The Coming Political Earthquake – Part 2/Program 2

By: Dr. Frank Wright, Janet Parshall, Craig Parshall; ©2008

Is it true that because gays are “people just like us,” they should not be denied the right to marry? Are there scientific reasons to preserve the traditional definition of marriage?

Introduction

Announcer: Today on the John Ankerberg Show, The Coming Political Earthquake: How the November elections could impact America in very drastic ways.

My guests will explain: Why the coming elections are not just about the next four years, but about the Supreme Court Judges who could affect our laws for the next 30 years.

Mr. Craig Parshall: Those Supreme Court Justices will not only govern during that administration, but if history tells us anything on that, it will be a law in effect for at least two to three decades. So American citizens will reap the benefits or the unfortunate bad law of a Supreme Court Justice for the next 30-40 years.

Announcer: Then, how the definition of traditional marriage and family is at stake.

Mrs. Janet Parshall: I think a lot of people out there never thought in a million years we would have to stand in the marketplace of ideas and give a defense for what constitutes a marriage as one man and one woman. It was one of those universal truths. It’s been there since time immemorial. Cultures that have lasted have been built on that cornerstone institution. Cultures that have fallen began to dabble with that.

Announcer: How the November elections could decide whether America will uphold the right to life of unborn children in the womb.

Dr. Frank Wright: If you won’t defend the life of a baby in the womb what will you defend? What kind of people are we if we will not stand up for the weakest among us?

Announcer: How newly elected officials could drastically change our religious liberties.

Mr. Craig Parshall: The problem with hate crimes is that it has very little to do with preventing crime and a lot to do with labeling Christians with hate, saying we are hate-mongers when we simply preach what the Bible has to say.

Announcer: I will not tell you which political candidate to vote for or which political party to join. Rather, our purpose will be to inform you of crucial issues based on biblical values and explain why basing your choices on those biblical values is crucial.

My special guests today are: Dr. Frank Wright, President of the NRB, the national religious broadcasters, an association of more than 1,500 Christian television and radio broadcasters, representing millions of viewers, and listeners.

Second Janet Parshall, host of a daily three-hour nationally syndicated radio program originating from Washington, DC, entitled Janet Parshall’s America. In February, 2005, she was selected by President Bush to represent the White House in the capacity of public delegate to the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women. As a radio and television commentator, she has appeared on almost every political network television program.

And third, Craig Parshall is the Senior Vice President and General Counsel for the National Religious Broadcasters. Prior to coming to NRB, he represented clients before the US Supreme Court, the Federal District Courts and Courts of Appeal in Washington, DC, Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, Denver, Dallas and Richmond, and has argued before the state Supreme Courts of Wisconsin, North Carolina, and Maryland.

Join us today for this special broadcast of the John Ankerberg Show to hear how the November elections could impact Christians in very drastic ways.

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Ankerberg: Welcome to our program. We’ve got a great one for you today. And we’re talking about a key issue in the elections that are coming up. And we’re not telling how to vote because that’s not our job. Our job is to try to tell you this is what God’s word says, and it’s truthful, and Christians ought to be listening to it, and it should be influencing your decisions when you choose candidates.

Now, the fact is there’s also health reasons, there’s societal reasons, there’s economic reasons that all flow into this question of, are we going to save traditional marriage in this country or are we going to permit same sex marriage to come into our society? Now, there’s a fight going on and part of that fight we’re going to discuss today.

But our guests are Dr. Frank Wright, who is President of the National Religious Broadcasters. All of the 1500 Christian television and radio broadcasters, we formed an assembly, a membership and the fact is, we chose him to be the President over the whole crowd. Over on this side, Craig Parshall, our attorney at the National Religious Broadcasters that represents us. Supreme Court, Appellate Courts, all the way down, gives us advice in different areas. He’s terrific. And then in the middle we have got Janet Parshall, who’s got a three hour radio program every day that close to two million people listen to this thing every single day, Janet Parshall’s America. I mean, she’s just voted year after year the number one talk show host, or of the top 100, she’s up there all the time; the top 100 talkers in America. But I’ll tell you this, that her ratings are showing that she is growing, she could be the number radio hostess on radio and coming up on television as well in the future.

