How Will We Stand
Before Them?
“I never
imagined a day like this would come, where I would be asked to violate a
central teaching of Scripture and of Jesus Himself regarding marriage. To issue
a marriage license which conflicts with God’s definition of marriage, with my
name affixed to the certificate, would violate my conscience.”
-Kim
Davis, Clerk of Rowan County, Kentucky
The
media and homosexual rights activists delightedly mock her and trot out her
less-than-righteous marital past which includes four marriages and children
conceived in an adulterous union. After spending five days in jail for contempt
of court, upon release she has agreed not to interfere with the issuing of
marriage licenses from her office to same-sex couples, although her name will
not be on them, which could compromise their validity, as only the elected
County Clerk can issue marriage licenses.
For
all that, Kim Davis, county clerk of Rowan County, Kentucky, has done something
worthy of our admiration: in a nation in
which, according to a recent poll, 41% of Americans disagree with the Supreme
Court Obergefell vs Hodges decision
(which unilaterally legalized same-sex marriage throughout the country,
overturning the bans which still existed in seven states), and 56% of Americans believe that religious freedom should take precedence over gay rights, very few people have actually stood up and opposed the new “law,” - in fact the
creation of five individuals on the Supreme Court rather than a law enacted by
Congress- with the subsequent unpleasant consequences.
The
White House on the day homosexual “marriage” was “legalized”
It
cannot have been an easy time for Davis when she was faced with the dilemma of
issuing licenses which directly went against her Christian beliefs. During her
court testimony she stated that she fasted and prayed about the decision and
resolved to follow her conscience, but would not take “the easy way out” by
resigning her post (as an elected official she cannot be fired, only impeached,
which is unlikely because most Kentucky officials are of the same mind). While Davis could have some hope that she
would be able to get away with her actions, as some Alabama and Texas counties
are not issuing marriage licensesto homosexuals as well, still, she faced jail
time and an uncertain future.
She
has also experienced a media backlash, exposé of her personal life, a mocking billboard
and protesters in her hometown, and threats of arson, rape and death. Her
husband was told that he would be beaten up and then be forced to watch while
his wife was raped. Hateful comments are rampant on the Internet, in general so
vulgar that they cannot even be quoted here.
“Someone should just kill Kim Davis,” one person tweeted, “The world
doesnt (sic) need people like her.” Davis was forced to change her home phone
number in order to avoid the hate calls.
Where
is the tolerance and love that the homosexual establishment so fervently
preaches?
Despite
many promises from the establishment that the new marriage law will not impinge
upon religious rights, Davis is far from the only target and victim of hatred
by homosexuals for living according to her Christian beliefs, nor will she be
the last.
There are
numerous stories of how the homosexual lobby has destroyed family businesses –
and hence families – because they did not want to cater their “weddings.” Aaron
and Melissa Klein, parents of five, were fined 135,000 dollars, enough to
bankrupt them, and forced to shut down their bakery in Oregon after refusing to
make a cake for a lesbian wedding. Now Aaron works as a garbage man while Melissa
homeschools the children to protect them from bullying at school. They have
also received numerous death and arson threats, while their bakery truck parked
in front of their home was vandalized twice. Upon reporting these incidents to
the police, the only advice given was “get a gun.” A family pizzeria was closed down in Indiana
and a florist in Washington was closed down for the same thing. Perhaps the
most disturbing is the case in Idaho City, where Protestant pastors were faced
with jail time of 180 days and a fine of $1,000 for each day that they refused
to perform a homosexual “wedding.”
The
Klein Family
Christian
pastors and business owners, however, are not the only ones suffering: in an
open letter to the Federal Fifth District Court, signed by Katy Faust, B.N.
Stein, Dawn Stefanowicz, and Robert Oscar Lopez, four grown children raised by
same-sex couples, they write in detail why they are against same-sex marriage. Their experiences vindicate all of the
“homophobic” fears and assumptions any traditionally-minded people would have
about such childhoods. Dawn Stefanowicz describes how, while being raised by
a homosexual man, she was taken to LBGT meeting places where she was exposed to
nudity, sodomy, pornography, group sex, and sadomasochism. Her father’s “partners” ate and slept at
their house, and even if they were not around for long, she had to listen to
them. If she brought any male friends home from school, they were invariably
sexually approached by her father and his “friends.”
Why are more children not speaking up? Stefanowicz explains,
“As children, we are not allowed to express
our disagreement, pain and confusion… Most adult children from gay households
do not feel safe or free to publicly express their stories and life-long
challenges; they fear losing professional licenses, not obtaining employment in
their chosen field, being cut off from some family members or losing whatever
relationship they have with their gay parent(s). Some gay parents have
threatened to leave no inheritance, if the children don’t accept their parent’s
partner du jour.”
While Stefanowicz describes an abused
childhood, Robert Oscar Lopez, raised by lesbians, affirms that he had an
“ideal childhood” according to the ideals of the LBGT propaganda, but he
nonetheless suffered from sexual confusion and turned to male prostitution as a
teenager in his need to feel “needed and loved by a father figure.” He credits his later stabilization in life,
marriage and family, to having found his father and developed a relationship
with him.
