National Organization for Marriage Visits North Carolina
By L.A. Williams, Correspondent
Christian Action League
RALEIGH — Enduring shouts and chants from same-sex “marriage” proponents, leaders in the battle to preserve traditional marriage stood strong Tuesday on the grounds of the State Capitol to let the world — and more precisely the Supreme Court — know that they will not be silenced and that God’s first institution for the welfare of the human race will not go down without a fight.
“It is love that compels me to speak out in favor of what is in the best interest of my neighbor, even if that should incur his wrath,” the Rev. Mark Creech, executive director of the Christian Action League, told the crowd of about 70 who were outnumbered more than 2-to-1 by promoters of same-sex “marriage” and a group of atheists who gathered across the street to disrupt the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) rally, one of the latest stops in the group’s nationwide Summer for Marriage Bus Tour.
Brian Brown, president of NOM, said he was growing accustomed to the verbal attacks from homosexual forces and that supporters of traditional marriage should not expect an easy road.
“All of the principalities and powers are going to come down against you …. This is not going to be easy,” he said. “But what great truths? What great movements for justice? When were they easy?”
Brown said that the National Organization for Marriage would do everything possible to support North Carolinians’ right to vote on a constitutional amendment confirming marriage as between one man and one woman, a move he said is even more critical than ever following Judge Vaughn Walker’s decision to strike down California’s Proposition 8.
Bill Brooks, president of the N.C. Family Policy Council, talked over shouts and car horns, telling the crowd that the rally was necessary because people in the Tar Heel state have been “closed out of having a debate where it matters on this issue — in the committees and in the Legislative Chambers of the North Carolina General Assembly.”
The Rev. Creech said organizations like NC4Marriage, the N.C. Family Policy Council and the Christian Action League had lobbied for seven years for a marriage protection referendum, one that polls show would pass overwhelmingly. But he said that even a change to the state constitution is not safe from acts of judicial tyranny and that a federal constitutional amendment is also needed.
“Traditional marriage has had state sanction and promotion in our nation’s history because of what it provides to the state. It is a relationship that has no equal – no peer – and that’s why other relationships are not deserving of state sanction and promotion because they do not contribute to the degree that natural marriage can or does,” Creech said, reminding the crowd of just a few of its benefits, from lengthening life spans of both genders to protecting women and children, lowering welfare costs and modeling gender roles to children.
“I’ll grant that heterosexuals have degraded and injured marriage through divorce. But that’s no credible argument for same-sex ‘marriage,’ which would essentially be the last nail in the coffin for natural marriage,” Creech said.
Mary Frances Forrester, wife of Sen. James Forrester (R-Gaston), who has seven times introduced the Marriage Protection Amendment bill in the General Assembly, told the crowd on behalf of Concerned Women for America that redefining marriage will lead to the end of marriage, a fact borne out in Scandinavian countries where same-sex unions are legal and now a majority of children are born out of wedlock.
She said the fight for marriage was not about battling the small minority of the population who embrace the homosexual lifestyle, but about the rights of parents to teach their children traditional values and about fighting “intolerance of traditional marriage.”
The Rev. Olden Thornton, pastor of the Raleigh International Church, cited apologist Frank Turek, who said the battle over same-sex “marriage” is “not about equality or equal rights, not about discrimination against a class of people, not about denying homosexuals the ability to commit to one another; not about love or private relationships, not about tolerance or intolerance, not about bigotry or homophobia; not about sexual orientation or being born a certain way, not about race or the civil rights struggle, not about an interracial marriage; not about heterosexual divorce, not about separation of church and state, and not even about religion.”
“These are all smokescreen topics designed to divert you,” Thornton said, telling the crowd that in countries that legalize same-sex “marriage,” 96 percent of homosexuals don’t get married.
“So what is the debate about? Same-sex ‘marriage’ will win them what they really want — validation and normalization,” Thornton said. “And they want it government-backed. That’s what we’re saying No to.”
As had every speaker before him, Thornton urged the group to show love in the face of hate.
“We don’t hate anyone over there,” he said in reference to the homosexual protestors who continued to try to disrupt the rally by shouting and sending some individuals across the road which separated the two groups.
“Just as radical as they have been since we’ve been out here, let’s show how radical we can be,” the Rev. Thornton said, asking Christians to extend their hands in prayer toward the protestors and calling on God to change hearts and open eyes.
Protestors, who had earlier been chanting “Get your hate out of our state,” began a chorus of “God is love” after Thornton proclaimed “We love you.”
Brown echoed the “God is Love” chant in closing the rally but reminded the crowd that “Love means standing up for the truth even when it’s not easy.”
He urged the crowd to take their message to polls in November by electing people who will not just give lip service to protecting marriage but who will pass a Marriage Protection Amendment bill. He said North Carolina will be in the spotlight as the Supreme Court measures the nation’s reaction to Judge Vaughn’s ruling.
“You need to be the leaders saying nothing has changed ….the people have stood up and said that marriage is the union of one man and one woman,” he said.
The Rev. Creech said that Christians can choose apathy or choose to “trust God and make a difference for good.”
“Love — real love — that places our neighbor’s good above our own does not give us the option of non-involvement or remaining silent on this issue,” he said. “Future generations are depending on how we live, act, and respond to life’s challenges today.”