Dear Charley --
As usual, your liberty-oriented column makes some very good points. But – on this aspect of your conclusion, at least – I feel a need to comment to you directly and personally:
“If they wish (homosexuals) to live together in a state-licensed relationship, it's nobody's business but their own.”
Would that it were true, Charley! Better still, and I suspect you agree anyway, I just wish they’d LEAVE ME ALONE, quit stealing from me to subsidize those others, and stop trying to criminalize and demonize us instead. We both have a pretty clear idea where such meddling ends. Unfortunately, history shows that it’s the same place that State approval, or licensing, of every aspect of life also ends; “that which is not forbidden is mandated”.
You see, I’m a man who believes that God alone ordains marriage, that He wrote the Rules, and that He NOWHERE prohibits (and, as you might be aware, under at least one circumstance even REQUIRES) a man from having more than one wife. My covenant to provide for and “cover” more than one wife is in fact no one else’s business – particularly a State which violates the clear tenets of its own supposed Supreme Law. The “Congress shall make NO law” prohibition obviously died long ago, along with “shall not be infringed”.
I have no state licenses for my household – nor do I want, or accept them. I don’t take Caesar’s “benefits”, and I don’t welcome his heavy-handed attempts to control my family. Watching the Texas Tyrants attempt to steal children from people infuriates me, too – even though I am not now, nor have I ever been, associated with post-Revelation prophets, or anything Mormon.
I know of other Christian, Messianic, or “Patriarchal” followers of God who practice Biblical polygyny. Some of them even think that these new rulings may make their lives “easier” – even though the irony inherent in having the State approve and mandate acceptance of a practice that the Bible forbids, while forbidding that which the Bible does not, does not escape any of them. More and more of them are coming to recognize that asking Caesar’s permission places one under Caesar’s authority – even if they have trouble understanding that thing their Savior warned about – not being able to “serve two masters”.
Ultimately, I both agree and disagree with your conclusion, Charley. Those who welcome state-licensing of every aspect of their lives (and that is in fact what a ‘marriage’ license ultimately entails) are welcome to worship at that altar. Where I disagree is that the same increasingly all-powerful State, or those who clamor for its spoils, is ever about to let those of us who choose otherwise alone. I’ve already chosen Whom I will serve, but the State is a jealous god, too.
Sincerely,
Mark Call
Niwot, Colorado
(Great response, Mark!)