A Mormon on Gay Marriage

I got a call this morning from a member of the Church of the Latter Day Saints, urging me to vote Yes on proposition 8, which eliminates the rights of same-sex couples to marry in California. His arguments for the proposition were:

1) It would create an amendment to the California Constitution which would prevent the constitution from being changed.

2) It doesn't take any rights away from same-sex couples that they didn't have back in 2000 when Californians voted against giving them rights. In fact, it merely protects the right of traditional couples to be the only ones allowed to get married.

3) If we don't support this proposition, we're risking the secularization of marriage. The way this works is that if we let same-sex civil unions be called marriages, it will retroactively turn traditional marriages into civil unions.

4) If we don't support this proposition, we risk losing our ability to teach our own children that marriage is between a man and a woman, because technically that won't be true, in a legal sense.

This last point was particularly important to him, and our conversation about it went something like this:

Me: So you're saying that failure to pass Prop. 8 would restrict your ability to choose how you bring up your children?

Mormon: Yes! Honestly, I've never heard it put that way before, but that's exactly it, and I want to say thank you to you for articulating it so clearly!

Me: Do you think that everyone should be able to choose how they bring up their children, even if it means teaching them that same-sex marriage is ok? Or do you think everybody should be required to choose to teach their children that marriage is only between a man and a woman?

Mormon: Um, well, obviously I would prefer the latter...