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Dear Friend,

We felt that this was so urgent  that we needed to share it with you. We are involved in this defense of marriage and by informing you we hope to give you some tools to help you in your involvement.

Focus on Family calls for Constitutional Court to affirm marriage between a man and a woman only

Today, 17 May 2005, the Constitutional Court is hearing argument on whether marriage should be re-defined to include same-sex unions. Focus on the Family Southern Africa supports the Marriage Alliance and the government in their defence of the traditional definition of marriage between a man and a woman only.

Apart from moral reasons, the state needs to protect marriage because it uplifts society. Studies show that children with both a mother and a father are more successful. They do better at school, are healthier and have less risk of getting into crime and other problems that are costly and difficult for the state to solve. Millions of South Africans have been helped by Focus on the Family Southern Africa’s various projects to strengthen marriage and families. Government has also supported initiatives like Moral Regeneration and the 10th Anniversary of the Year of the Family.

Calling something ‘marriage’ which is not, undermines respect for real marriage. Less respect means fewer people get married; more divorce and more children are born outside of marriage. The Netherlands, the first to recognise so-called ‘same-sex marriage’, has doubled births outside of marriage since court cases began. Unlike Holland, South Africa doesn’t have comprehensive state social services and is struggling to cope with the AIDS epidemic. Re-defining marriage would worsen this. It is a dangerous social engineering experiment, which like apartheid, will fail with disastrous results. 

In Holland, Sweden and Canada religious freedom and free speech has already suffered, as homosexual militants try to silence opposition and redefine morality as discrimination. The South African ‘Gay Rights Charter’ states the goal of making teaching against homosexuality by churches illegal. In both Sweden and the Netherlands pastors have been sentenced to jail for Bible teaching against homosexuality. The case is currently on appeal in Sweden. In Canada a Christian group is currently being sued by homosexuals for refusing to allow their hall to be used for a homosexual wedding. Ordinary moral people have also suffered, for example, as bed & breakfast businesses are forced to close if they don’t allow homosexual couples. A Constitutional Court ruling to change the definition of marriage may mean, for example, that state schools would no longer be able to teach true marriage as better than ‘living together’ or! homosexual unions.

We therefore call for the Constitutional Court to affirm the true definition of marriage as between a man and a woman only.

Sincerely,

Malcolm St.Clair
CEO, Focus on the Family South Africa

For more Questions and Answers on same-sex marriage click here

WHAT CAN I DO?

• Pray for the Constitutional Court judges

• Write to your local newspaper and express your views in your own words on the Constitutional Court case on whether marriage should be between a man and a woman only. Short letters are most likely to be published. At the bottom of your letter, include your street address and home telephone number so they can verify who you are.