Well Said

I never thought of it like this but after hearing about what is going on in California I think this is stated so well. It is a little long but very interesting.

By Gary Lawrence - CA Pollster - Meridian Magazine

“There was a war in heaven,“ my dad said as he taught me about our pre-earthly existence and the purpose of life. It had only been a few years since he had returned from service as a Marine in World War II, so it was natural that his 10-year-old son immediately imagined a great battle with planes, tanks, and bazookas. What a war it must have been, I thought.

How disappointed I was when he told me the implements of that special conflict were … words.

Words? How exciting could that have been? I liked my version better.

But I soon grasped the importance of this hinge event in our existence and the “weapons” we used to defend the principle of agency and God's plan for the happiness of His children. And I grew to understand that this war has not ended, that only the battlefield has changed.

That battlefield is now California and the parallels between that pre-mortal conflict and the battle over the definition of marriage are striking.

The scriptures tell us the beginning (“Satan rebelled against me, and sought to destroy the agency of man” 1) and the end of the heavenly phase of that war (“he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.” 2), but they do not reveal the details of the conflict itself. We can deduce, however, that Lucifer and his followers must have used very effective arguments to turn a third of the hosts of heaven away from the Father despite pure knowledge of God's will.

From 35 years of studying arguments in political campaigns, and a bit of reverse engineering, here is my stab at what these arguments might have been.

Argument 1: Equality. Lucifer sets the foundation by appealing to fairness and the equal worth of every spirit child.

We are all children of the Father. It's only fair that all of us be together forever and enjoy the same things the Father has.

Argument 2: Sympathy. Having set the logic, Lucifer turns to emotion.

Under the Father's plan, some of your friends will never return. Look at Brother Jones here, or Sister Smith over there. How are you going to feel when you find out that people such as they — good, deserving people — may not make it back?

Argument 3: Hate. After playing on the victim angle, Lucifer gradually steers emotions to the negative. Knowing that rebellion against righteousness can never be sustained without hate, he sows doubt about the Father Himself and leads the gullible step by step to that absolutely necessary ingredient if he is to win.

Father doesn't really love you as much as you think He does. He has already prepared three kingdoms for us — a first-class kingdom, a second-class kingdom, and a third-class kingdom. None of us should be second-class citizens. This is unfair. This is discrimination. This is bigotry. This is hatred. … And it's okay to hate in return.

Argument 4: Change. Now Lucifer returns to logic.

The old ways have not worked. On the worlds without number the Father has created, too many were left behind and never returned to the Father's presence. It's time to do things differently. It's time for change.

Argument 5: Guarantee. Amid the arguments about the consequences of each choice, Lucifer administers his clincher.

Follow me and do what I say and I will guarantee that we will all return and live in celestial glory. And when I have the glory and power of the Father, I will make you my leaders and we will rule over those who did not follow us.

It's the familiar guarantee of happiness and power that every tyrant in history has promised his followers. If he had been asked the details of his plan, Lucifer never would have admitted that he did not know how to create physical bodies for his followers to inhabit, and would not have revealed his plan to take over the bodies the Father would create. Lucifer would have couched his guarantee in amorphous language that appealed to those looking for an easier way without work. He's not called the father of lies for nothing.

Now turn to the present battle. Whereas the principle under fire in the war in heaven was agency — the right to choose — the target in 2008 in California is marriage, both a principle and an institution. Just as agency is essential to our progress and happiness, so is marriage “central to the Creator's plan for the eternal destiny of His children.” 3And the arguments of those supporting same-sex marriage are eerily familiar:

Equality. Together with its ally fairness, equality of outcome will always be the beginning point for those opposed to any part of God's plan.

Gays and lesbians are people, too. They have the same emotions as anyone else. It is only fair that they be given equal rights. They should not be second-class citizens.

Sympathy. Emotion is evoked by specific situations, in this case having two women in their 80s be the first same-sex marriage in California.

Phyllis Lyon and Del Martin have the same loving and caring feelings for each other that any man and wife in a traditional marriage experience, and have been true to those feelings for five decades. Why can't society allow them a simple measure of happiness?

Hate. The opposition must be shamed, vilified, and demonized. These descriptors of defenders of traditional marriage can already be found in anti-Prop 8 literature and blogs, and the list will grow:

Christian extremists, anti-gay, right-wing radicals, old-fashioned, hung-up, homophobes, bigots, stupid, intolerant, mean-spirited, knuckle-draggers.

Change. With emotions high and the opposition villainized, a bow to fairness makes the proposed solution look reasonable.

It's time to change, to break free of oppression. There are many types of families, and marriage should be broadened to include all of them. It's only fair, and if it will make them happy, why not?

Guarantee. This time the guarantee is not what someone will get, but a reassurance of what will not change.

Same-sex marriage will not harm anyone. Heterosexual marriage will not be hurt. Nothing will change except all people will have every right that anyone else has.

In short, if the arguments used in the war in heaven were persuasive enough to draw billions of God's spirit children away from Him, why should we not expect them to be used on the present battlefield? The same minions cast out from the Father's presence still remember what worked up there.

The stakes are critical. If same-sex marriage advocates can dilute and hollow out the central part of the Creator's plan, the whole structure collapses — the family, the nation, and in time civilization itself. The time has come for those of us who believe that God, not man, created marriage (fortunately still a majority) to take a stand and defend it.

Proposition 8 is a defining moment, a tipping point, a critical battle in our existence, melodramatic as that might sound. This is not a political sideshow. Long after the world only vaguely remembers a President McCain or a President Obama, people will continue to be affected by what happened in the California battle to protect marriage in the fall of 2008.