Even since May, when Gov. John Baldacci of Maine signed a marriage equality bill, Religious Right opponents have been vowing to seek a referendum to overturn the law via a "people’s veto." And last week, they announced that they had gathered more than 55,087 signatures necessary to put the issue to a vote.
Among the myriad of Religious Right groups active in the effort has been Focus on the Family, which has been donating thousands of dollars to the cause. And, via Box Turtle Bulletin, we come to find out that repealing this law in order to "protect marriage" is among FOF's top priorities:
Sonja Swiatkiewicz, Focus’ director of issues response, declined to say how much money was being sunk into the campaign effort as a matter of strategy.
...
She said working to strengthen and protect marriages is one of Focus’ priorities.
“Protecting the institution of marriage as between a man and a woman is one of our primary goals. We receive about 250,000 communications a month from folks who have very deep hurts, many of which are related to the breakdown of marriage and how that impacts mean, women and children.
“We work to protect or restore marriages as closely as we do on the sanctity of life beginning at conception and protecting religious liberties.”
Which brings us to The Maine Family Policy Council, which is a "fully associated" member of Focus on the Family's network of Family Policy Councils and this article that Good As You discovered on the Maine Family Policy Council's website in which it claims that the "call for same sex marriage and other forms of sexual immorality" are directly linked to urban blight (complete with photos, which I haven't included):
Homosexuality and other forms of aberrant behavior are on proud display in Portland, home of Maine's "Gay Pride" parade, with its seven hundred foot long Rainbow Flag. The Rainbow Flag is everywhere in Portland. Certain bars cater exclusively to homosexuals, including the club called Styxx, shown at below right.
Trash collectors are apparently overwhelmed in Portland. City streets were pristine in 2002, much cleaner than say, Manhattan or Chicago. Now litter and household trash is seen in every part of town, and when the wind blows, the garbage is simply blown down the streets. The photo at below left shows a common sight along lower Congress Street. Garbage is strewn throughout formerly beautiful Deering Oaks Park.
Evidence of crime is often seen, as in the photo below, where a smash and run burglar has smashed out the windows of a parked Audi. The sad thing about this photo is that the theft happened in broad daylight, across from the Eastland Park Hotel, and nothing was done about it. The car sat in that condition for hours, an open invitation for other criminals to do the same.
These photos taken on an average day in Portland are meant to illustrate the fact that the call for same sex marriage and other forms of sexual immorality is not happening in isolation. It is part and parcel of a society which calls itself progressive. But is it really progressive? Is it even Maine? These days, Portland looks like somebody put the city in reverse, and stepped on the gas.
Even though the legislation legalizing gay marriage didn't pass until two months ago, the MFPC makes repeated reference to how Portland has declined "since 2002."
Apparently, residents of Portland just knew back in 2002 that, seven years down the road, gay marriage might be legal in the state and so they just gave up and decided to let their town decay .. or there was some sort of effort launched in 2002 to start running down the town so that eventually gays could get married ...or maybe something else.
All I was able to figure out was that gay marriage leads to messy streets and your car getting broken into ... or maybe that messy streets and burglarized cars lead to gay marriage.
So if you are in a neighborhood where you spot trash in the street and smashed windows, you can rest assured that gay marrige is not far behind ... or has already passed through.
