Chittister: It's not about same sex marriage

Joan Chittister: From Where I Stand

According to the Republicans, at least, the single most important issue in the United States right now is same-sex marriage. In a society where more people seem to be trying to get out of marriage than they are trying to get into it.

Or, closer to the truth, maybe, the most important thing for the party in power is its ability to manipulate this issue to the forefront of the electoral agenda. If that can be done, of course, it will be possible to divert attention from other issues here like U.S. integrity in Guantanamo Bay, secret torture centers, military massacres of Iraqi civilians, the over-extension of presidential power, the moral necessity of the continuous deaths and wounding of U.S. soldiers, and the underlying question of what we are doing in Iraq in the first place.

[snip]
Morality is certainly a major issue in the United States today. But what morality? All of it or only some of it?

From where I stand, the issue of same-sex marriage is not at the base of U.S. decline today. At the base of U.S. moral deterioration today is political oligarchy, corporate greed and the complete breakdown of the kind of morality that is not only social but civil and Christian. That kind of morality, unfortunately, we haven’t seen for years, even from some of our moralists

(Emphasis added)

I've been a fan of Sister Joan ever since I saw her on Now (one of the best programs on PBS) Check out the whole column here (link)

You might also want to read the book, Just War, Lasting Peace: What Christian Tradition Can Teach Us (Orbis). Sister Joan was part of the symposium on which the book is based.