Gems of Ignorance
by Gary DeMar

Some of the emails I received last week are real gems. The homosexual network has gone into overdrive to slam any public figure that does not approve of homosexuality. I’m one of their main targets. Newsweek magazine called to interview me. I can’t wait to see how my words will be twisted. My wife tells me to quit granting interviews. Some interviews I do turn down. Somebody has to tell the truth about what’s going on. Many Christians have adopted the liberal refrain “I’m personally opposed, but I don’t think it’s right to impose my personal moral beliefs on others.

I received some interesting emails after an interview I did on American Family Radio where there was some discussion of the movie Brokeback Mountain and issues related to the way Christianity is portrayed in the media. It was a fairly routine interview. Nothing I said was very controversial. A swarm of homosexual emailers came out of the hive in attack mode. Here’s one from an anonymous emailer who identified himself as “Nomen Nescio,” that is, someone who does not want his name to be known:

Dear Gary:

You are the perfect moral argument for abortion. If you were black, you'd be the perfect moral argument for lynching, and if you were Jewish, you'd be the perfect moral argument for Auschwitz.

This is great rhetoric. I wish I had a similar flare, but of course I would never write such a thing. “He cuts off his own feet, and drinks violence who sends a message by the hand of a fool” (Prov. 26:6). I’ve learned over the years that when arguments cannot be made rationally, people resort to name calling, viciousness, and irrational rage.

The next email I received came from “Josh.” He is an admitted homosexual. He wrote:

Homosexuality is not a choice, and please do not say otherwise because as a homosexual, I and other homosexuals are the ONLY people who have the right to tell you wether [sic] we made a choice or not.

The Bible tells us, “Answer a fool as his folly deserves, lest he be wise in his own eyes” (Prov. 26:4). This proverb is telling us to adopt the operating presuppositions of the opposing worldview and extend the logic of those presuppositions. So let’s play "fill-in-the-blank" with Josh's logic:

“___________________is not a choice, and please do not say otherwise because as a ____________, I and other ____________ are the ONLY people who have the right to tell you whether we made a choice or not.”

• Murder . . . murderer . . . murderers
• Rape . . .  rapist . . . rapists
• Child molestation . . . child molester . . . child molesters
• Cannibalism . . . cannibal . . . cannibals

Defense Attorney Clarence Darrow made the following remarks to the jury in the Leopold and Loeb murder case in 1924: “Why did they kill little Bobby Franks? Not for money, not for spite, not for hate. They killed him as they might kill a spider or a fly, for the experience. They killed him because they were made that way. Because somewhere in the infinite processes that go to the making up of the boy or the man something slipped, and those unfortunate lads sit here hated, despised, outcasts, with the community shouting for blood.”

Emailer “Josh” goes on to argue: “Personally I don’t see a problem with polygamy, as long as it is for cultural reasons and there is love and respect. The Anglo-Christian way of life is not the only way. You should open your eyes. True homosexuals cannot have children, yet nature created us this way, and so therefore you cannot argue we are ‘Unnatural.” Anyone, doing anything, could argue in a similar fashion. “Nature made me this way.” Flip Wilson’s character “Geraldine” used to claim that the devil made her do it. Now it’s “Nature or my genes made me do it.” To show you where Josh is headed with his presuppositions (folly), consider the following:

 “Cannibalism in some cultures is acceptable. For example, is it wrong to eat the dead? Why? You think yes because of your cultural beliefs about the human body being sacred, but other cultures do not view it this way. Some believe that consuming the bodies of the dead helps to imbue the eater with the power of the dead. To them it is not foul or evil, it is holy and righteous. Once again, comparing a cultural phenomena or individual fetish to homosexualism is pretty stupid to put it bluntly. There is nothing actually wrong with cannibalism, unless the Person being eaten did not wish for their body to be treated in such a way, or unless the Cannibal actually attributed to the person’s death.

What more do I need to say, but I’ll say more anyway. This is a perfect example of what lengths some people will go to defend a lifestyle that does not make either moral or rational sense.

In his last email to me, Josh states that he is an atheist. All of his complaints evaporate once the claim is made that God does not exist. There can be no right or wrong about anything. Josef Stalin, Adolf Hitler, Pol Pot, and today’s Islamic extremist haven’t done anything wrong. They only acted in terms of their genetic predispositions. Josh wants some of the benefits of the Christian worldview he denies. He wants me to believe in moral absolutes (“Do not judge”) to allow him the right to sleep with whomever he wishes. The problem is, there is no way to account for any moral absolutes if according to Josh “God is an adult version of the invisible friends we all had as children.”