President Bush’s comments redarding same-sex marriage prompted much outrage yesterday. Gay talkshow host Michelangelo Signorile played the clip again and again, shouting, “How dare George Bush call me a sinner!”
Lots of folks agree with the president. The Vatican says countries approving gay marriage are peopled by individuals with “profoundly disturbed minds.”
I was surprised, however, to open a copy of the Dalai Lama’s newest tome, 365 Dalai Lama: Daily Advice from the Heart, and find a series of meditations which frown on homosexuality as inappropriate for believers. With far more grace and clarity than our president, the Dalai intones that any sex other than vaginal intercourse for the purpose of procreation is “wrong” and “against Buddist ethics.”
He goes so far as to include homosexuality within a broad class of “sexual misconduct,” which includes everything from masturbation to rape. In other interviews, he characterizes homosexuality as wrong, unwholesome, and a vice.
What intrigues me is this: can you imagine the uproar if President Bush had said, “Gay people are in the same class as masturbators and rapists. What they do is wrong, unwholesome, and a vice?”
The Dalai’s statement reeks more strongly of disapproval than our President’s — yet there’s been no real expression of outrage. Why? Because the Dalai is more cuddly? Are these sentiments less offensive when expressed by a chubby, balding man in saffron robes?
After listening to it again and again, I actually find myself impressed with President Bush’s statement. Despite Michelangelo Signorile’s claims, the President never said, “Gay people are sinners.” He said we’re all sinners … expressing, in the process, a central tennet of Christian faith.
I don’t agree with the President that marriage should be defined by law as a relationship between one man and one woman … but I do respect him for having the courage and honesty to own, in public, his true feelings.
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