c. 2006 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) I understand that people have different views on homosexuality, as they do on virtually everything. I understand that feelings are high.

But I cannot fathom the political and moral logic that lies behind the so-called “Marriage Protection Amendment” to the U.S. Constitution, better known as the “gay marriage ban.”

If there is any document that needs to be preserved from religious squabbling and moralizing, it is the Constitution.

The Constitution doesn’t exist to resolve religious disputes. It exists to provide a just and equitable environment of laws and rights in which citizens can address religious issues, along with equally thorny issues involving human rights, property rights and competing claims for power.

The Constitution doesn’t exist to implement a certain “American way of life.” It exists to ensure an environment of freedom in which the ways Americans live can flourish and evolve, within a common commitment to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” as stated in the Declaration of Independence.

The Constitution doesn’t exist to implement certain religious beliefs. The colonies had been down that road, and it was disastrous. The Constitution exists to provide an environment in which all citizens are free to worship and to believe as they choose. It is difficult to imagine a situation more antithetical to the American way than faith by fiat.

Yes, Americans disagree, often heatedly, about a broad range of morality issues, from homosexuality to abortion to women’s rights to distribution of wealth. The beauty of our constitutional system is that it guarantees our right to disagree, to speak freely, and to work out our disagreements in the complex matrix of family, community, civic debate, free elections, publishing and commerce.

It is remarkably short-sighted to think that one part in that morality debate is so compelling that it merits undermining the entire fabric of rights and laws. That is theological nonsense. If any topic of Christian morality deserved such a spotlight, it would be the one Jesus actually addressed _ namely, wealth and power.

The proposed amendment is also an abuse of our national heritage, in that it targets one subset of citizens for discrimination and opens the door to other repressive acts of targeting.

Don’t worry, say some observers. The “Marriage Protection Amendment” is just for election-year show, not serious deliberation. Such trifling with our common life is no less worrisome. It manages to trivialize marriage, human sexuality, legitimate methods for resolving disputes and the U.S. Congress all at one time. That seems a lot of damage just to make the point that one branch of Christians doesn’t believe gays and lesbians should have the same rights as other citizens.

Besides, how does banning same-sex unions address a 50 percent divorce rate among heterosexual marriages, high rates of domestic violence, incest, infidelity, economic dislocation, drug and alcohol addiction, and emotional distress? It doesn’t. That, too, is worrisome, because it suggests that repressing gays matters more to some partisans than actually helping people.

Moreover, by ignoring actual causes of family breakdown and targeting homosexuality as the factor requiring sanction, it sets up a classic scapegoating dynamic: If your marriage is in trouble, it must be the fault of gays and lesbians. What then? Pogroms, like those launched by church and czar against Jews in 19th century Russia?

The stability of American society depends far more on freedom, justice, fairness and common sense than on banning certain expressions of human sexuality. History has taught us to ask: If gays are today’s target for moralistic repression, who will be tomorrow’s?

(Tom Ehrich is a writer, consultant and leader of workshops. His book, “Just Wondering, Jesus: 100 Questions People Want to Ask,” was published by Morehouse Publishing. An Episcopal priest, he lives in Durham, N.C. His Web site is http://www.onajourney.org.)

KRE/PH END RNS

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