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<SPAN style="COLOR: #f55506">Sergius, Bacchus, and the growing myth of “early Christian gay marriage”</SPAN></DIV>
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<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify" class=MsoNormal>by <B>Thomas Peters</B> on August 24th, 2010</P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify" class=MsoNormal> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Just as Dan Brown capitalized on ignorance and prejudice to sell copies of his bestselling <EM>The Da Vinci Code</EM> novel, some historians have tried to sell gay marriage by claiming that the early Christian martyrs <A href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saints_Sergius_and_Bacchus" rel=nofollow target=_blank>Sergius and Bacchus</A> are an example of Church-sponsored same-sex marriage.</P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Seriously?</P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">With Judge Walker’s recent decision to declare same-sex marriage a “constitutional right”, gay-marriage proponents are in overdrive trying desperately to convince people on the fence that gay-marriage is the wave of the future – as well as the suppressed reality of the past.</P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Consider <A href="http://current.com/1levn4c" rel=nofollow target=_blank>this article and headline</A> by Daniel Maguire on AlterNet:</P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"><STRONG>“Christian Right Bigots Are Hiding the Truth — Early Christians Condoned Gay Marriage”</STRONG></P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"><STRONG></STRONG> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"><EM>Many of the world’s religions — including Christianity — supported same-sex unions, a reality obscured by modern-day shrill, conservative commentary.</EM></P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"><EM></EM> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Dan’s goal isn’t to convince <EM>us</EM> that his claims are true (I’ll show in short order how they’re false). His goal is instead to confuse and convince the majority of people who will never take the time to investigate his claims – the same people who read Dan Brown’s <EM>Da Vinci Code</EM> and came away believing that the historical evidence demonstrates conclusively that Jesus had a love-child with Mary Magdalen and that the Church has been hiding this embarrassing fact for centuries.</P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">In other words, gay-marriage proponents who bring up the argument about Saints Sergius and Bacchus, like Dan Brown, are either totally deluding themselves about history because they can’t handle reality, or intentionally deceiving others about history because they stand to gain from twisting it.</P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">The claim that Saints Sergius and Bacchus represent an example of Church-sponsored same-sex marriage was first put forward in 1994 by John Boswell in his book <EM>Same-Sex Unions in Premodern Europe</EM>. Boswell’s claims have been completely debunked by David Woods, Robin Young, and Brent Shaw (to name the first three authors I found during a simple internet search).</P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Some samples of the conclusions of their debunking:</P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">“the comparison of the punishment of Sergius and Bacchus to the punishment of those convicted of homosexual offences is misleading at best.” – <A href="http://www.ucc.ie/milmart/sergorig.html" rel=nofollow target=_blank>Woods</A></P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">“the author’s painfully strained effort to recruit Christian history in support of the homosexual cause that he favors is not only a failure, but an embarrassing one.” – <A href="http://www.leaderu.com/ftissues/ft9411/articles/darling.html" rel=nofollow target=_blank>Young</A></P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">“…same-sex marriages forged with the approval of the Christian church, and with its rituals? No. Such a reading is very misleading.” – <A href="http://web.archive.org/web/20060507014622/http:/www.learnedhand.com/shaw_boswell.htm" rel=nofollow target=_blank>Shaw</A></P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">The last author – John Shaw – is actually sympathetic with same-sex marriage, but even <EM>he </EM>cannot stomach the idea of arguing for changing the future based on lying to yourself about the past. </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Dan Maguire and other gay-marriage proponents who call Christians “bigots” and claim we are “hiding the truth” would do well to emulate half the integrity of real historians who, whatever their personal beliefs may be, refuse to project those beliefs unto the historical record.</P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">I think, furthermore, that we can identify a pattern among examples such as John Boswell and Judge Walker. Both men have violated the principles of their vocation (as a historian and judge, respectively) in order to further a personal, “activist” goal. Boswell’s arguments have been called into serious question by other historians, and even powerful supporters of legalizing same-sex marriage are <A href="http://www.americanprinciplesproject.org/blogs/two-thought-provoking-views-on-the-prop-8-decision.html" rel=nofollow target=_blank>uncomfortable</A> with how Judge Walker has tried to force the issue. </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">Nevertheless, even in the face of criticism from their own peers, same-sex proponents feel free to lash out violently against anyone who calls their claims into question.</P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify"> </P>
<P style="TEXT-ALIGN: justify">As a defender of traditional marriage recently <A href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2010/08/18/chuck_cooper_strikes_back_106789.html" rel=nofollow target=_blank>wrote</A> about Judge Walker, does this sound like the behavior of people with an airtight logical case?</P></DIV></DIV></DIV></div><br>
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