Religious-right groups in Texas are furious (surprise!) that Republican state Senator John Carona of Dallas has dared suggest that gay and lesbian Texans should be treated with dignity and equality.
In an interview this week with the Dallas Voice, Carona expressed his support for legislation barring job discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, allowing state universities to offer benefits to domestic partners of employees and permitting birth certificates to include the names of both same-sex adoptive parents. Carona said he doesn’t support marriage for same-sex couples but that his views are “evolving.” Carona explained to the Dallas Voice how his opinions are informed by his conservative values:
“I’m very undecided on the [marriage] issue and I struggle with it,” Carona said of marriage equality. “I think the whole country is evolving, and I know for a fact that our young people are evolving including young Republicans.
“I can’t say that I’m there yet, that would be dishonest, but I can say that it’s a question that I find myself asking myself over and over,” Carona added. “What is the most conservative approach? Well, I’m always told less government, not more government, is better. What is the right thing? Well, I think anything that advances, encourages monogamy is a good thing. And frankly how could you be against people who want to get their affairs in order and have a loving household? So, yeah, I’m evolving, but admittedly I’m not there yet, nor do I believe the district is there yet, but times change and things may change.”
Carona also said he does not permit discrimination based on sexual orientation in his company, Associa, which provides services to the community management industry.
You can read the whole Dallas Voice article here.
Religious-right groups wasted little time in issuing statements attacking Carona. Liberty Institute/Texas Values criticized the senator for supporting “top legislative agenda of the homosexual lobby” and charged that “these so-called ‘gay rights’ measures are nothing more than a direct attack on marriage.”
The master gay-baiters from the Texas Pastor Council are also in a tizzy. The group’s head, Dave Welch, has previously called Houston Mayor Annise Parker a “sodomite” and claims that the mayor’s “agenda” has brought “moral perversion and sin flowing from our city hall.” In an email to far-right activists today, Welch now urges Carona “to publicly restate your past support of traditional marriage and decline to support the effort to violate God’s laws and the state constitution.”
The email also includes this from another anti-gay Houston pastor, Steve Riggle:
“The senator is falling prey to the false premise that any relationship of two or more people living together is equal to the historic, sacred and proven institution of the covenant marriage relationship between one man and one woman. God created this institution ‘In the beginning…’, man’s laws affirm its intrinsic value to society and anything that undermines it – including recognizing domestic partnerships and same sex ‘couples’ in adoption – is a violation of both God’s and man’s law.”
In the same email, San Antonio pastor Charles Flowers also framed Carona’s defense of dignity and equality for gay Texans as a rejection of the “moral laws of God”:
“Elected officials and government administrators who believe they can act in direct contrast with the moral laws of God and the clear intent of the people as defined in the Texas Constitution without consequences are going to be faced with an unpleasant reality. We will no longer be silent, intimidated or ignored when traditional marriage, the nuclear family and our moral standards are threatened. We love God and love His people too much to allow those threats to remain unchallenged.”
Senator Carona’s office almost certainly will be deluged with intolerant and hateful emails, letters and phone calls from religious-righters. But we salute the senator for his courageous stand and encourage others to let him know that you do, too.
