The Cincinnati Enquirer has been running a series of briefs on candidates for City Council.  Each candidate responds to the same series of eight questions.  The second question is this: “Would you support efforts to repeal Ohio’s ban on same-sex marriage?”  It was a relief on Wednesday morning to read the response of candidate Melissa Wegman as follows: “Because the definition of legal marriage is contained in the Ohio constitution, any change to that definition must be approved by Ohio voters, not Cincinnati City Council.  Factual, non-emotional, and to the point.

The liberal candidates have been tripping over themselves in their haste to state support for such efforts, and most of them cited “discrimination” as their reason, as they seek the votes of the same-sex sympathizers.  If they fear all discrimination, they should not seek to be on City Council, for every legislative body exists to discriminate in favor of something or against it.

Discrimination is the business of law, and most discrimination is not unjust.  For example, to stay in the area of sexuality, laws against prostitution are not unjust discrimination against working women.  Laws and rules against teachers having sex with their students are not unjust discrimination. Laws against parents having sex with their children are not unjust discrimination.  There is a natural- law basis for all of these laws as well as the experience of centuries.  The same is true about laws that limit marriage to heterosexual couples.  Marriage exists primarily for man and wife to have and raise children who have an inherent need of a male father and a female mother.

To the natural-law basis can be added the traditional Christian belief about the sanctity and exclusivity of heterosexual marriage based on the words of Jesus when he was questioned about divorce and remarriage:  “From the beginning of creation, God made them male and female” (Mark 10: 2ff).  There is a divinely established order of creation, and men and women have a right to marry within, and only within, that divine order.  To believe and to uphold the traditional biblical teaching of heterosexual marriage is not an example of unjust discrimination.

John F. Kippley

October 23, 2013