people
subordinate to a committee of nine unelected lawyers does not deserve to be
called a democracy.” In a footnote
Justice Scalia stated, “The Supreme Court of the United States has descended
from the disciplined legal reasoning of John Marshall and Joseph Story to the
mystical aphorisms of the fortune cookie.”
Justice Thomas, joined by
Justice Scalia, wrote that there was no way he could agree with the majority
decision because it “inverted the relationship between a person and the
government” and “the majority’s decision suggested that human dignity can only
come from that government.” “He warned
that what he saw as the majority opinion’s misunderstanding of liberty – which he
said was really freedom from the government, rather than access to government
benefits -- `will likely cause collateral damage to other aspects of our constitutional
order that protect liberty.’” He wrote
of “potentially ruinous consequences for religious liberty.” He suggested that the majority’s decision
will not change the dignity of people who voted for laws defining marriage as
between one man and one woman.
Justice Alito, joined by
Justices Scalia and Thomas, wrote in his dissent that the majority had
apparently forgotten that the purpose of marriage was to procreate children,
not simply to satisfy the desires of adults.
Even though he acknowledged that modern marriage had fallen far from the
ideal of marriage, he was concerned about the majority’s “abuse of its power.” “If a bare majority of Justices can invent a
new right and impose that right on the rest of the country, the only real limit
on what future majorities will be able to do is their own sense of what those
with political power and cultural influence are willing to tolerate…. Even enthusiastic supporters of same-sex marriage
should worry about the scope of the power that today’s majority claims.”
At first, I was shocked – yes shocked
– that the Supreme Court would make this ruling. I realized right away that the five justices
composing the majority had pushed our entire nation much further down the
slippery slope of debauchery in order to please a very small percentage of its
citizens. We are now far down the
slippery slope leading to the destruction of our nation because this ruling
legalizes serious sin. Homosexual thoughts and feelings are not sins,
but homosexual actions are grievous sins, the same type of sins that led to the
destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah in Old Testament times. (See Genesis
19:5; Leviticus 18:22, 20:13; Deuteronomy 23:17, and Isaiah 3:9.) It does not matter whether you or I believe
it is sin because God says it is sin. Sin
is wickedness, and wickedness never leads to happiness.
After I overcame my shock, I
began to wonder how God plans to use this ruling in dealing with His children
on earth. The ruling, of course, was no surprise
to God; He knew it was coming. What
actions has He taken to counteract the decision of the majority of justices?
God has proclaimed that marriage
between a man and a woman is ordained of God.
He put Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, not Adam and Steve. He has a plan for His children, and same-sex
marriage is not part of His plan. We
each have the freedom to make choices, but we do not have the freedom to choose
the consequences of our choices. What
will the consequences be for the decision to legalize same-sex marriage? I know that only time will tell, but I expect
that the consequences will not be pleasant ones.
What does God want us to
do? How does He desire us to act as a
result of this Court decision? I was
greatly comforted and strengthened by the remarks of Nancy Leigh DeMoss in this
You Tube video entitled “Nancy Responds to `Same Sex Marriage’ Ruling.” She reminded her listeners that “Heaven Rules”
– not the Supreme Court. She indicated
that we have three choices in how we act or react: (1) We should not curse the decision and
become angry and hateful. (2) We should
not allow ourselves to become overwhelmed by the darkness by falling into
depression or condoning the sin. (3) We
should allow our light to shine in the darkness and love the sinners while
hating the sin. We should feel
compassion for them for they will suffer.
No comments:
Post a Comment