Moscow: No Gay Parade!
The Mayor of Moscow this week has rejected a plan to hold the city's first-ever "gay pride" parade [see http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article345947.ece].
Why did he do that? Because the Chief Mufti of Moscow, the leader of the city's Muslim community, said all hell would break loose if he didn't. The mufti warned that Muslim protests against the gay parade "might be even more intense than protests abroad against those controversial cartoons." He was referring, of course, to the riots and embassy-burnings in response to a dozen cartoons of Muhammad published in a Danish magazine.
A few days later, the Bishop of the Russian Orthodox Church in Moscow joined the mufti in condemning the parade. The parade's organizers have threatened to sue Russia in the Eurpean Court of Human Rights, to force the city to allow the parade. Other gay activists have frankly called the plan "suicidal."
Do you ever get a little queasy with the notion that in this "clash of civilizations," we are fighting for the supposed "right" to celebrate and encourage and revel in behavior which the Bible says is an abomination and a sin? Are you totally comfortable with that?
Has the mufti in Moscow got it right, and we wise, worldly, freedom-loving Westerners got it wrong? If it were most cities--if not each and every city--in America, not only would they have the parade, but the mayor and the council would be marching in it beside the topless lesbians, and all the major businesses would sponsor floats celebrating various aspects of sodomy.
Before we rush forth with a fifes-and-drums discourse on the First Amendment, let's cast our minds back to the year 1789, the year our Constitution, First Amendment and all, was ratified. Do you believe, for one minute, that in 1789, even one city in America would have consented to a parade celebrating sodomy? Do you believe anyone would have argued that the First Amendment protected such goings-on? Had anyone dared to hold such a parade, what do you suppose would have happened?
The First Amendment to the Constitution hasn't changed since 1789, but our national commitment to respect God's laws certainly has--and not for the better. In 1789 we would not have needed a Muslim mufti in Moscow to explain to us the difference between right and wrong.
Now, it seems, we do.
Why did he do that? Because the Chief Mufti of Moscow, the leader of the city's Muslim community, said all hell would break loose if he didn't. The mufti warned that Muslim protests against the gay parade "might be even more intense than protests abroad against those controversial cartoons." He was referring, of course, to the riots and embassy-burnings in response to a dozen cartoons of Muhammad published in a Danish magazine.
A few days later, the Bishop of the Russian Orthodox Church in Moscow joined the mufti in condemning the parade. The parade's organizers have threatened to sue Russia in the Eurpean Court of Human Rights, to force the city to allow the parade. Other gay activists have frankly called the plan "suicidal."
Do you ever get a little queasy with the notion that in this "clash of civilizations," we are fighting for the supposed "right" to celebrate and encourage and revel in behavior which the Bible says is an abomination and a sin? Are you totally comfortable with that?
Has the mufti in Moscow got it right, and we wise, worldly, freedom-loving Westerners got it wrong? If it were most cities--if not each and every city--in America, not only would they have the parade, but the mayor and the council would be marching in it beside the topless lesbians, and all the major businesses would sponsor floats celebrating various aspects of sodomy.
Before we rush forth with a fifes-and-drums discourse on the First Amendment, let's cast our minds back to the year 1789, the year our Constitution, First Amendment and all, was ratified. Do you believe, for one minute, that in 1789, even one city in America would have consented to a parade celebrating sodomy? Do you believe anyone would have argued that the First Amendment protected such goings-on? Had anyone dared to hold such a parade, what do you suppose would have happened?
The First Amendment to the Constitution hasn't changed since 1789, but our national commitment to respect God's laws certainly has--and not for the better. In 1789 we would not have needed a Muslim mufti in Moscow to explain to us the difference between right and wrong.
Now, it seems, we do.
