Same-sex marriage is a hot topic in Australia right now, but the argument about its validity has been around for centuries.

While doing research for an article about the furor in Australia, I have come across a breadth of information, ideas and opinions. While most of it is supportive, a lot of it is not. The majority rule in anti same-sex marriage arguments is, of course, religion.

I consider myself to be an Atheist; a stance that has only been cemented during the course of researching the same-sex marriage debate. When people of a religious persuasion start likening my sexuality to that of a rapist and a paedophile, it tends to raise my hackles.

What I find encouraging is that alongside the aforementioned ranting of anti-gay zealots, there is also a great deal of support for same-sex marriage amongst religious folk.

Australian Christian Lobby (ACL) chief Jim Wallace recently wrote an opinion piece on ABC’s The Drum. “The great majority of those who support [heterosexual] marriage are not going to bother publicly proclaiming it when they are continually subjected to vicious language and abuse whenever they raise their heads,” he stated.

Erm, are you familiar with the term, ‘hypocrite,’ Jim? Because I just made you a badge, you can wear it with pride. When a great majority of those who support homosexual marriage publicly proclaim it, they are continually subjected to vicious language and abuse – from your ilk, Jim.

What I love is that halfway down the comments section there was this:

“Don’t paint us all with the same brush,” said a Christian commentator, “the reality is that Mr. Wallace is as representative of Christians as Fred Nile. As in – not at all.”

BAM. Thank-you Mr. Moderate Christian, for not adding to the poisonous vitriol that homosexuals so often receive at the hands of those who claim to be speaking for Christians as a whole.

Also on the topic of appreciating moderate religious folk, I had a profound experience today while surfing the net. All caught up amongst my same-sex marriage Google searches, I found a website called God Made Me Gay. (I can just imagine the anti-gay zealots choking on that one!)

In an open letter titled ‘A Letter to Louise,’ Pastor Bruce Lowe from Louisiana writes of his new-found understanding of homosexuality and it’s place within the church and in the bible.

The following excerpt was my ‘wow’ moment. I read through all 42 pages of Louise’s letter, and this part stuck with me. How could anyone, religious or non-religious, gay, straight or otherwise, find argument with this? It just makes sense…

“The Biblical writers never contemplated a form of homosexuality in which loving, monogamous, and faithful persons sought to live out the implications of the gospel with as much fidelity to it as any heterosexual believer. All they knew of homosexuality was prostitution, pederasty, lasciviousness, and exploitation.

“These vices, as we know, are not unknown among heterosexuals, and to define contemporary homosexuals only in these terms is a cultural slander of the highest order, reflecting not so much prejudice, which it surely does, but what the Roman Catholic Church calls “invincible ignorance,” which all of the Christian piety and charity in the world can do little to conceal. The ‘problem’, of course, is not the Bible, it is the Christians who read it.”

And my point is?

Homosexuals are just as entitled to the sanctity of marriage as heterosexuals because we are no different.