A thoughtful piece at Religion Dispatches speculates that the Supreme Court’s widely-expected affirmation of same-sex marriage rights may setup decades of contention similar to Roe v. Wade.
If Greenhouse and Siegel are correct that it was “ordinary politics” that produced the long-running conflict over abortion, and the concomitant political polarization, there’s no reason to believe that same-sex marriage won’t become similarly entangled. That’s because even though the contours of the battle may be different, it’s the same fight over the meaning of family, the authority of traditional (usually religious) leaders, the meaning and limits of sexual expression and autonomy.
The author is undoubtedly correct to understand that evangelical leaders have a lot of vanity invested in the outcome, but overlooks some things that make same-sex marriage much more likely to deal a huge blow to their influence.
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They have grievously discredited themselves with hysterical, shrill, inflammatory language, and their influence diminishes every day.
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Demographics are trending against the Evangelical Right, a fact that surely contributes to their hysteria. They know there isn’t going to be a do-over.
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Abortion is susceptible of meddling, of disingenuous reasoning about ‘personhood,’ necessary levels of available care, and indeterminate speculations about fetal pain; there are 9-months worth of roadblocks on as many grounds as the imagination can dream-up.
As a legal arrangement, a marriage is or is not; there is no gestation, no gradations.
The expectation that the Court will uphold same-sex marriage is nearly universal, and with good reason; that is the clear implication of recent decisions. If that in fact happens, instead of some narrow, weirdly-qualified compromise, it would be a devastating, Waterloo-like defeat for the Evangelical Right and probably settle the dispute as definitively.