So, Janet, let me start with you. I mean, you are a keen observer and you are an apologist for the traditional family. And President Bush actually asked you to go to the United Nations conferences in terms of looking at women’s issues. So I want to talk to you about the impression that Americans are picking up in this debate. I think that, Craig, you said in a previous program that folks say, “I may be personally against this but, you know, I’ve got a neighbor, I’ve got a friend who is struggling with homosexuality or is gay, alright. And the fact is, you know, I hate to be hard on my neighbor; I don’t want to come across hard on my neighbor.” And I would say I’ve got friends, too, that are struggling with the issues of homosexuality. There’s a large percentage of people in the pews in our churches that are struggling with this issue. But take us back to an interview that Ellen DeGeneres had with John McCain, and let’s start with that in terms of the way it’s being presented across America by the gay movement.

J. Parshall: I’m so glad that you singled that out, because it is emblematic of really those who try to position this as an empathetic argument as opposed to a biblical one or one that deals with objective truth. John McCain was asked by Ellen DeGeneres, “Where do you stand on the subject of same sex marriage?” And he said, “I think it’s a definition reserved to the union between one man and one woman.” And Ellen said, “Well, we’re people too, and you need to understand that we feel just like you.” And, you know what? At one level she’s absolutely right. The handiwork of the creator is all over Ellen DeGeneres just like it was John McCain, just like it’s you and me.

But here is what I know, it isn’t you or me or John McCain or Ellen DeGeneres who said sex outside of marriage is sin. It’s God. And He didn’t say just homosexual sex, He said promiscuous sex, pre-marital sex, extramarital sex. And when you step outside its protective boundary you fall down and you get hurt.

I want to talk to the people that you pointed out, because it’s true; we know that right in our own pews we have people who are struggling with this. But the operative word is struggle. Why do they struggle? It’s because it’s sin in their life. And the reason they’re not comfortable with it is because the way God designed them was for His perfect world, His perfection and the reflection of His handiwork.

So, as an example, we hear all of this conversation that you’re genetically predisposed. Well, absolutely no sound substantial science on that: no robust peer review; hasn’t been in academic journals. In fact, usually these studies are funded by a gay activist where it’s situational ethics, any means whatsoever is justifiable as long as you get to your desired end: we’ll start out believing there’s a gay gene and work backwards; and they just can’t quite get to substantiating that.

But here’s the other issue: we know that people can change. You know, I have to tell you that very often, and I have been involved in this for about 20 years, I have often said to people, “Don’t even step into this arena unless you’re willing to have your heart get broken, because people are hurting in this area; so much self loathing, so much self condemnation.” The father of lies says, “You understand what you’ve done? Do you think you can ever be forgiven for that by God?” And then what happens is the gay community draws you in because you’re affirmed, you can march in their parades, you’re told you were born that way, you can get all kinds of special rights. And the church wags its finger far too often and it doesn’t say, “Wait a minute. You forgot to hear what Paul said, ‘Such were some of you.’” In his long litany of sins, and among those are sexual sins, he points out the fact that transformation is absolutely possible.

But here is the problem, John, as I see it. In all of my years in Washington I have never seen the United Adulterer’s Association march down the streets of Washington. This is one particular sin, politically incorrect though that categorization might be, that’s demanding civil rights and protection. It wants to change the language of our textbooks in schools, it wants to redefine our adoption laws, it wants to redefine our marriage. It is sin because God Himself said it was, and it comes to Washington and plants itself like the Colossus of Rhodes before Capitol Hill and says, “You will give us special rights.”

Now the problem with the church is we’ve blistered against that because we’ve said, “Wait, you’re trying to normalize deviancy.” The problem is, the mandate out of Ephesians is, “Truth in love.” We work against the public policy that tramples truth underfoot, but we reach out that right hand and we rescue those who are caught in the snare of sin, reminding them that all things are possible; that when we come to Christ old things pass away and all things become new again. Sometimes it is instantaneous, sometimes it takes a long period of time. But there are mature brothers and sisters who will walk with you every step of the way. Learn to deal with those desires in conflict and get to a place where you recognize how God designed and made you. His fingerprints are all over your life, He didn’t leave you in the midst of this challenge, and Philippians reminds us that, “We can do all things through him who will strengthen us.”

