My generation is tired of the culture wars.
We are tired of fighting, tired of vain efforts to advance the Kingdom through politics and power, tired of drawing lines in the sand, tired of being known for what we are against, not what we are for.
And when it comes to homosexuality, we no longer think in the black-at-white categories of the generations before ours. We know too many wonderful people from the LGBT community to consider homosexuality a mere “issue.” These are people, and they are our friends. When they tell us that something hurts them, we listen. And Amendment One hurts like hell.
Regardless of whether you identify most with Side A or Side B, (or with one of the many variations within those two broad categories), it should be clear that amendments like these needlessly offend gays and lesbians, damage the reputation of Christians, and further alienate young adults—both Christians and non-Christian—from the Church.
Amen.
Read the rest here.
hoping for redemption 
I don’t know if she’s ignorant of the impetus for these amendments, or just being polemical. The amendments are a response to the gay power movement trying to sue their way to victory. This keeps the issue out of the courts. It takes two to culture war.
I’m neutral on the issue, since I don’t think government should uphold marriages of any kind. However, I am not going to base my policy positions on whether they hurt someone’s feelings.
I probably agree with you more than I’d disagree on policy.
However, I don’t think it’s about “hurt feelings.” It wasn’t about hurt feelings when women wanted to vote, blacks wanted to be free, when people from different races wanted to marry. It was about the rights of individuals.
To me, gay marriage is analogous, albeit not identical, to those types of issues. My feelings, your feelings, etc., are secondary concerns.
The civil rights argument fails on a host of levels. For starters, everyone has the equal right to marry someone of the opposite sex. Of course, homosexuals do not WANT to do so, but rights are equal across the board. So the analogy fails.
That said, Rachel’s argument is all about hurt feelings. As is par for the course with emergents, she never considers the possibility those with whom she disagrees might have a carefully considered viewpoint. This post was “are you happy now, jerks?”
I don’t see how this logic really works.
Let’s rewind 80 years and say, “Everyone has the equal right to marry someone of the opposite sex who is also of the same ethnic group.”
For the sake of conversation, even if Rachel’s point is strictly about feelings (and in this post, I think you’re probably right, although she’s got more on the topic than this post), what’s wrong with that? Feelings do matter, right?