Ideas and Society

Since organizing Defend Marriage to fight for traditional marriage and the natural family in the political arena, I have sometimes been asked, “why?”  

It is not that most people do not understand the importance of this effort.  They do.  

What they mean is, “why me?” 

After all, as many well-intentioned people–and others who perhaps are less well- intentioned–point out, I have already taken on more than I can do well.  In addition to trying to fill such personal roles as husband, father, church member and sometime amateur actor, I am a BYU law professor and Managing Director of BYU’s World Family Policy Center. In this latter capacity, I have had the opportunity to represent the Center over the years at many international conferences and negotiations. I recently calculated that so far this year I have been out of the country on such assignments about a third of the time.  

While there are many facets of the answer to the question, “why me,” the primary ones stem from these experiences abroad. Attending these international conferences and meetings gives me a better perspective than most Americans on how serious the assault on basic moral values and critical institutions has become worldwide. The focus of these attacks is not just sexual issues that directly impact traditional marriage and the natural family, though that is certainly the most active area. It includes such other morally-based social issues as abortion, euthanasia, and “children’s rights” as well.  

Consider several recent developments internationally just in the area of sexual issues.  

We are rapidly losing the fight to prevent legalizing same sex marriage in most of the developed nations of the world. It is already legal in Belgium and the Netherlands and, it appears, soon will be in Canada as well. The provision of the European Union’s Charter of Fundamental Human Rights that prohibits “any discrimination based on any grounds such as.sexual orientation” almost certainly grants a right to same sex marriage throughout that growing union of nations.  

With that battle virtually won in many countries, the new “cutting edge” issue for homosexual activists is passing laws to prohibit any “vilification” of homosexual conduct, imposing civil and in some cases criminal penalties. No one should doubt that this is a worldwide effort. At the 2002 AIDS conference, the United Nations High Commissioner of Human Rights asserted that it is already obligatory for member nations of the United Nations to “create appropriate legal penalties for vilification of homosexual behavior.”  

A number of nations have adopted various versions of “vilification” laws in recent years, including Canada, the Netherlands, Australia, South Africa, Great Britain and Sweden. While these laws have broad implications for the rights of free speech generally, the more insidious danger is to expression of religious beliefs. The Judeo-Christian-Muslim religions are the last great reservoirs of moral teachings and standards in the world. To the extent that they can be muzzled by governments and prevented from advocating moral positions on sexual issues or any other, the critical final battle is being lost.  

Recently, there has been one successful civil prosecution of religious speech in Britain and one unsuccessful criminal prosecution of religious speech in the Netherlands. While the recent decision of the federal government of Canada to push legislation to legalize same sex marriage in that country has gotten wide publicity, less well publicized was the civil conviction of two Canadians for exercising religious speech. Their “crime?” Publishing an advertisement listing Bible verses condemning homosexuality.  

The European Union’s Charter of Human Rights may also be a source of prosecution of religious speech. Its provision that “nothing (in the Charter) shall be interpreted as implying any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms recognized in this Charter” is immediately in conflict with other provisions in the Charter supposedly protecting religious freedom. It is not at all clear how European courts will rule in the inevitable cases that will claim that religious teachings violate the Charter’s guarantees of freedoms or protections from discrimination based on sexual preference.  

And, lest any of us assume that it cannot happen here, Pennsylvania recently became the first state to pass a “vilification” law. In another very troubling development, U.S. courts have begun to hand down decisions recognizing “new” rights based on U.N. agreements– even though they have not been ratified by Congress or have been specifically excluded by Congress as having any impact on domestic law.  

It is clear to me that other nations around the world are simply ahead of us in how far along and how successful these attacks are on vital institutions and moral standards. The campaigns both here and abroad are well-organized, well-planned and very well-funded. They use similar tactics and venues, including our public schools and universities, popular entertainment and the media to desensitize us to their true objectives. We are running the risk of the proverbial frog swimming in water being slowly heated to the fatal boiling point.  It has already happened in much of Europe and other developed nations and it is probably too late to reverse it there. Unless we take immediate steps to warn the people in this country about what is happening and organize them to fight back, it will happen to us here as well.  

One of my primary reasons for starting Defend Marriage, then, is to bring this international perspective to the small but dedicated coalition of conservative groups in this country that are already fighting the good fight. But I also have another reason based on my international experiences. That is the concern I have for the many allies and dear friends I have made over the years, mostly from Catholic and Muslim countries of the developing world. They are struggling against intense international pressures to protect and promote the same morals and values in their countries that most conservative Americans also hold dear, such as the importance of traditional marriage and the natural family and the sanctity of life.

Without us, they have little hope of success.  This is because the United States is not only a military and economic superpower. We are a moral and cultural superpower as well. For good or ill, more than any other nation in the world, what we do influences all other nations.  

However, this country cannot be a force for good abroad unless we are also defending and promoting these same moral values and critical institutions here at home. If anyone doubts how important our domestic policies are to the influences we exert abroad, simply contrast the role of the United States at these international meetings during the Clinton years, when this country was part of the problem, with the situation today. Under the Bush administration, we can be proud that our official U.S. delegations to these world conferences now work hard at being part of the solution.  

The First Presidency’s Proclamation on the Family was a proclamation to the whole world. It imposed certain responsibilities on all faithful Latter Day Saints. But because of the unique role our nation can play, I believe it imposed special responsibilities on Americans.  

We in this time and in this place are being called upon to shoulder a major responsibility to help determine the future of many other nations and peoples as well as our own. Organizations like Defend Marriage are essential to the effort to keep this country “a shining city set upon a hill,” and a “beacon to the nations.”