Tuesday, December 13, 2022 – Albert Mohler
Well, just yesterday, E.J. Dionne asked us the question. The Washington Post columnist asked conservative Christians this question, why draw the line here? And by here, he means it opposition to same-sex marriage. The title of his column that ran yesterday at the Washington Post sets the issue squarely. A “Question to conservative Christians on gay marriage. Why draw the line here?” Well, E.J. Dionne ask the question and it is a serious question. It is a question that deserves a serious answer and it’s up to conservative Christians to answer this question. Why draw the line here? But how does E.J. Dionne set up the question? How does he set up this challenge? He begins by telling us that he celebrates what he calls the victory of marriage equality, last week as the United States House adopted the amended version of what is called the Respect for Marriage Act.
Dionne says that the victory of same-sex marriage, “Became inevitable once LGBTQ Americans came out in large numbers.” He then wrote this, “Suddenly even the most traditionally minded discovered that people they loved, respected and cared about were not heterosexual. Given a choice between abruptly abandoning relatives, coworkers and friends are opening our hearts, most of us chose the better option.” It’s why, said E.J. Dionne, support for same-sex marriage has skyrocketed reaching 71% in the most recent Gallup numbers. Now those numbers, I don’t contest. There is plenty of evidence that support for same-sex marriage in this society has not only increased but has skyrocketed. Furthermore, I think E.J. Dionne is probably right in claiming that one of the major moral factors behind this massive change on the moral landscape is the fact that many people simply lost the will to hold to any kind of conservative sanction, against individual sexual behavior and sexual orientation.
I do want us to note how Dionne uses the language here. He says that on the one hand, you had people who held to say a traditional biblical sexual morality that has been generally historically associated with Christianity for two millennia. As compared to those who responded by in his words, “Opening our hearts.” Saying, most of us chose the better option. Now let’s just state that this is rhetorically loading the dice, so to speak. By implication, those who do not support same-sex marriage have not opened our hearts according to his logic.
Consistent with what he has written before, E.J. Dionne says that, “In truth, opposition to marriage equality is not disappeared.” He points out the most that republicans voted against the Respect for Marriage Act and that’s both in the House and the Senate by the way, but I’ll just insert here a sufficient number of Republicans, particularly in the Senate, joined with Democrats in this measure to push it over the line. And now of course it is headed today for the signature of the President of the United States in a White House ceremony. We’ll talk more about that in just a moment.
Dionne registers concern not only about the fact that there is still political and moral opposition to same-sex marriage. Including at least the majority of Republicans right now in both the House and the Senate. He also is quite concerned about the 303 Creative case just heard in oral arguments before the Supreme Court. And he sees the claim made by conservative Christians in that case as lacking in validity and furthermore, opening the door for what he sees as the exercise of outright prejudice. But then the most important part of his article begins with this, “But such questions also invite us to examine the case from a different perspective. Why do conservative Christians want this exemption in the first place?” This refers to the Supreme Court oral arguments last week.
He answers this way, “That question is neither naive nor rhetorical. Many traditionalist Christians view homosexual relationships as sinful. I think they are wrong,” he writes. But I acknowledge that this is a long-held view. Yet he says, Many of the same Christians also view adultery as a sin. Jesus was tough on divorce. “What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder. He says in Matthews gospel.” Inciting Jesus as avowedly against divorce. Well, he is absolutely right. Of course, the interesting thing is that he doesn’t go on to cite Jesus as making very clear that marriage is the union of a man and a woman. The challenge from Dionne arrives with these words, “But unless I’m missing something, we do not see court cases from website designers or florist or bakers about refusing to do business with people in their second or third marriages. We do not see the same ferocious response to adultery as we do to same-sex relationships.”
He goes on to say, “Conservative Christians in large numbers were happy to put aside their moral qualms and vote twice for a serial adulterer. Why the selective forgiveness? Why the call to boycott only this one perceived sin.” In his judgment, “What we are seeing in the opposition to same-sex marriage is less about religious faith than cultural predispositions. American attitudes towards homosexuality have certainly changed radically, but so have our attitudes towards racial and gender equality. Are not these moves toward greater openness, all expressions of the equal God-given dignity of every person?” He rounds the bend in his discussion when he writes, “I hold religious freedom as a high value and see religion as on the balance of positive social force.” Yes, he says, “The latter view is increasingly controversial among people who share my politics. I support well-crafted legal exemptions to protect the autonomy of religious institutions and the free exercise of religion, but these cannot become a defensive discrimination in the marketplace or in our legal system.”
