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gay-In Truth there is no East or West
A blogologalog in embodying the future, not embracing the futurology of David Blankenhorn.
TOWARDS A GAY THEOLOGY
One power of perfectly positioned prejudice is that Blankenhorn can write or talk about marriage, without really ever specifying how he defines it and why. The beauty of such a stage act is to cast his musings as those of the roving empiricist, investigating “attitudes” and associated “behaviors”. He masks his theology, in doing so. Why? To avoid the appearance of trying to codify a sacramental view into secular law? To be able to tuck in value-laden terms like “erosion”, without explicitly giving justification for such non-empirical characterizations? Honestly, I don’t even need my gay decoder ring to be able to know which punishing bag the cat jumped out of when folks start in about “happiness” principles in the context of rival “goods” (to God’s own?).
For their own part, gay law advocates sometimes fail to meet the challenge of tacit theologies head on, preferring instead to rely on legalistic formulations like the separation of civil from religious marriage or other expert empiricists. Why not just meet the theological challenge with arm of armor? (That’s just a casual observation. I certainly haven’t read all of the rapidly growing set of “must read” books on the matter.)
Ignoring the danger of short-handing anything theological, I’ll just do it. There are relationships that seem to have merit, in one way or another, which we choose to bless and to celebrate. Children are the fruits (and worldly burden) of these blessings, not the purpose of them (and in no case the exclusive purpose of them, that I know).
The fruits of non-gay relationships are just incidentally different than the fruits of gay relationships, by biological accident or by procreative choice, even. We bless them both because, after discernment, we find value in them. Furthermore, because we might expect different gifts from each type of pairing, we consider them complimentary goods, not rival goods.
For the most part, the State simply sticks to what are legitimate state interests, such as raising children well, all children, rather than wrongfully picking and choosing among theologies or “promoting relationships” rather than stating and enforcing the civic responsibilities of parents.
Such role definition is critical, because it’s easy enough to dismiss Blankenhorn’s “ideal” of one-man and one-woman for raising children on non-gay grounds. What about the vision of the ideal as Walton’s Mountain, in which a child has access to an environmentally rich, multi-generational family, that includes grandparents, aunts, uncles, siblings, cousins and various friends? I can think of some public policies that would promote that kind of thing, but I doubt most economists would support them. The truth is that children can draw on a variety of sources for their developmental needs, far beyond their parents. Children need most from their parents a loving environment that builds moral character, not mostly some oddly posited complementarity of the sexes.
THE ROAD IS STILL LONG
[to be continued]
