Open Letter to Senator Warner


I am moved as I am watching the C-Span series on “the Capitol”, and am moved, not just by the history, but also by the standard of behavior of great senators. And I am wondering if your eventual contribution will be as great as your potential. I admit a cautious respect for your performance as our senator. Cautious in that I don’t know you well, but the glimpses I see of you on talk TV and C-Span from the floor of Congress, give me the sense of your wisdom, intelligence, patience, humility, good nature, and judgment – if not a little political savvy.

And I wonder if you also have the courage, and are as enlightened, relative to our forebears – to that of Jefferson and Patrick Henry. Whom I can imagine today would take a stand against the real and present, state-prescribed, discrimination of homosexuals. This, long years after every reputable expert has agreed that homosexuality is not a moral choice, but is a condition of being.

After slavery was abolished, most people came to realize how bad it had been. As women were given equality with men, most people came to realize how bad it had been. As mentally ill were treated humanely, most people came to realize how bad it had been. But the heroes to me were those who saw the evil when it was in place and took a stand against it then. Those are the ones in favor in my eyes and I would imagine in God’s. I think there will be a time in the future when two adults in a loving committed relationship will be celebrated, whether that is a traditional husband-wife or is a same sex couple. Enlightened peoples, enlightened countries, and in America, enlightened states and religions, are today seeing the truth to this.

Surely you have the understanding of the bright line, the firewall, our founders placed to separate both church and state from undo intrusion on each other. Civil marriage and church marriage can be and should be separate. But to acknowledge that, logically requires you to recognize that civil marriage be viewed from a civil, and thus a rational and scientific argument -- and not from a superstitious, or unaccustomed, or uneducated, even if popular, argument.

A pathway towards gay equality in this country could begin with your support of a “NO” vote on this coming November’s Virginia marriage amendment – not just on the technicality of the second paragraph, but on the very ugliness of the first paragraph alone.

I ask that you consider this again, and if you conclude, as I have, that the 200,000 homosexuals in Virginia have a right to expect equal treatment under our Constitution – as equal as is afforded to blacks, to women, to handicapped, to 18, 19, 20 year olds – that no future Virginians will have to live under this type of state recognized discrimination, and can cautiously come out of the shadows and into the public life most citizens take for granted,

I would be surprised if the Senator actually has time to read but a sampling of his mail – I pray that he has the opportunity to read and consider this one.

Comments

Unknown said…
I hope you sent a copy to him...good letter and good points...
Wednesday, July 12, 2006 11:52:00 PM
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