It’s kind of a pointless gesture to comment on this now. My true comments are comprised of the moral and intellectual framework that I’ve been laying down in my preaching, writing, talking, marching, and loving for the past several years. Posts like this are merely symbolic gestures offered by those of us who wish to go on record in moments of truth as people who took a stand for truth, according to our best understanding.
I think Amendment One is a pointless piece of garbage that I refuse to dignify with the term “legislation.” I am not currently a registered voter in North Carolina, but I’ve spent the majority of my life so far in that state. Therefore, it matters to me, personally, what happens today, since many people who I love will be affected.
North Carolina, if you pass this amendment today, it will become an albatross around your neck. It will be an embarrassment and a mark of shame to future generations for whom the question of same-sex marriage will be a non-issue (and that generation is coming much sooner than you think). You are neither preventing the secularization of North American culture nor laying the foundation for a biblical regime by doing this. Read Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale and then tell me if theocracy is even a goal you want to achieve. To loosely paraphrase William Stringfellow, human beings are most effective at bringing hell to earth when they believe they are bringing heaven.
I’ll close with the lyrics of a song by Evangelical Christian songwriter Derek Webb. Here are the lyrics and the video. Listen and read. I hope it gets stuck in your head while you head to the polls.
You say always treat people like you’d like to be
I guess you love being hated for your sexuality
You love when people put words in your mouth
About what you believe
Make you sound like a freak‘Cause if you really believed
What you say you believe
You wouldn’t be so damned reckless
With the words you speak
You wouldn’t silently consent
When the liars speak
Denying all the dying of the remedyTell me brother, what matters more to you?
Tell me sister, what matters more to you?If I can see what’s in your heart
By what comes out of your mouth
Then it sure looks to me like being straight
Is all it’s about
It looks like being hated
For all the wrong things
Like chasing the wind
While the pendulum swings‘Cause we can talk and debate
Till we’re blue in the face
About the language and tradition
That He’s coming to save
And meanwhile we sit
Just like we don’t give a shit about
Fifty thousand people who are dying todayTell me brother, what matters more to you?
Tell me sister, what matters more to you?
Hopping Hadrian's Wall 