Now working backwards here, I’ll simply point to the fact that if you do have exemptions, then they do allow some form of discrimination. And again, I must come back to the fact that the law is an endless process of making discriminations. That is not a word that left alone makes any clear moral sense. The law makes a very clear distinction, a discrimination between those who pay their taxes and those who don’t, those who obey the law when it comes to something like a speed limit in those who do not. And there are all kinds of forms of discrimination and many of them are absolutely valid. That’s the point. If you are looking at two candidates for say, a position in the federal government and one is clearly more qualified than the other, well you would think that discrimination would apply in the same way that it would if you need heart surgery. I want the best heart surgeon with the very best educational pedigree.
I will be very discriminating if in that position and that makes moral sense. At the same time, the Christian worldview makes clear that there are wrongful forms of discrimination and this would include racial discrimination. It would include discrimination against image bearers of God that would deny the fact that they are image bearers. But when it comes to what we’re talking about in this case, which is after all same-sex marriage, along with a host of other issues, the E.J. Dionne adds in. Well, the fact is that discrimination as he defines it, is basically the right of historic Christian institutions and others of very clear religious faith and conviction to hold to those convictions not only in private but with public consequence. It’s also interesting to note that in those last sentences I read, E.J. Dionne basically says that the view that on balance religion is a positive social force is well, in his words, increasingly controversial among people who share my politics.
Well, that’s an interesting admission, that’s a concession that’s important to understand in its context. Here you have E.J. Dionne who is a political liberal saying, look, in this political class, it is simply true that it is increasingly controversial that religion is a positive social force. I have no doubt that columnist E.J. Dionne sees himself as an imminently reasonable man. He’s certainly a very intelligent person. He graduated from Portsmouth Abbey School and then he went to Harvard University. After that, he became a road scholar at Oxford University in England and for that institution he eventually earned a doctor of philosophy in sociology. Since 1993, he has worked as a colonist for the Washington Post. He is often on television including public television. He is a widely known public intellectual and he makes very important and usually very clear arguments. He is also on the other side of the fence from conservatives and he recognizes that. He has written a succession of books and in at least a couple of them, he basically offers advice to conservatives about how to preserve conservatism.
But at the end of the day is a conservative, I would have to say what would be preserved is a conservatism that liberals would like. Dionne is one of the most influential intellectuals in the United States associated with a Catholic identity, that’s very important to his identity. He has written for years as a colonist for Commonweal, which is very well known Catholic publication, a liberal Catholic publication. Now, it’s also very interesting to note that E.J. Dionne has not always been for same-sex marriage. As a matter of fact, in 1995, he wrote an article in which he suggested that same-sex marriage was a step too far. In that 1995 article also published at the Washington Post, Dionne was responding with a generally very appreciative response to Andrew Sullivan’s recent book published at the same time. The book was entitled Virtually Normal, an argument about homosexuality and Andrew Sullivan made what he called a conservative argument for same-sex marriage.
A lot more to say about that. But what’s important to recognize right now is that in 1995, the argument against same-sex marriage made sense to none another than E.J. Dionne. In 1995 responding to Sullivan, he said this, “I am less convinced by his insistence on the word marriage to apply to them.” Meaning publicly recognized, committed homosexual relationships. He says, “That word and the idea behind it carry philosophical and theological meanings that are getting increasingly muddled and could become more so if it were applied even more broadly.” In other words, he said there are philosophical and theological issues at stake and it would be important to recognize those and not to threaten those. So you some other word for what you will call these relationships, but don’t call it marriage. That was 1995. By his book published in 2008, E.J. Dionne was arguing to the contrary. Although to his credit, he was acknowledging that he had held the contrary position as recently as 1995. But at least back in 2008, E.J. Dionne was not asking conservative Christians why the line would be drawn here.
He seemed to understand it in 2008. He wrote this, “I do not expect social conservatives or religious traditionalists to accept these arguments immediately or without qualms.” Indeed, he wrote in the book entitled, Sold Out Reclaiming Faith in Politics After the Religious Right again, 2008. He wrote, “Indeed, to the extent that I still agree with what I said on this subject in 1995, I understand how hard it is for people who live traditional lives as in fact I do to accept gay marriage. I worry as they do about the problems’ marriage confronts. I agree with them entirely that for all its problems, the two parent family is in most cases still the best mechanism we have to raise children and that family breakdown is the enemy of economic equality.” So we have one position in 1995, another position in 2008, and now in 2022, the man who said he basically understood conservative theological reservations about same-sex marriage, he said that in 2008.
In 2022, he’s turned around and said, what are you guys thinking? It’s also interesting to note that in 2008, E.J. Dionne did go on the record to say that even if same-sex marriage was not a winning issue in 2008, politically winning, he meant. He said that it shortly would be, and on that he was certainly right.