At various times, we have had one or more of our kids in private Christian, public, home, and cyber schools. I can honestly say that the worst experiences in education have come from the Christian school. For narrow sectarian reasons, one of my kids was singled out for ridicule in a way that never happened in a public school.

M, I am not worried about your kids and mine, and I bet the gay students in their school have no problem with them either. However, your kids and mine aren’t the only ones there. Some kids come to school thinking that gay kids are inferior and need to be roughed up a bit. I don’t mind if teachers tell those kids that gays specifically are worth respect and will be protected individually and as a group.

I recall feeling that in posts about anti-bullying programs in the public schools, you seemed not to consider how those types of programs might be exploited by those with a more expansive agenda. I feel those concerns are legitimate, just as I recognize that those who try to introduce intelligent design discussions into public school science classes often consider that but a first step to greater things.

How are these two things related? There is plenty of room in schools for ID in philosophy classes, but as the evidence pointed out in the Dover, PA trials, it does not belong in science classes. Whatever agenda might be accomplished by anti-bullying programs it is entirely unconscionable that Christians, above most others, would try and prevent them from being adopted, especially in the wake of so many suicides which appear to be tied to bullying of gay or perceived-to-be-gay kids. I can’t believe you’re even condoning such concerns.

Re: “Can it for once be about the children? Please?”

Of course! My standard is simple: no child – gay, straight, liberal, conservative, religious, atheist, should ever have to feel threatened or isolated at school. If the school wants to deliberately present a particular ideology, however, the environment that creates for those who will come under pressure for disagreeing with the ideology has to be considered, as well.

This is a convenient dodge (one I hear quite often from Evangelical folks) of the reality currently being faced by some gay kids. Anti-bullying programs SHOULD be about creating a safe place for all kids, regardless of their religious affiliation or lack thereof, or sexual orientation. However, you do not address the present problem of kids committing suicide because of bullying related to their sexual orientation. Sometimes anti-bullying programs have to be targeted to particular groups to make sure a particular point is made. Schools have to be able to talk about sexual orientation in order to make these schools safer.

Regarding your statements about marriage:

Additionally, why is the state identifying a romantic arrangement as being of particular value, particularly if access to legal benefits, not children, is the issue at hand?

Then why allow infertile or old couples get married? If you want to ban marriages for those that cannot have children then you need to do that across the board and be fair about it. But be aware that many gay couples, esp today, are raising children.

If the word *marriage* bothers you so much, I’m fine with domestic partnerships (even if the same sex couple was married in a church), but the rights and privileges have to be the same as for married couples or you create a second-class citizen and that’s never going to pass constitutional muster.

The problem, as I understand it, with the ‘Seven Mountains’ mob is they disagree with such a separation.

Of course Christians (like myself) want to see society be constantly enriched by truly Christian values (just as those campaigning for human and civil rights for, say, lesbians and gay men, want society to be enriched by the values that they espouse); the moment one tries to ‘enrich’ society through coercion, it is surely only ultimately impoverishment that ensues. And religious-based coercion is probably the most dangerous type there is.

As long as traditionalists recognize that homosexuals pay taxes, too, and that we therefore have every right to expect some fair accommodation from the government, including some sort of legal recognition of our relationships and households, “it neither breaks my arm nor picks my pocket” if they personally consider homosexuality to be immoral.

As to the question of whether Jesus Christ approves of homosexual relationships or not, that’s for traditionalist and progressive Christians to duke out amongst themselves — I’m not a Christian and it’s not for me to tell them what to think. (Although personally I root for those who say that Jesus approves of same-sex marriage, but he hates same-sex fornication, same-sex adultery, and same-sex divorces…)

As I said, I think I’m cool with gay marriage if “marriage” is here to stay in the civil realm. I just think it is a mistake to start with to blend a religious and civil institution like this; it’s going to cause more problems in the long run.

As for harm being the litmus test for public policy, that still leaves us with some seriously tricky situations, because people will disagree over what causes harm, what constitute harm, etc. Democracy is messy!