LETTERS: MARRIAGE ISN'T CIVIL-RIGHTS ISSUE

To the editor:

Despite developments in Hawaii, Alaska and, more recently, Vermont and California, most Americans would be surprised to learn that our nation is moving ever closer to legalizing marriage between two people of the same sex.

We will know more about trend this month when voters in California decide whether to preserve marriage in its traditional sense -- a union between a man and a woman -- of expand the meaning of marriage to include same-sex unions and other coupling arrangements. Whatever the outcome in California, citizens of other states will soon be faced with the same question: Should our time-honored understanding of marriage as the sacred union of a man and a woman be kept intact?

As a Christian church body that seen the Bible as the sole source, norm and guide for living, the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod must consider even the thought of same-sex marriage as being totally contrary to God's will. This is a truth the church must proclaim to society loud and clear.

In the unique dynamic of marriage, a man and woman enter into a physical, emotional and legal union whereby each sacrifices a portion of his or her independence for something greater. The surrender of personal independence for the greater good makes marriage the basic building block of human society. It creates families, extended families and communities. It is this willing sacrifice of self-interest for the greater good that distinguishes marriage from other coupling arrangements.

Proponents of legalizing same-sex marriages claim the issue does not turn on our timeless understanding of marriage, on the religious or moral debate over intimate same-sex relationship or on marriage's foundational role in society. Rather, they say it is purely a civil-rights matter.

Civil rights are rooted in the recognition that all people are equal under the law. Civil-rights laws protect against discrimination based on immutable physical characteristics like race, sex and national origin. But homosexual behavior is not an immutable physical characteristic. It is a course of action. Civil rights do not protect behaviors and actions. Laws prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sex ensure that the law treats males and females equally. They do not guarantee a right to engage in homosexual behavior any more than they guarantee a right to engage in any other specific sexual activity.

Using the language of civil rights to argue for a right to same-sex marriage is a form of legal sleight-of-hand that shifts our concept of civil rights from protecting people to protecting behaviors.

Since the creation of humankind, the core purpose of marriage has been procreation, the biological ability of married couples to "be fruitful," to conceive and nurture children, thus assuring the survival of the human race. Homosexual couples, obviously unable to fulfill this underlying purpose of marriage, have thus never qualified as marital partners. But advanced in reproductive technology now enable same-sex couple to have children, thus removing the final barrier -- or at least what some courts consider the final barrier -- to same-sex marriage.

This thinking, however, is flawed. Children need to be raised in a setting that provides both male and female role models. This blueprint is simply common sense. The differences between men and women are profound and enduring. Through the workings of marriage, this universe of gender differences is marvelously and uniquely integrated, producing a whole far greater than the sum of its parts.

It is God's intention -- and, therefore, it should be ours -- that a child see and experience these complementary processes at work in his mother and father's common endeavor of raising him. To deny a child this, to place him in a household to be raised by two homosexuals, is to deny him something of incalculable value: the wholeness and completeness he instinctually yearns for and receives through the distinct yet harmonious contributions of a loving mother and father.

Granting the status of marriage to same-sex unions thus requires that we sacrifice the sacred meaning of marriage on the altar of sexual freedom, that we transform our concept of civil rights and that we deny many children their right to a natural, balanced, fully integrated upbringing.

The REV. DR. A.L. BARRY, President

Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod

St. Louis