Ankerberg: Yeah, let me take an illustration from secular society apart from the Christian church here; that when the medical science came in that smoking knocked off seven years of your life, alright, we made laws to put a boundary around people that smoke. And those boundaries have been getting sharper and sharper. So now there’s no advertising on television, and the fact is that, you know, you can’t smoke in most restaurants, you can’t smoke in airplanes and in most hotels. And a lot of people are inclined to smoke, okay, but we made laws because it was detrimental to their health.

Let me just tell you the studies that have been done. Here’s one, Omega study results that compared homosexuals obituaries to that of heterosexuals obituaries, the fact is, those that have died. And it showed something actually staggering.

• It said married men died an average of 76 years of age; the percentage that lived past that were 80% more.
• Single or divorced men, it was amazing it dropped down to 57 years; and they were 32% got up to 80.
• Homosexual men without AIDS, the study was shocking; it showed that they died on average at the age of 42, and only 9% of those that were homosexual men without AIDS went on up to 80.
• Homosexual men without AIDS that were living with a long term sexual partner – in other words, we are advocating or people are arguing for we need to have the stability of a homosexual marriage where two guys stay together – interesting thing is that the study showed those that do engaged in more riskier behavior for a variety of reasons, and their average age of death was 41, and only 7% of them went on to live up to 80.
• Homosexual men with AIDS, they only lived to 39 on average.
• And homosexual men with AIDS with a long term partner, it was still 39, and only less than 2% of those went up to 80.

Now, if society came against smokers on a seven year basis, and we are talking 20-30 years on the other area of homosexual marriages, okay? That’s got to be some evidence that our legislatures, our politicians look at for the safety, for the care of our own people, we should institute laws that prohibit that. Now, that’s just from that point of view. How do you see that constitutionally, attorney?

C. Parshall: Well, first of all, John, you’ve touched on something very important. The Supreme Court has said that whenever there are what they call health and welfare considerations, that is, things that strike at the health and welfare of the American people, by and large Congress has been able to do a wide variety of things in terms of regulations or even prohibitions in their laws that they otherwise wouldn’t be able to do. And so, looking at the statistics you indicated right there, it would appear to be conclusive, beyond debate, that the homosexual lifestyle or lesbian lifestyle is an unhealthy form of relationship.

So, number one, are we talking about outlawing it? No, we’re not. Well, are we talking about protecting it? That’s really the issue. These new laws that are being proposed and some by candidates for President on down, were actually asking that this dangerous and unhealthy lifestyle not only be tolerated but given special constitutional protection. Imagine for a minute that not only did we not have laws about regulation of smoking or putting labels on cigarettes but actually made it a criminal offense for people to criticize smoking in America. Well, you would say that makes absolutely no sense. It’s a health hazard, we have to speak out against it.

The church has the one and only opportunity really to speak with the definitive moral voice from God’s holy scripture in terms of what the consequences and moral depravity of homosexual is. And yet the church is the one really being threatened with silence and censure. Case after case that I have seen this movement has been silencing both in the courts and otherwise those Christians who’ve been speaking out against it. So it’s the one situation where I’ve seen logic and empirical data turned on its head.

Ankerberg: Yeah. We’re going to take a break, and when we come back we’re going to talk about the costs in terms of just the breakup of a traditional marriage, okay? A study just came out; it’s absolutely staggering from an economic point of view what it costs the American taxpayer when our people divorce, alright? We will talk about that when we come right back. Stick with us.

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Ankerberg: Alright, we’re back. We’re talking with Frank Wright, President of National Religious Broadcasters; we’re talking with Janet Parshall of Janet Parshall’s America, her radio program; and Craig Parshall, who’s our attorney for all of the National Religious Broadcasters.

