Gay marriage issue not a matter of legislation

By Hans Zeiger, KRT Campus

—Art Courtesy of KRT Campus

In this present American marriage emergency, we have no choice but to amend the Constitution. Homosexual weddings have become reality in San Francisco, Massachusetts and New Mexico, portending moral anarchy unless a constitutional amendment is passed to forbid the legal annihilation of marriage. Though an amendment is necessary, I do not join the chorus of conservatives who seem to believe that such an amendment will signal a great victory in the culture war.

In fact, the desperate need for a marriage amendment demonstrates our failure. For too long, the American conservative movement has pretended to fight the culture war on the pretext that by limiting ourselves to what the Apostle Paul might call the battles of the flesh—in the realms of politics and public policy—we will win the battles of the spirit. Sadly, we are losing flesh and spirit alike as evidenced by the dramatic rise of the radical homosexual movement.

This last ditch effort to save marriage parallels previous public policy efforts—Defense of Marriage Acts in 37 states and the 1990s national Defense of Marriage Act. While such measures may halt the spread of vice for a moment, they cannot replace virtue.

If, as John Adams said, the constitution is only fit for a moral and religious people, a trashed constitution itself cannot redeem a wayward people. We cannot expect to steel America’s character by amending our constitution. The constitution rests on the character of the people, not the other way around.

From the beginning, conservatives have often turned to the wrong institutions in hopes of solving our gravest moral problems, and we now face the consequences. This war against what Rebecca Hagelin and David Spady call “cultural terrorism” is not and never has been so much a matter of public policy as it is a matter of private conscience. It is not so much a battle of the flesh as it is a battle of the spirit.

The key struggle being spiritual rather than constitutional, what then is the salient preservative of America’s moral vitality? We see an answer perhaps in Mel Gibson’s new film “The Passion of the Christ” as it presents the Gospel to a nation that needs it quite desperately.

It is the greatest of contrasts. On the one hand, we witness the gruesome rise of a movement spewing vehement hate for God and His institution of marriage. On the other, we are reminded that the Son of God died as a substitute for all this fallen humanity.

Before us is a desperate, urgent, plain choice. It is not simply a choice between the values of Mel Gibson and Rosie O’Donnell, between George W. Bush and San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, between heterosexual and homosexual, between spiritual revival and moral carelessness. It is a choice between good and evil, life and death.

As a young American, I take interest in this crisis because, in a sense, it is not unlike the battles fought by previous generations of Americans, fought against slavery, fascism and communism. In our generation, we must combat the spirit of indifference that pervades our land—indifference to the utter destruction of marriage, indifference to the growing disdain for truth, indifference to the need for spiritual renewal.

For in the cases of America’s past divisions, it was not so much in the halls of Congress or the corridors of bureaucracies that evil was defeated. It was not even the hallowed text of the constitution that made America strong. Rather, it was in the hearts of the American people that decency triumphed over moral perfidy. And there today, in the hearts of our generation, character must win the victory if America is to have to a future.

As General Douglas MacArthur said, “It must be of the spirit if we are to save the flesh.”

— Hans Zeiger is a Seattle Times columnist and conservative activist and can be reached at hazeiger@hillsdale.edu. Responses to this column can also be sent to collegian@csufresno.edu