A Man-to-Man talk

I know we have talked and talked about the bills being proposed to make same-sex marriage legal in our state.  I don't want to talk about that bill per se, as we all can have our opinions, no matter how wrong.

But the debate sponsored by Dan Rodricks in the SUNpaper, on his midday radio show on WYPR FM and on the pages of Facebook, caused a woman named Diane to write an interesting letter to the editor of the SUN.  Here is what she said: 

Good for Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller saying he believes that marriage should be between a man and a woman because that arrangement is blessed by God ("Wait just a blessed moment, Mike Miller," Jan. 27). The majority of us still believe that! God has plenty to say against homosexual liaisons in the Bible, and nowhere does it say that He blesses such unions. All I can say to Dan Rodricks is that in the very end (of time), we will see who has this right.

First, I betcha that's not ALL you would have to say to Dan Rodricks about this, but I have to say a couple of things.  The first thing is, I am no Bible scholar, so I am at a disadvantage if people start quoting from Leviticus.  I know I believe in God, and God tells me above all to love everyone.  I am heterosexual and am happily involved in a 37-year "standard" marriage.  During those 37 years, I have seen plenty of marriages between men and women start off fine and end in heaps of acrimonious bickering, amid charges of adultery, drunkenness, physical abuse, mental abuse, and all down the line.  I don't think that's what God had in mind when He talked of marriage, nor did I figure that He favored a 55-hour sham marriage between Britney Spears and some guy she dated in Louisiana just because it was a man and a woman. 


And I have seen plenty of marriages start off great and stay that way.  Is it significant that some of them are man-woman, and some are man-man and some are woman-woman?  When this sinbuster Ted Haggard hires a male prostitute to have sex with and use crystal meth with, and then goes to therapy and comes out pronounced "totally heterosexual," do you worry more about his drug use and his cheating on his wife, or about the fact that he did those things with a man?


When Diane starts talking about "the very end (of time)," I wonder what she is worried about.  If she feels that her marriage and her life can hold up to questioning at the Pearly Gates, than she shouldn't worry about others so much. Because 100% of the good marriages are between two people, and that's all Diane needs to know.  I humbly suggest to Diane that she worry less about what Dan Rodricks will have to answer for, and widen her views a little to allow others a chance to flourish before that great come-and-get-it day rolls around.


I often think of how sad it must be to be scorned just because of the way one chooses to love.  I think of the words of Sammy Davis, Jr., forced to hide his dates with Kim Novak because they were of different races.  Plenty of Dianes back then raised plenty of Biblical objections to mixed-race marriage, and eventually, common sense won out.  But Sammy said that during that relationship, he was panhandled by a seedy, filthy, drunken, intemperate drifter who approached his limousine and asked for money.  Sammy gave him a C-note and then was saddened to realize that Kim could be seen in public with this mendicant with no outcry, just because he happened to be of the same race as she.  

To the Dianes: Live and let love.  Please.