The family has societal priority
True conservativism depends on an appreciation of natural law. That is, no law can be deemed legitimate if it runs contrary to the deeper and natural law. So, a society may come up with different punishments for murder, theft, battery, and the like, but every society must recognize that these behaviors run contrary to the natural law and must be dealt with. So, we may take this idea to think about children and how they fit into society. Children are not the property of the parents, as if land or animals, but they do belong to their mom and dad. Any kind of trading of children, selling of children, and this includes sperm and egg donation, is contrary to natural law and inherently exploitative.
The rainbow pride is antithetical to true conservatism at the most basic level. Conservatism recognizes that the family has societal priority. Allegiance to God runs to the heart of conscience and freedom, the freedom to do what is good. Then comes family, which is a natural estate that is prior to government and its demands. As such, a free society recognizes parental authority and the parent-child bond. But the rainbow pride redefines and undefines society's foundational institution, the thing that best and most lastingly establishes basic human ties, spreading out into a web of natural relationships.
Adoption is a good option when, due to sin and tragedy, things fall apart. And in it a child finds a true home. This is not the same thing as when Mayor Pete somehow finds a child and pretends that he and his friends are somehow parents. The situation is ripe for exploitation, even as poorer moms will be pressed in having children for others, and the child will be purposefully be left without a mom or dad. Adoption is about making the best of a hard situation, while the rainbow pride purposefully makes for difficult situations, breaking the ties that naturally bind us. As such, marriage is not a construct but is recognized as a natural good, and if that good is not recognized, then it will be purposefully unjust, and anything but conservative.
As rainbow pride is not grounded in truth, it demands coercion, the force of punitive law, ostracization, and the silence of anyone who would point out the fact that the emperor has no clothes. Any Republican who pretends otherwise is either a fool or deceiver, perhaps deceiving himself. Wherever the rainbow pride reigns, Christians suffer, as does free speech. All dissent must be silenced, even as Drag Queen story hour spreads while we sit on our hands in dumb silence. And this includes the indoctrination of our children in schools paid for by our own tax dollars.
Do I expect things to change? No, my guess is that the Chamber of Commerce will win, and that the stakes are too high for most, and so they will simply self-silence. But we should still say such things while there is still the freedom to do so!
The Rev. Dr. Peter Scaer is chairman and professor of Exegetical Theology and director of the M.A. program at Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, Ind.
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