Tennessee has on its ballot an amendment to the constitution to keep gay and lesbian couples from obtaining marriage rights. Probably 7 of 10 voters in East Tennessee support such an amendment. This is a wonderful thing for the political and religious right. We have big elections this November, including Bill Frist's Senate seat. What better way to get out the vote than to put unexamined prejudices on the ballot.
Eric Watson, a state representative from Cleveland, TN said: "It’ll be a sad day when queers and lesbians are allowed to get married ... and kiss in front of the courthouse."
There you have it.
So off we go to the polls, thinking that the most important issue facing us is gay marriage.
It will be a far sadder day when our environment becomes uninhabitable, when we are burning candles for light, and when our economy is in a shambles. The major issues facing the United States and the world are the three e's: ecology, energy, and economy. Our nation is failing at all three.
For the next three blogs, I am going to give my view of why I think that these are three most important issues and why if we fail to address them (that is elect political leaders who will seriously address them) we are in for a dark, dark age.
This is a religious issue. Sharing resources of Earth and sustaining life is about as spiritual as you can get!
Blessings,
john
Sounds good, I’m ready: let us have it. These are issues that can seem so overwhelming, we the people try to ignore them and sort of treat them like an uncomfortable bad dream. This is an exciting direction to explore and potentially take the congregation, where we might even consider some personal sacrifice for things bigger than ourselves. I’m excited about how you might approach this. We need new ways to connect on these issues and personalize our responsibilities to our planet.
ReplyDeleteHi Bobby,
ReplyDeleteThanks! In the end, I do hold out hope for human creativity, ingenuity, and kindness. We need to evaluate what the reality is and then we need to wake up these qualities! Thanks for being part of the solution!
John