By John G.
There are some topics that I don’t like to post on – mainly ones that involve the private lives of individuals. Mary Cheney has always proved a difficult figure for me as a blogger, because I want to respect the privacy of her personal life, but at the same time, her father’s Vice President-ship gives her a certain level of prominence that attracts a lot of media attention. Whether it’s the much discussed Dear Mary campaign during the last election, or the current brouhaha over her pregnancy, she is a figure that liberals and progressives can’t help pointing out as a stain in the Republican party’s claims to moral superiority. And while conservative voices have seemed to mostly bite their tongues in the past, they’re not pulling any punches now.
What I really want to think about in this post isn’t Mary or her pregnancy, but the reaction from many conservatives and Evangelicals to her and her pregnancy. Specifically, I am trying to think through Biblical examples of parenthood and family life, to determine what the Bible says about how to raise children. I think its an important exercise, because while I would not advocate Biblical parenting techniques unless psychology upheld them, Biblical dialogue seems to be missing from the religious Right’s critiques of families that eschew the “biological father and biological mother who are living together” model. Why is that? Maybe because Biblical examples of parenthood show that God doesn’t mind parenting models that the religious Right bends over backwards to condemn. Moral of the story: it would appear that one can embrace so-called alternative parenting and family models and still be a good Christian.
Because it has been well discussed by others and because I’m not attempting to advance any theory of parenting techniques, I’m not going to take the time to dive into actual scientific work on parenting. Rather I’d like to point out why the Right is holding up pseudo-science and not the Bible in their discussion of family structure. Additionally, I’d like to show how those of us who are convinced by peer-reviewed, credited scientific research can use the Bible to support parenting by not only same-sex partners, but many other living arrangements as well. (I will throw out there, for reference, one of the better discreditings of the religious Right’s pseudo-science, which was on Slate: Lesbians of Mass Destruction: The Empty Case Against Mary Cheney.)
Continue reading "Biological Parents Living Together? What about all the concubines?" »
Recent Comments