I have created some controversy with my public stand in support of marriage equity. I hope that this paper may clarify my views enabling both my supporters and detractors to come to a deeper understanding of the issues.

My primary concern is not one of marriage equity; this is simply the presenting issue. I want, however, to stress the importance of this matter in the terms of human dignity and justice.

The abiding concern is one of the relationships of people of faith with the secular state.

A secular democracy is a system of government that respects that citizens have a variety of religious practices, beliefs and traditions. The government doesn't infringe upon the various individual beliefs, and does not impose one set of religious beliefs upon any unwilling citizen. People of faith are free to live out their private religious traditions under the rule of law. If personal religious practices infringe the law, then the faith practitioner must we willing to pay the penalty prescribed by the law.

The marriage equity debate has vividly raised the issue of the imposition of a certain religious view upon unwilling citizens, who are for all intents and purposes, living entirely within the rule of law.

In a secular democracy can legislators legitimately be motivated by their personal religious convictions to deny a right to one group that is afforded to another? The answer to this is clearly no, as it would be a contradiction in terms for a secular democracy.

Religious special interest groups, and any other group for that matter has the right and even responsibility to inform legislation, but not the right to form it. The churches have every right to lobby the legislature to be exempt from performing same sex marriage as a matter of conscientious objection. The secular government then has a responsibility to allow the churches to discriminate on certain matters of conscience. The advantage of a secular democracy is that it can allow for limited discrimination within the rule of law, while simultaneously protecting the rights of diverse groups of citizens.

To enshrine in law the denial of a secular civil right creates a precedent that could, in the fullness of time, be used to deny the rights of other groups. There is no doubt that some time in the future Christians will become a minority group in Australian society. Until then it is difficult for them to fully appreciate the ramifications of their campaign to deny homosexual people marriage equity.

Most Christian appeals on the issue of marriage equity are based in the bible. This raises the question; what place does the Hebrew and Christian scriptures have in the life of a secular state? Some would say none. However that would only serve to impoverish the western democratic tradition of its foundational Meta Narrative. Whether we like it or not, the biblical narrative is a formative part of our western historical development, and there is much to be learnt from this.

For the biblical narrative to be of assistance as information for legislative purposes it must be read, not through the eyes of faith, but with historical, cultural and textual criticism.

The text most used by the opponents of marriage equity is Leviticus 18:22. This lies in the midst of a long list of dietary, cleanliness and moral laws, the breaking of most of which is commonplace in modern society, and rarely raises an eyebrow. It is not clear why one short verse on homosexuality has taken on such enduring primacy. Can a theory of sexuality that has its origins in a Bronze Age understanding of society and science be used to inform 21st Century legislation?

These are some of the issues that I have attempted to raise through my public statements. I have also attempted to be an alternative Christian voice in a context that is dominated by conservative Christians. There are so many people of good will in the community that have a genuine desire to be followers of Jesus, but feel excluded by the dominant voices of some of his more conservative followers.

I want these people to know that there are progressive Christians, and that they can be one too.

Fr Rod Bower
Rector of Gosford
14/12/11