Congratulations Proxy, that was an excellent point!

Dear Runner,

Questions such as whether homosexuality, pornography, incest, partner-swapping, abortions, etc. etc. are good or bad, may be interesting, but are not the subject of this particular discussion.

This discussion is only about legal matters, not moral matters.
Legal matters are of a secular nature.

Would you agree that God gave us free choice?

In that case, who is the government to try to take away God's gift from us?

Remember, one cannot be good unless one CHOOSES to be good. Acting out of compulsion simply does not count as virtue! Making (and enforcing) laws denies us not only the option to be bad or naughty, but also denies us the option to be righteous and virtuous, to allow our inherent goodness to shine and our divine spark to win. With compulsion, without the freedom to choose, life's own purpose is lost:

"See, I have set before thee this day life and good, and death and evil; In that I command thee this day to love the LORD thy God, to walk in his ways, and to keep his commandments [snipped-for-brevity-and-space]... I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life, that both thou and thy seed may live"

[Deuteronomy 30, verses 15-19]

As a lover of God, your own blood should boil at the idea of a secular institute undermining God's essential gifts to humankind.

----
(sorry, this is my 4th post here for the day, so it will be a while till I can respond again)

Yuyutsu
You make some good points however the article is about having a 'conscience' vote on what they call gay marriage. I would of thought conscience implied moral. One definition reads 'Conscience is an aptitude, faculty, intuition, or judgment of the intellect that distinguishes right from wrong.' Legal matters are moral matters.

My point is clear. Anyone without a depraved seared conscience could not vote for something as destructive or perverted as what is called gay marriage. And no I would not want to take away people's choices. That is normally more in line with secular dogma.

INCESTUOUS COUPLES.

The ONLY reason that a father cannot have a sexual relionship with his daughter is.... GENETIC. i.e..if he fathered a child the chances of deformity or mental retardation are high.

SO....SOLUTION. If a man finds himself overwhelmingly 'offspring attracted' and has struggled with this attraction for years.. but has finally resigned himself to "I was born this way"...then the ONLY thing he needs to do in order for that relationship to be fully satisfying and enjoyable is to have a VASECTOMY!

As long as the couple prevent the possibility of PREGNANCY then there is no biological reason whatsover for them not to be married.

Just so is the 'End Game' of a society lacking a moral anchor.

When sex crazed deviates insist on the 'moral' acceptability of their position.... there is no limit to where it will lead.

Man/Woman....Man/Woman/dog....Man/man Man/boy Woman/woman... Woman/Woman/sheep...and so it goes on...and on..and on.

When the dutch boy removed his finger from the dyke... the flood didn't come immediately... the water 'wore' a hole bigger and bigger.

But the flood did come.

And any bright spark who things they can drag that boy away from our societal dyke is in for a suprise.

Rather than defining a crucial party or national political moment, Ken, you overflow with an emotional anti-religious tirade.

Marriage is, by its foundation, a religious institution. To insist that same sex relationships be recognised the same as marriage declares the desire to imitate the marriage ideal and thus honour and uphold the institution.

To insist on being allowed to play the game, while dismantling its basic rules doesn’t make much sense.

Many gays realise this, and see the fallacy in pushing for it.

Yours is a side-issue, Ken, but we see the real agenda in your anti-Christian polemic.

That's a very narrow view, Boaz.

>>When sex crazed deviates insist on the 'moral' acceptability of their position.... there is no limit to where it will lead<<

It could, of course, lead to the founding of a fairly major dynasty

I presume you do know that Abraham married his sister?

Fortunately, you are not in the cleft stick in which creationists find themselves, having to explain the descendants of Adam and Eve without mentioning the "i" word.

Autre temps, autre moeurs.

Dear Runner,

Thank you for your kind reply.

A 'conscience vote' is a political term. It simply means that a member of parliament is allowed to vote as they wish and not as their party wishes. It does not imply that all members of parliament necessarily have a conscience, actually follow a moral code, or have the faculty to distinguish right from wrong.

I understand the confusion of words, but this is still a secular term and a merely secular issue.

Now, nobody actually is voting for gay marriage, or ever suggested to encourage it: this vote is only about allowing you and I such an option - along with the blessed opportunity to reject that option. Once gay marriage is allowed, you should actually rejoice for all those people, by far the vast majority, who COULD marry their own gender, but choose not to.

As I mentioned earlier, my personal view is that all this storm in a tea-cup should be bypassed: the state should stay away from marriages altogether, of any kind. It is none of its business.