Mailbag

Costs of inaction

Living in Oregon, where some Multnomah County commissioners have tried to force the public to accept homosexual &quotmarriages," I rejoiced when I read Lynn Vincent's article, &quotRemaking the family" (March 6). Mr. McManus is right when he says that the church is much to blame because of her inaction. Our church has been speaking out for some time now, and it was encouraging that someone else recognizes the need. May your article awaken churches throughout the country and help them see where inaction will lead us.

-Hannah Payne, Gaston, Ore.

Yesterday our pastor talked about the problems with same-sex marriage. At the end of the service, my 4-year-old daughter asked her mother, &quotDo I have to marry a girl? I want to marry a guy like Andy (her older sister's husband)." This whole homosexual mess makes the difficult task of raising children so much harder. Kids these days have such a tough road ahead.

-Mark A. Stevens

Zelienople, Pa.

Thank you to Lynn Vincent for asking and answering the right questions concerning the gay-marriage issue. This is a case where common sense should conquer the personal agendas of the gay community.

-Sharon Wellman

Aquilla, Texas

How long until threesomes demand the right to marry, and foursomes become one &quotfamily unit"? Soon well-educated and wealthy pedophiles will demand their right to have sex with consenting children, and they'll lobby and organize so that we'll be forced to deal with this issue as well.

-Cate Kennedy Marsden

Haverhill, Mass.

Although 50 percent of all marriages end in divorce, as your article states, this does not mean that half of all married people will divorce. Some people will marry, divorce and remarry repeatedly, skewing the statistics.

-Rod Slagter

Huntersville, N.C.

The erosion of the family now manifested in homosexual &quotmarriage" began over the past half-century with the sanctioning of divorce. The restoration of the family must begin with the church before we can hope for anyone else to take our values seriously, never mind use them as a standard for civil society.

-Robert Cole

Newark, Del.

What a bunch

For 30 years The Brady Bunch has greased the slide toward &quotRemaking the family." I have heard so many heterosexual couples say they were making their own version of the show and make it sound so quaint. To have homosexual couples identify with the Bradys demonstrates how desperate they are to achieve social approval, as Mr. Veith describes in &quotThe Nordic track" (March 6).

-Tim Schlueter

Elizabethtown, Ky.

he idea that Scandinavian marriage rates are declining because gay people can here enter into marriage-like relationships is mistaken. Whether one is for or against homosexual civil unions, one should realize that the driving force behind changing marriage rates is not law or religion but an expanding job market for women that made them less dependent on men for support. It would take a tremendous effort to stem the tide, a form of Christian fundamentalism little better than Muslim fundamentalism. I am sure the average American person is healthy enough to reject any kind of fundamentalism.

-Henrik Thiil Nielsen

Copenhagen, Denmark

Family disasters

While I am all for the federal marriage amendment, it will not create or promote traditional father-mother, two-parent families (&quotMarriage amendment stakes," March 6). Are we willing, as the church, to put our actions where our mouth is and clean up the family disasters in our churches so we can lead instead of follow?

-Steve Holle

Billings, Mont.

Defeating evil

Joel Belz is right on the money in his analysis of the policy of &quotcontainment" (&quotContent with containment," March 6). I was on the front line of the Cold War, with nuclear alert as one of my duties as an F-111 fighter pilot. My NATO tour was during the last of the Carter and first part of the Reagan administrations. The difference was like night and day. It wasn't containment that brought down the Soviet Union, it was Ronald Reagan. He knew evil when he saw it. I was so proud to be a warrior on his team, and I know many fighter pilots today feel the same way about President Bush.

-Jerry Kemp

Covington, Ohio

It is not exactly true that containment defeated Soviet Communism. In the late 1970s, containment was breaking down as Soviet-sponsored terrorist groups and leftist parties took over one Third World country after another-Nicaragua, El Salvador, Afghanistan, and so forth. Ronald Reagan applied a new plan that included denunciation of the &quotevil empire," the threat of an arms race &quotthey could not possibly win," and assistance to anti-Communist resistance groups. In 10 years it accomplished what 53 years of containment did not: the peaceful end of Soviet Communism.

-Paul Bade

Mankato, Minn.

Our government's job is not to destroy or punish evil in other countries but to protect us from it and to punish it here.

-Matthew Deamer

Lynchburg, Va.

Thank you for Joel Belz's excellent column on George Kennan. Many people think that America should just &quotmind its own business," but we should be trying to stop the evil that is out there, and so save ourselves trouble by dealing with danger when it is easier to deal with.

-Andrew Payne

Gaston, Ore.

Judging Judas

Andrew Coffin's negative review of the ABC miniseries Judas (&quotPassionless dialogue," March 6) was underlined-literally-by the photo. In it Johnathon Schaech (Judas) wears a medallion with the Hebrew word for lord, adonai. The problem is that besides the Hebrew consonants it also has vowel markings, which didn't exist in Hebrew until the fifth century ad. If that's the kind of research done for the show's costumes, I can't imagine what the rest of it was like.

-Mike Miller

Eureka, Ill.

Mr. Coffin should put down his protest sign and let us watch Judas for ourselves. There were some really good scenes and dialogue in the movie that gave me a greater appreciation of Jesus and His work in our lives (represented by His bumbling disciples). If I take Mr. Coffin's advice (don't watch it), it's hard to connect with my neighbors.

-Bruce McCluggage

Goleta, Calif.

Concrete cesspool

It makes me see red to read how someone used his access to government agencies to bribe Ramon Carrasquillo into pouring the foundation for the Austin abortion clinic (&quotConcrete realities," March 6). I sincerely hope someone can dig to the bottom of this cesspool and bring to justice, or at least to the public eye, those who abuse their public trust in such a manner.

-Nick Jesch

Olympia, Wash.

Democracy abuse

That odor from rotting garbage in the streets, a thousand charcoal fires, and no sanitation system is the smell of a worldview that says, &quotLet every man do what seems right in his own eyes" (&quotNo more lip service," March 6). I saw my first coup d'etat within months of arriving in Haiti. I once asked some young men why they burn tires and block roads during national crises, hoping to show them they are only hurting their neighbors. One replied, &quotThis is democracy.... Democracy means that we can do what we want with no dictator over us. It means we can take from the rich people with no one stopping us." May God give us citizens, leaders, and judges who will refuse to abuse the democracy that God has so richly blessed us with. Otherwise, we will have our own version of thugs burning tires in the streets.

-Wayne Fowler

Blairsville, Ga.