These
tragic stories are only a microcosm of the big picture, the outline of which
can be found in entirely non-religious sociological research, such as that done
by sociologist Mark Regnerus of the
University of Texas at Austin and published in Social Science Research, which shows that children with homosexualparents fare far worse than those in intact heterosexual families all across
the charts in every area of life, including education, employment, and emotional
well-being. In contrast to the homosexual
establishment’s assertions, children raised in these households are far more
likely to be sexually confused themselves:
children from lesbian households are 75% more likely to be in homosexual
relationships in adulthood, and children from male homosexual households are 3
times more likely to be in homosexual relationships in adulthood. The most
disturbing and damning statistics are for sexual abuse: children raised by a lesbian mother were ten times more likely to be touched
sexually by a parent or caregiver, while in male homosexual households they
were three times more likely to be abused.
In general, children raised in homosexual households are far more likely
to be sexually promiscuous, whether engaging in homosexual or heterosexual
behavior, when they reach adulthood. Such
findings affirm that B.N. Klein’s experience described in her brief is far from
unusual:
By the time I
was 11, I also found that the gaycommunity had an obsessive unhealthy
invasive preoccupation with their children’s sexuality. They in
fact encouraged sexual activity—because “they were open”… My mother told
me often that being a virgin was for the stupid…”
So we should not just be worried about ourselves and Christians
who will face persecution for not bowing down to the homosexual agenda, but
also a future full of over-sexualized, abused, and neglected children who will
grow up without at least one of their biological parents. Lopez affirms that
his opinion about same-sex marriage has changed from positive to negative,
because while he saw that it would make his mother and her partner’s life
easier, it would have prevented him from making the connection with his father
which would eventually help him lead a stable life. As Katy Faust concludes in
an open letter to Justice Kennedy, one of the Supreme Court justices who ruled
for same-sex marriage,
“We
are just the tip of the iceberg of children currently being raised in gay
households. When they come of age, many will wonder why the separation from one
parent who desperately mattered to them was celebrated as a “triumph of civil
rights,” and they will turn to this generation for an answer. What will we tell
them?”
Here
in “Orthodox” Serbia it may not seem so urgent a task to warn Serbians of the
threat posed by the homosexual agenda.
The experience in America, however, should be a lesson to us all: though
it has a larger population of genuinely practicing Christians of all
denominations, along with many organizations dedicated to the defense of family
and religious freedom, the country has seen a steady decline in victories for
Christians and a steady increase of the power of the homosexual movement. The
homosexual lobby is extremely determined and powerful, and after a few years
can entirely change the laws of a Christian country and even browbeat it into
shifting attitudes – with disastrous results for society, especially the
children.
As it
is, sadly, Serbia does not have much to boast of in the field of morality, with
one of the highest abortion rates in Europe and a divorce rate of one in every
five marriages, not to mention the uncharted immorality in the other types of
fornication and adultery. Forty-one
percent of Serbs in a Gallup poll say that “religion plays an important part in
their everyday lives” – but what does that really mean? Do we
fast, do we pray like our forefathers?
Surely only a very small percent of the Serbian population is living a
minimally Orthodox life. We are realizing the words of Our Lord about the last
times, “because iniquity shall
abound, the love of many shall wax cold” (Mat 24:14). Will we have the moral
strength, and the grace acquired from right living, to continue the fight to
uphold at least some remnant of normalcy in our society? Or will we take the
cowardly line of Patriarch Irenaeus last year, whose only comment about the
Sodomite parade was “let them do it with their own money”? Of course, they DID NOT do it with their own
money, they did it with our taxpayer’s money – who else would pay for a force
of 6,000 armed policemen, tanks, and helicopters to swarm our capital city like
a conquering army? We should at least be
proud that the establishment thought it necessary to take such measures, and we
should strive to keep it that way as long as possible. This is not because we
intend to do physical harm to these unfortunate, demonized people, but because
we want to show our anti-Serbian government that there is still a Serbian
people alive enough to fight for a healthy and safe future for their children.
As a nation, aware of our low moral state, all the more blameworthy because,
unlike most Americans, we are of the true faith, we should at least
follow the example of one once very troubled Protestant convert in America, and
take a stand however we can, whatever the consequences may be. Kim Davis had a sinful life, but once she
accepted Christ in the way presented to her, she actually changed, from giving
up makeup, wearing skirts and growing out her hair, to the more serious changes
of stability in her married life and regular worship in church. During her time
in prison, she began a bible study with her fellow inmates which she continues
now that she is (for now) a free woman.
That fundamental repentance gave her the moral strength to do what she
did. We should examine our own lives and
actions and really consider whether we are living for our own salvation and the
good of others around us, or taking the selfish and ultimately damning path of
least resistance. Even if our sacrifices and suffering do not save this nation,
at least our consciences will be at peace and we will not stand before the Lord
in shame as traitors to His holy commandments, nor will we stand condemned by
future generations as collaborators in the creation of a hellish, nightmare
society in which they must live. These people and their supporters may have a
different look and different trappings from the Turks, but their “tastes” are
very similar, as is their ruthlessness, and they are right at our door. St Lazar’s curse summons us to the fight.
Nun Ekaterina Allen
Uteshiteljevo Monastery
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