Gay Marriage Opponent Echoes Segregationist Complaint

On Tuesday, I mentioned subscriber complaints made to the Washington Post about the front page picture of a gay couple kissing after applying for their Washington, DC marriage license. For frame of reference, here’s the picture again.

Jeremy Ames and Taka Ariga kiss after applying for a marriage license

Ombudsman Andrew Alexander quoted several of the complaints in his response (see previous post). You can visit the Post to read the rest of them, but today I want to focus on this particular line from Ann Witty of Woodbridge, Virginia.

“I am 65 years old and I realize that the world is changing rapidly – much more rapidly than I would like it to,” she e-mailed.

I stared at the quote for a long time and finally realized that Ms. Witty’s comment reminded me of a quote from Martin Luther King‘s book of sermons called Strength to Love. In the sermon “A tough mind and a tender heart” (page 15), King had this to say (emphasis added):

The softminded man always fears change. He feels security in the status quo, and he has an almost morbid fear of the new. For him, the greatest pain is the pain of a new idea. An elderly segregationist in the South is reported to have said, “I have come to see now that desegregation is inevitable. But I pray God that it will not take place until after I die.” The softminded person always wants to freeze the moment and hold life in the gripping yoke of sameness.

Ms. Witty expresses this the same sentiment. She knows it’s coming, but she doesn’t want to be here when it comes. This frame of mind is as sad as it is timeless, as timeless as it is frustrating. And while we may understand it, we also understand that we can never permit the injustice it demands.

Lest we forget our own responsibility and Dr. King’s call for the oppressed, I’ll close with these words from a later sermon entitled “Loving your enemies” (page 56):

Time is cluttered with the wreckage of communities which surrendered to hatred and violence. For the salvation of our nation and the salvation of mankind, we must follow another way. This does not mean that we abandon our righteous efforts. With every ounce of our energy we must continue to rid this nation of the incubus of segregation. But we shall not in the process relinquish our privilege and our obligation to love. While abhorring segregation, we shall love the segregationist. This is the only way to create the beloved community.

To our most bitter opponents we say: “We shall match your capacity to inflict suffering by our capacity to endure suffering. We shall meet your physical force with soul force. Do to us what you will, and we shall continue to love you. We cannot in all good conscience obey your unjust laws, because non-cooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is cooperation with good. Throw us in jail, and we shall still love you. Send your hooded perpetrators of violence into our community at the midnight hour and beat us and leave us half dead, and we shall still love you. But be ye assured that we will wear you down by our capacity to suffer. One day we shall win freedom, but not only for ourselves. We shall so appeal to your heart and conscience that we shall win you in the process, and our victory will be a double victory.”