And I want to bring up this little statistic that I have found. A study has come out from the Institute for American Values where they estimate that the cost to taxpayers for the breakup of the traditional marriage, when we divorce or we have children without marriage, period, the fact of, what is the cost to our society to mop up on all the pieces that happen in that thing. They came up with this figure that over 10 years of time the American government puts in $1 trillion to solve the problems that are related to divorce and unwed mothers, alright? Now, that means that we’re spending at least $112 billion every year just on that topic. Now, I bring that up, that is a statistic that is coming from the economic side of the tracks. This is what it’s costing our society. Now, we’ve got to make decisions about, are we going to try to protect our marriages? Are we going to encourage further breakup of the family? Alright, now you were saying that in Europe the fact is there’s a trend when people do legalize same sex unions, okay, what’s the result?

Wright: Well, first of all, let me just say that what you’ve raised in terms of the economic argument and the public health implications, all of those are legitimate topics of discourse for a government that has to establish its public policy. Those are all valid, must be taken into account. But it’s like, Craig made a comment in an earlier discussion about the word movement. And every movement must, by definition, have a direction in which you’re moving from one point to another. So what is the real direction that same sex marriage is in fact moving? If you look at Europe, and we don’t have to debate this in a vacuum, we have these examples in European countries that have adopted same sex marriage. You find that once that right is secured, you would think that all the gays would then get married, right? Not so fast! They don’t. They tend not to avail themselves of the right to be able to marry because that was not their intent in the first place. Their intent is to destroy the moral authority of the church to condemn their behavior as outside the law of God. And so the real target here isn’t the institution of marriage, the real target is who has the moral authority to define relationships in general, the marriage relationship specifically? And so I think that’s what’s the real,… that’s what’s in the crosshairs today; it’s the church of Jesus Christ and our ability to proclaim the truth of the Gospel without the heavy hand or the heel of government to come down on our heads because of some protected class that has been established.

Ankerberg: Yeah, Christians are supposed to love our neighbor, okay?

Wright: Absolutely.

Ankerberg: So the fact, is if we actually love people we are not going to institute laws where they die early, okay? We are not going to institute, supposedly, things in our society that steer our children wrong, alright; that teach them wrong; that are going to cost us economically. It just doesn’t make any sense. But let’s take this whole thing, because I’m listening as a non-Christian at this point too, okay? And you know, it’s always interesting when you find out that your friends are in the news. And, you know, Keith Olbermann was talking about Janet one day and he was criticizing, he must listen to her radio program or something, but the fact is he was criticizing her because she brought up this fact, listen, you know, God says, you know, you shall have no other God’s before me. And he said, “Well, you know, she quoted the verse correct, but I mean, it’s dumb, the fact is, that’s just for Christians that believe in that God, those are the rules for them. But there’s a whole lot of other people who have their other God or no god, and the fact is, they’ve got their own rules for the road.” Would you want to unscramble that for us, the fact is, of what he’s saying and how you come back on that?

J. Parshall: Well, it gives evidence to the fact that he used to be a sports broadcaster and not a theologian. It comes through loud and clear. First of all, you’d have to add Jews to that as well, because that comes out of the Old Testament. But then also, if you’re going to look at this theologically, all the major religions of the world find homosexuality to be abhorrent. It’s not just a Christian ideal. And that’s because, when you stop and think about it, as man is trying to figure out how he connects with God, God has so clearly revealed His truths to us. He has placed eternity in our hearts. For those of us who subscribe to the Judeo Christian worldview, and I want to pick up on what you said because it’s so right; our heart has to break in this area. This isn’t a matter of normalizing that which God Himself calls sin, because in the end you’re going to get hurt. We talked about what we do as a collective cultural ethic, and that’s really what you were intimating before. When Bill Clinton was President he put in place that you couldn’t put a Joe Camel billboard within so many feet of a school, because he wanted to say collectively with one cultural voice, don’t smoke: it’s going to kill you. If any of us go to a convenience store and somebody sells an underage kid a six pack of beer, they’re going to go off to jail just like that.

