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A new policy paper from The Heritage Foundation warns that the redefinition of marriage to include same-sex unions “poses significant threats to the religious liberties of people who continue to believe that marriage is a relationship between a man and a woman.” These threats are acknowledged by both those who support and those who oppose redefining marriage, according to to Thomas M. Messner, a Visiting Fellow in the Richard and Helen DeVos Center for Religion and Civil Society at Heritage. Some “talking points” from Same-Sex Marriage and the Threat to Religious Liberty:

— Judicial decisions redefining marriage to include same-sex unions state that limiting marriage to men and women is a form of unacceptable discrimination against homosexuals.

— The freedom to express the view that marriage involves a man and a woman will come under growing pressure as courts, public officials, and private institutions come to regard the traditional understanding of marriage as a form of irrational prejudice that should be purged from public life.

— Individuals and institutions that believe marriage is a relationship between a man and a woman could lose access to government benefits and become subject to costly lawsuits under nondiscrimination laws that protect sexual orientation, gender, and marital status.

— Given America’s long history of protecting the basic human right to religious liberty and the role of religious liberty as a pillar of free society and liberal democracy, lawmakers have a serious obligation to uphold religious liberty and to provide exemptions where laws would force people to violate their religious beliefs.

In California, opponents of Proposition 8, the successful ballot initiative that affirmed traditional marriage, are turning their ire on the Mormons. According to a report in the Salt Lake Tribune, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints “got into the thick of the California battle when officials issued statements encouraging members to actively support the ban. All told, Latter-day Saints are estimated to have given, by some counts, as much as $22 million to the effort.”

Proposition 8 was backed by Orthodox bishops in California and won strong support from blacks and Hispanics:

Exit polls showed that 70 percent of black voters, and a majority of Latino voters, voted yes on Proposition 8, one likely reason why the measure won a slim majority in Los Angeles County, where pre-election polls had suggested it would lose, even though it lost by a huge margin in the Bay Area.

Whether your guy won or lost on Tuesday (mine came in second) you have to marvel at this very exceptional nation called America. And, indeed, the whole world is doing just that. In an editorial, the Times of London described the election as a “Masterclass in Democracy”:

The world has been fascinated and profoundly moved by this election most of all because of what America is — a nation founded on universal aspirations, and thus a mirror to humanity. For two centuries that mirror has seemed irreparably cracked by the legacy of slavery and segregation, a pernicious and enduring racism that remains a factor in the blighted lives of so many of the poor blacks among whom Mr Obama launched his political career. He is not the last role model they will ever need, but he is the most powerful proof his country has produced that it is ready to judge them by the content of their character, not the colour of their skin.

The world watched as 121 million Americans peacefully went to the polls and democratically elected a new leader in Barack Obama. John McCain conceded to Obama in a speech that the Telegraph described as one of “striking grace and generosity.” He will succeed President George W. Bush who immediately and graciously promised a smooth transition.

In his acceptance speech in Chicago, Obama talked about the “values” we share:

Let us resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long. Let us remember that it was a man from this state who first carried the banner of the Republican Party to the White House – a party founded on the values of self-reliance, individual liberty, and national unity. Those are values we all share, and while the Democratic Party has won a great victory tonight, we do so with a measure of humility and determination to heal the divides that have held back our progress. As Lincoln said to a nation far more divided than ours, “We are not enemies, but friends…though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection.” And to those Americans whose support I have yet to earn – I may not have won your vote, but I hear your voices, I need your help, and I will be your President too.

Of course, as Christians, we are more concerned — or should be — about illumination by the Truth than we are about any competition of “values.” Even atheists have values, don’t they? In the coming weeks and months, we shall have hard evidence about how Obama plans to “heal the divides.”
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In yesterday’s Washington Times, James George Jatras looks at the unintended irony in Washington’s opposition to the expected Russian recognition of an independent Abkhazia and South Ossetia in the wake of the Bush Administration’s support for an independent Kosovo. Jatras, an advisor to AOI, asks:

If Moscow stepped over the line in its crushing military response to Mr. Saakashvili’s offensive, what do we call 78 straight days of NATO’s bombing throughout Serbia, destroying most of that country’s civilian infrastructure? If Russia is to be faulted for imperfect implementation of the Sarkozy agreement, what can be said about Washington’s violation of U.N. Security Council Resolution 1244, which ended the 1999 Kosovo war and reaffirms Serbian sovereignty in the province?

The standard reasons cited for making Serbia an exception to the rule we demand in Georgia is that NATO intervened to stop genocide of Kosovo’s Albanians and that they will never again accept being part of Serbia. But after the war actual casualties among all ethnic groups – whether by military action, atrocities committed by both Serbs and Albanians, and the toll of NATO’s bombing – proved to be far fewer than those cited in justification for the war. Compared to South Ossetia’s much smaller population, mutual accusations of genocide against South Ossetians and Georgians, respectively, are proportionally larger than those at issue in Kosovo. And are South Ossetians and Abkhazians less adamant that they will not submit to Tbilisi’s rule than Kosovo’s Albanians are with respect to Belgrade?

Read the full article on the Times site.

Metropolitan Ambrosios Aristotelis Zographos was enthroned on July 20 at St. Nicholas Orthodox Cathedral in Seoul as the Church’s second metropolitan, reports the Union of Catholic Asian News. Around 450 clergy and laypeople of the Orthodox Church from South Korea and abroad attended.

The Orthodox Metropolis of Korea, which is under the Ecumenical Patriarchate, has about 3,000 members with eight local clergymen, including two deacons, and two nuns, the news site reported. It administers seven churches and one monastery.

In his enthronement speech, the new metropolitan spoke of the Orthodox Church’s “unknown treasure” of patristic traditions. He called on all members of the Church in South Korea to bear faith witness through its liturgical and spiritual traditions. “Nowadays, many non-Orthodox Christians around the world recognize the uniqueness of Orthodox spirituality and seek to learn it,” he said.

More on the Orthodox Metropolis of Korea here.

HT: The Western Confucian