Here’s Jimmy Carter’s religious argument in support of marriage equality, and it’s funny — it’s exactly what gay activists have been fighting for:
Homosexuality was well known in the ancient world, well before Christ was born and Jesus never said a word about homosexuality. In all of his teachings about multiple things -– he never said that gay people should be condemned. I personally think it is very fine for gay people to be married in civil ceremonies.
I draw the line, maybe arbitrarily, in requiring by law that churches must marry people. I’m a Baptist, and I believe that each congregation is autonomous and can govern its own affairs. So if a local Baptist church wants to accept gay members on an equal basis, which my church does by the way, then that is fine. If a church decides not to, then government laws shouldn’t require them to.
The idea that gay people want to “force” churches to marry us has always been a straw man erected by the biggest liars of the Religious Right to scare people. Individual churches have always and should continue to be able to bless or not bless whatever unions they want to.
Why would we want to get married in a congregation that doesn’t support us in the first place?
[h/t Zack Ford]
