Put on your seatbelts, Newsweek's cover story, this week demonstrates just how far on a flight of fancy the mainstream media will go to support same-sex marriage even to re-interpreting the Bible. In this case, Lisa Miller, Newsweek's religion editor has penned a cover story “Our Mutual Joy” that uses as its lead, “Opponents of gay marriage often cite Scripture. But what the Bible teaches about love argues for the other side.”

She offends with her first words, “Let's try for a minute to take the religious conservatives at their word and define marriage as the Bible does.” Tim Graham, the Director of Media Analysis at the Media Research Center, accuses Newsweek of thus saying, “Religious conservatives are troglodytes on the wrong side of history. They certainly can't be taken at their word.

She continues with these kinds of whoppers: “First, while the Bible and Jesus say many important things about love and family, neither explicitly defines marriage as between one man and one woman. And second, as the examples above illustrate, no sensible modern person wants marriage—theirs or anyone else's —to look in its particulars anything like what the Bible describes.” I guess she forgot to read Matthew 19:5, where Jesus said, “For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?

Miller continues, “The Bible is a living document, powerful for more than 2,000 years because its truths speak to us even as we change through history. In that light, Scripture gives us no good reason why gays and lesbians should not be (civilly and religiously) married—and a number of excellent reasons why they should.”

Ah, now it is not just the Constitution that is a “living document”, but the Bible, too, both infinitely malleable to whatever we want them to say. So much for eternal standards that we can count on.

She goes on to claim, “ No matter what one thinks about gay rights – for, against or somewhere in between – this conservative resort to biblical authority is the worst kind of fundamentalism. Given the history of the making of the Scriptures and the millennia of critical attention scholars and others have given to the stories and injunctions that come to us in the Hebrew Bible and the Christian New Testament, to argue that something is so because it is in the Bible is more than intellectually bankrupt – it is unserious, and unworthy of the great Judeo-Christian tradition.”

Translation: To appeal to Biblical authority is despicable, “the worst kind of fundamentalism” and appealing to the Bible is unserious and unworthy of the great Judeo-Christian tradition. Huh?

The blog at The Weekly Standard refers to Miller's piece as a “dire mess.” Richard Land of the Southern Baptists Convention's Ethics and Liberty Commission told Politico, “It doesn't surprise me. Newsweek has been so far in the tank on the homosexual issue for so long, they need scuba gear and a breathing apparatus. I don't think [the piece] is going to change the minds of anyone who takes biblical teachings seriously.

Mark Hemingway, writing in National Review said of the piece, “Of course, religious Americans are more than used to shoddy coverage of theological debates. So what else is new? Criticism that a Newsweek cover story serves a left-of-center political worldview is almost, well, a weekly occurrence.

“What is remarkable about this week's cover story was how Newsweek 's editor, Jon Meacham, has handled the backlash. He hasn't defended the piece as a matter of opinion or part of a public debate. Rather, Newsweek has apparently come out of the closet as an explicitly ideological magazine editorially endorsing the article's viewpoint.”

No wonder, he notes, Newsweek is in a slump for subscribers.

Same-Sex Marriage in Iowa?

Family Leader had an amicus or “friend of court” brief in the case that was argued yesterday before the Iowa Supreme Court. At issue is whether the court will mandate same-sex marriage in Iowa and call the Iowa statute defining marriage as between a man and a woman unconstitutional.

The case, Varnum vs Brien, involves six same-sex couples who sued Polk County Recorder and Registrar Timothy Brien in 2005 after his office denied them marriage licenses. Last year, District Court Judge Robert Hanson, ruled in behalf of the couples but suspended his decision until the Supreme Court could review the matter.

Questioning was brisk yesterday, as the justices plied both sides with hard questions. If marriage opened its doors to same-sex couples, “How do you stop?” asked Justice Mark Cady. “How do you stop more than two people from getting married?”

When Justice Brent Appel asked Assistant Polk County Attorney Roger Kuhle how same-sex marriage would hurt children, he said that in future generations it could harm children by eventually leading to the belief that marriage is unneeded.

A ruling is not expected for several months. Iowa has no state marriage protection amendment and amending the constitution in the state is difficult, requiring a simple-majority approval of the Iowa House and Senate during two consecutive legislative sessions, followed by a simple majority of voters in the next general election.

More information: Attorneys Conclude Supreme Court Arguments in Gay Marriage Case