The majority of citizens in the US believe that anti-discrimination cases should be limited to unchangeable issues of nature like race, gender and matters of disability.
Religious based discrimination is viewed as a separate issue addressed by the first amendment.
Most Americans are also hesitant to to include people’s sexual desires and behaviors under anti-discrimination law. The push on the part of homosexual activists to widen laws and ordinances to include their sexual orientation is perceived as an effort to force their sexual lifestyle on others.
People are being socially coerced to widen laws and ordinances to include sexual desires and behaviors to acquiesce to an agenda designed to force the chosen lifestyles of a few on all of society.
A key tactic in the agenda to normalize homosexual behavior and legalize gay marriage has been to convince the public that opposition to homosexuality is a form of racism. But, traditionally, anti-discrimination law of the civil rights kind protected people based on unchangeable aspects their nature– not their chosen lifestyles.
This is why the debate over homosexuality turns to whether one’s sexual orientation is a matter of choice or a condition of birth. A somewhat easy case can be made for heterosexual orientation as a natural condition of birth. The categories of male and female have never changed in any place at any time. We all know that without heterosexuality, we would cease to exist as a race.
Occasionally someone will ask me if I chose to be heterosexual. The aim of the question is to trace the origins of sexual orientation. But even if I could prove that I was born genetically preconditioned to be sexually attracted to women, it wouldn’t mean that acting on the attraction would always be the ethically right decision.
Answering source questions for behaviors will not necessarily lead to moral assessments of those actions. Morality has to do with right and wrong; source questions are more complex. Sources behind behavior could include genetic, cultural, experiential and social contributors. But sources cannot force me to behave in a certain way. They can exercise strong influence over me but, in the end, I must choose to act in relation to those influences. I see things this way based on a high regard for human dignity. And this means that I must look elsewhere for deciding matters of right and wrong.
Consider, as an example, an adulterous woman who complains that her act of adultery (i.e. her wrongful heterosexual behavior) was because of her distant and uncaring husband. Sympathy toward her for being in a troubled marriage is understandable but it doesn’t mean that her act of adultery was the morally right choice.
If a pedophile feels driven to his behavior from what he identifies as a natural urge of genetic origin, or if he argues that he has a wonderful nurturing relationship with the children he sexually molests, we cannot approve his behavior on either account. No matter what reason he offers, his sexual conduct must be condemned as morally reprehensible. He must be held morally culpable for his sexual choices.
When resolving ethical and legal questions, a person’s choice must be considered as a primary factor in sexual conduct. Arguments for sexuality based on genetic predisposition do not advance discussions about right or wrong or what is best for a society. It is possible to be physiologically inclined toward many different types of behavior. But we must be very careful about using such impulses to define personhood or to justify behavioral choices.
I do not think it is best to speak of any type of sexual desire outside of the context of human choosing. And it is especially misleading to compare civil rights battles regarding race and gender to battles for sexuality. This is a false comparison that removes human choosing from sexual behavior. It also gives people the misleading impression that those who desire certain sexual lifestyles face mistreatment comparable to the wrongful ways African-Americans were treated during the civil rights battles. This is a highly offensive comparison and using it to gain support for sexual lifestyles is a form of emotional manipulation. If people are wrongly treated because of lawful sexual lifestyles, there are sufficient existing laws to provide protection for them. Creating new laws to support sexual lifestyles is unwise and sets a dangerous legal precedent.
A society that intends to condemn certain forms of sexual conduct as illegal (i.e. rape, incest, child pornography, etc), must treat sexuality in the context of human choosing– not as a predetermined condition.
Steve Cornell
Senior pastor
Millersville Bible Church
58 West Frederick Street
Millersville, PA. 17551
Wisdomforlife 
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Thomas Jefferson said the First Amendment builds a wall that separates church and state. The state, then, is required not to LIMIT it’s considerations to religious doctrine but to open itself up to other views, as well. And the state may not dictate things based on religious beliefs. And the state may not make religious views a test for public office.
No one is asking anyone here to participate in homosexual encounters of any kind. And the right to have homosexual encounters is not only God-given and inalienable but the Ninth Amendment specifically prohibits the federal government from denying rights that the various states or the people give themselves.
The Supreme Court has said that regulating adult sexual behavior is not the domain of either the federal or the state government because they can not prove any harm to the state or federal government. The same is with gay marriage.
All sexual behavior is a matter of choice, a private choice. When it happens between two or more consenting adults the state’s obligations to protect children from harm are met.
What you think your god thinks of it is not the business of the state. Whatever your god dictates to you about your own personal behavior is private and not the business of the state, either.
Finally, what you think of homosexuality is none of my business and what I do with my body is none of your business. And if there is a god that is going to judge me, that is between that god and me and none of your business, either.
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I appreciate your candor but feel that it is not as easy as you make it appear. Separating religious impulse and conviction from moral conclusion is tricky. And since law-making involves decisions regarding the good, morality is never far from law and policy. How much religion is separated from this is not always easily discerned. If one enters the discussion on explicitly religious grounds, it is a different matter. On a note of greater concern, we in America face a national crisis regarding to sexuality. The statistics are alarming. We produce more pornography than any other place in the world and it is a multi-billion dollar industry. How many lives are damaged by this widespread reality? We will soon have a million registered sex offenders in our nation (how many unregistered ones are there?)
In my counseling work, I have encountered an alarming number of cases of incest. Forty-percent of children are born out of wedlock in the US. We have a prison crisis in this nation that I attribute more than anything else to absentee fathers. There a far too many men who don’t mind getting woman pregnant but want nothing to do with raising sons and daughters. I view all of this as a call to ministry– not condemnation of people. Whatever struggles we face, they are our struggles together.
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In the case of absentee fathers and crime rate, legalizing homosexual marriage actually helps quite a bit. Statistics show that homosexual partners tend to stay together for life, whereas we all know the divorce rate has peaked over 50%. There is also no psychological evidence that raising children in a homosexual home has any affect on their development. Therefore it is highly likely that children growing up in a homosexual home won’t be dealing with single parents or absentee fathers and will live a life much closer to the “traditional family” than other children. It is also unlikely that a homosexual man would bear a child with a woman at all, let alone outside of wedlock!
I am a Christian man who has struggled with the notion of homosexuality and faith and have come to the conclusion that God is much bigger than my opinion, regardless of what that opinion is. Regardless of what I think, the gay man next door is as much a child of God as I am, and He loves him just as much. We’re all sinners and we all fall short of the glory of God so I don’t understand why this particular sin (which Jesus never even mentions) has been elevated to such a high level of importance. I also don’t think it’s fair to compare homosexuality to pedophilia. The monogamous love between two men or two women has nothing in common with the perverted lustful acts of child molesters.
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I am not sure where you got the statistic about fidelity among homosexuals but it is far from the truth. Promiscuity and multiple partners are pervasive realities among homosexuals. Within their relationships, statistically they are known for far more violence and unfaithfulness than heterosexual couples. And Jesus said all that one needs to hear on the subject in Matthew 19.
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