Re: The Confluence of Homosexuality and Abortion

Contra Ian Donnis, you can make this stuff up:

Mohler began by summarizing some recent research into sexual orientation, and advising his Christian readership that they should brace for the possibility that a biological basis for homosexuality may be proven.

Mohler wrote that such proof would not alter the Bible's condemnation of homosexuality, but said the discovery would be ''of great pastoral significance, allowing for a greater understanding of why certain persons struggle with these particular sexual temptations.''

He also referred to a recent article in the pop-culture magazine Radar, which explored the possibility that sexual orientation could be detected in unborn babies and raised the question of whether parents _ even liberals who support gay rights _ might be open to trying future prenatal techniques that would reverse homosexuality.

Indeed, anybody who took the initiative to find out what conservative Christians actually believe, argue, and proclaim wouldn't have to make anything up; it would be more accurate to say that they could predict it as a matter of straightforward analysis. As Rev. Joseph Fessio, provost of Ave Maria University and editor of Ignatius Press, explains:

''Same-sex activity is considered disordered,'' Fessio said. ''If there are ways of detecting diseases or disorders of children in the womb, and a way of treating them that respected the dignity of the child and mother, it would be a wonderful advancement of science.''

For those with disorders of a different sort, I'll put it simply: we right-wing fanatics simply believe that unborn children are in fact human beings, worthy, at the very least, of a right not to be killed. It is not the womb that is inviolable, but the individual, and to the extent that a treatment is legitimate for those outside of the womb, it is equally so within it. I'm not saying that some magnificently speculative procedure to treat a condition that may or may not originate in the womb is legitimate, let alone desirable, but if one is not surprised that an Evangelical would support medical treatment for homosexuality, then it betrays ignorance to level accusations of hypocrisy in this case.

Unfortunately, another thing that needn't be made up because it is so predictable is the utter inanity of liberal reactions, of which Mary Ann Sorrentino's is a fine example. In keeping with the apparent bigotry by which all conservative Christians are merely mind-melded drones — or "hordes of so-called Christians," if you prefer — Sorrentino evinces the above mentioned ignorance:

Mohler belongs to the same faction that has opposed pre-birth medical tampering in the past. Gender selection, in vitro fertilizations, even some pre-birth surgical procedures have all been deemed wrongful interference in divine territory. Now that these people see a way to diddle with the sexuality of the unborn, however, many of them are all over that possibility.

For the most part, the only "medical tampering" that raises substantial opposition from this so-called faction is that which involves death as its objective. That, indeed, is the primary objection to in vitro fertilization: that it requires the creation of embryos who will not be brought to term. Similarly, gender selection has largely been an issue — a real one, actually in practice, as opposed to the speculative brave-new-world version — because the "selection" takes the form of culling. As for "some pre-birth surgical procedures," I'm not sure what Sorrentino is talking about, much less who specifically objected to them, but her vagueness is typical.

Then, as if adhering closely to the guidelines of some rhetorical propaganda instruction manual, Sorrentino follows ignorance with laughable plying of emotional strings — describing a Hollywood movie that features a gay-therapy version of Clockwork Orange treatment and wondering darkly, "Is this the kind of thing that 'people of God' really support?" (I love the quotation marks around "people of God," as if she cannot even bring herself to countenance the sincerity of believers, even as she attempts to manipulate their good will.) This stratagem could only be followed with a faith-based elevation of homosexuality's existential essentialness beyond even genetics:

If Mohler is allowed to have his way, and society begins to tamper with the sexual preferences of about-to-be citizens still floating in the womb, the probable result will be a generation of would-be heterosexuals who eventually revert to their preferences for same-gender lovers.

Well, I suppose that, in an argument that brushes past two layers of speculative outcomes and transforms a villain's out-loud thinking into an assertion of "a way," it isn't out of place to declare the probability that all will be for naught. Similarly, it is not out of place for the author of such manifestly empty-headed rhetoric to read the minds of people with differing opinions and know — just know — that they are all about hate.