Wednesday, April 30, 2003

Santorum's 'gay bashing': Let's take a closer look

By DR. EARL TILFORD

Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA), a devout Roman Catholic, sowed the wind to reap a whirlwind when he stated regarding a pending Supreme Court case on the Texas sodomy law, "If the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual (gay) sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything."

The senator is making a legal argument. I think it is one firmly grounded in basic Judeo-Christian morality.

The League of Gay and Lesbian voters and "OUTfront," a wing of Amnesty International, among many other gay-rights advocacy groups, viciously attacked Santorum's remarks. The Democratic Left is incensed. What's new?

Santorum holds that he firmly believes in equality before the law for all Americans regardless of race, creed, gender or sexual orientation and we should take him at his word. The sinfulness of homosexuality is more of a moral argument than a legal one but it also is fundamental to a Judeo-Christian understanding of morality.

Biblical proscriptions against homosexual behavior appear in both the Old and New Testaments. Leviticus 18:22, in a portion of the Jewish Law dealing with basic morality, describes homosexual behavior as "detestable." The verse above condemns child sacrifice and what immediately follow forbids bestiality.

Two chapters later, Leviticus 20:13, also describes homosexual practice as a "perversion" punishable by death. The previous verse deals with incest ... same punishment ... the following addresses sex with one's mother-in-law ... and verse 15 requires death for bestiality. (PETA take note, the animal dies too.) Likewise, the Apostle Paul condemns homosexual behavior in Romans 1:24 and in I Corinthians 6:9. Santorum's position is grounded in Christian morality.

While not all Christians accept Biblical proscriptions against homosexuality, the majority do. In the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), the denomination to which I belong, for nearly two decades a small but vociferous minority advocated ordination of gay and lesbians and performing same-sex marriages. In three separate votes put to the Church's membership, elders and ministers affirmed retaining Biblical standards of sexual behavior by successively larger margins.

Furthermore, the position condoning homosexuality as an "alternative" to heterosexual relations within the sanctity of marriage is a minority position within Christendom as a whole. The same goes for Judaism and I would imagine Islamic proscriptions against homosexuality would be equally strong.

Rick Santorum, like us all, is a man informed by his morality. His comparison of homosexuality to bigamy, polygamy, incest and adultery no doubt offends many people. While Sen. Santorum claims that his remarks must be taken within their legal context, legality and morality do not always equate. After all, chattel slavery and segregation were legal. German lawyers were present in force at the Wannsee Conference on Jan. 20, 1942, when Reinhard Heydrich planned the Holocaust.

Whatever the legal ramifications, the notion that homosexual practice is immoral issues from traditional Judeo-Christian understandings of sexual morality. To accept homosexuality as moral within a Biblical context one also must accept bigamy, polygamy, incest and adultery. Ultimately not even our pets will be safe.

Advocates for gay and lesbian rights, particularly those who argue that homosexual activity is morally acceptable, base their arguments on several related assumptions.

First, and perhaps most compelling, is that since homosexuals are "born that way" their behavior is natural and, therefore, acceptable. Leaving aside that the evidence that homosexuality is a matter of genetic disposition, from a moral perspective it also is irrelevant.

The evidence that alcoholism results from genetic determination is far greater, but does that mean we condone public drunkenness? Try that argument on your highway patrolman. What about getting smashed in the privacy of your own home? Certainly, we have that right, but insurance companies also have a right to decline health and homeowners insurance to drunks.

Natural does not equate to good. Otherwise Ted Bundy might be a free man getting his "natural" gratification by inflicting pain and death on co-eds.

Second, a modified form of this argument holds that this is a social justice issue, like civil rights for African Americans or women's rights. Legally, that argument may have merit, but morally it fails because it is no more a sin to be born an African-American or a woman than it is to be born a white male. From Judeo-Christian perspective, we are all subject to original sin. Christians believe sinners need redemption, not confirmation. Gay and ethnicity do not equate.

Third, there is the argument that homosexuality is widespread, so it must be socially and morally acceptable. How "widespread" homosexual behavior actually is a matter of debate. Gay-lesbian groups tout figures such as "10 percent" but in reality 2 to 3 percent probably is more realistic. The fact is the vast majority of us are heterosexuals.

In the final analysis, what people do in the privacy of their own bedrooms is their business, a matter between them and God. Sen. Santorum said nothing that denies treating everyone equally before the law. One's moral fiber, however, is essential to one's character and it will determine their weltanschauung. All Christians believe in forgiveness and redemption.

Ultimately, the voters of Pennsylvania, of which I am one, will decide if Sen. Santorum's service to our interests warrants keeping him in office. A factor I will weigh is the extent to which his moral convictions determine his political actions.

[Dr. Earl H. Tilford is Professor of History at Grove City College. He enjoyed an extensive military career and after retiring from the U.S. Army, served as an associate professor of history at Troy State University in Montgomery and professor of military history at the U.S. Air Force Air Command and Staff College. In 1993 he became director of research at the U.S. Army's Strategic Studies Institute in Carlisle, Pa., where he worked on a project that looked at possible future terrorist threats. He has authored three books on the Vietnam War and co-edited a book on Operation Desert Storm. He has lectured throughout the U.S. and abroad on the Vietnam War and, more recently, the future of armed conflict.

Grove City College is listed as one of the Most Competitive colleges in the nation by Barron's. In its category, Grove City College is also ranked by U.S. News & World Report as No. 1 Best Value and No. 4 overall in the 2003 guide to America's Best Colleges. Grove City College has also been called a "best value" and a "hidden treasure" by guidance counselors in the Kaplan National High School Guidance Counselor Survey. Founded in 1876, it is located 60 miles north of Pittsburgh, Pa. With an enrollment of 2,300 students, it is a private Christian college teaching the liberal arts, sciences and engineering. It is an advocate of the free market economic system and accepts no federal funding. Tuition is about half of the national average for private colleges.]