But collectively as a culture, somehow in the area of sexual sin we harken back to what the pagans were doing in the Old Testament: that sexual deviancy is tied back to pagan worship. And I know that won’t get me invited to the better parties in Washington, but I am going to tell it like it is. The reality is this whole idea of deviancy being normalized has been the hallmark of pagan cultures since time immemorial. So what we get to do as Christians, and it’s a tough challenge for us because there is that loved one who’s struggling, there is that friend that they know, or the church has been too ham-handed up to certain points on this issue. What we need to do is take a deep breath and with great humility say, “Father God, what have You said on this subject? You said that any sex outside of the union of one man and one woman in the paradigm of marriage is wrong. And You said it, not because You are a cosmic killjoy, You said it because when we as His sheep jump the fence we fall down and get hurt. We get gobbled up by the wolves, we die of an early age of a disease.”

And by the way just within the last six months at the Center for Disease Control has said again, and it went horribly underreported, that the greatest number of cases of HIV/AIDS still remain in the gay community. If that doesn’t break our heart as a church, I don’t know what will. So the bottom line is, “there is a way that seemeth right unto man and the end therein is death.”

So what we as the church has to do is really be mature and go back to this mandate in Ephesians 6. It’s not a multiple choice test, it’s not truth or love, it’s truth and love; to be able to battle the public policy that’s roaring at us like a titanic ship coming our way, and at the same time be able to understand that in the midst of the public policy debate, there’s a loved one, there’s a friend, there’s a Senator, there’s a Congressman, there’s a candidate who is caught in the snare of that sin. And how do we throw out the lifeline? Battle the public policy we must, but at the same time throw out that life line to say to the person, “Let me tell you, I love you enough not to smoke, not to drink and not to get in a lifestyle that’s going to take your life.”

Ankerberg: I hope our heart is coming across on this. And I mean, I know that you’re President of the National Religious Broadcasters, and you are sweating it as we are talking these topics, because these are, these are touchy topics. And the tide seems to be turning and going this other direction, alright? And when we talk about the topic even, the fact is we’re branded as being people that don’t care, we don’t love, and we’re hardhearted, and we’ve got this agenda that we’re trying to force down everybody’s neck, okay? And I hope that our heart’s coming across, that we are saying, “You know, we’ve got a whole bunch of reasons. We trust that God knows what He’s talking about. But as we’ve investigated the evidence, there’s medical evidence, there’s economic evidence, that needs to be discussed, and, oh by the way, we actually do love our neighbor, that’s why we are talking about this.”

Wright: That’s right. Well, John, let me back up two steps and say one other thing too. Keith Olbermann is wrong on another aspect of his argument or his attack on Janet. And that is, it isn’t really a question of our Bible only that says this. God has revealed Himself to His creation in three ways principally: first of all, through the light of creation itself; secondly, through the light of conscience; and thirdly, through the light of Christ and through Christ’s word.

In creation we see a natural order that God has created, and the homosexual lifestyle clearly stands outside the bounds of what nature itself does. Now, you’ll find some scientists somewhere say we’ve found a snail in Oshkosh who is been acting a little funny lately. But the light of creation speaks against what they want to have us proclaim as normal.

Secondly, the light of conscience. There are people in your listening audience today who are heartbroken over what the gay lifestyle has done to them and to their families. And they know in their heart of hearts, without having to read a passage of scripture to tell them, that they’re on the wrong road, and they are on the road to death. And the scripture itself and Christ Himself says, “I am the answer to the death sentence that you are under. Come unto Me.” And so it isn’t, Keith is wrong: it isn’t what the Jews say versus what the Muslims say versus what the Christian says. All creation proclaims it, your conscience proclaims it, and yes, Christ and His word validates with the authority of time eternal, that these truths are not truths that can be transgressed because you have the political muscle to make it happen.

Ankerberg: The scary thing is in the next few weeks, as a nation we are making decisions on this area.

Wright: That’s exactly right.

Ankerberg: And it’s going to happen, one way or the other. It’s going to happen, one way or the other, alright? That brings us to our topic for next week. Because of the elections coming up and the people that are running for office, are we in the future going to have a chance to have this kind of discussion on television in the future?

Wright: That’s an open question.

Ankerberg: People say, hey, you’ve got to be kidding me. No, I am not kidding you, and we’re going to tell you all the details next week. So please join us on whether or not we are going to have religious freedom on television and radio in the future. Join us then.

Read Part 7