As the sacred institution of marriage was appropriated by the state, it didn’t take long before the logic of social contract theory redefined the meaning of the marriage bond.

The Intellectual Origins of Same-Sex Marriage

by Michel Therrien

In today’s “liberal” culture, as religious observance declines, the moral tide goes out, seemingly beyond the drop off. The Supreme Court decision of June 26 concerning DOMA is the most recent in an effort to “liberalize” traditionally held moral norms that owe their original establishment to the faith convictions of a once (and mostly) Christian people. Other norms include the prohibition against contraception, sodomy, adultery, no-fault divorce, abortion, and now euthanasia.

How easy it is to underestimate the salutary effect of grace, not only on our reasoning, but also on the exercise of our freedom. Without the operative effects of grace on the soul, the morally degenerate effect of original sin pervades the social order, and the efficacy of the law written on our hearts falls into disrepute, and with some ferocity it seems, especially when it comes to homosexual behavior (Romans 1:18-32). As it now stands, original sin is shaping a culture of marriage and family life that bears little resemblance to the human good. What ultimately stands behind the gay marriage proposal is a perverse rationale that originates in certain philosophical presuppositions we find all the way back at the inception of liberalism. It is these principles that have led, by a kind of necessity, to the perverse moral conclusions to which we are now being forcibly subjected.

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