They’re here. They don’t like queers. And they are very clear:
Gay marriage leads to a total meltdown of morality in this country. The not-so-sturdy foundation of traditional marriage will be bulldozed. Divorce will rise, Social Security will fall and polygamy will spread across the land.
I didn’t make this stuff up.
On Saturday, that message reverberated throughout Safeco Field in Seattle, where an estimated 15,000 people — including Snohomish County residents — attended the "Mayday for Marriage" rally and enlisted in a widening cultural and political battle on who can legally get hitched in this nation.
There was pomp and celebration, but what was said fortified a planned campaign of fear and voting.
"This is part of a larger strategy to save the day for marriage," the Rev. Joe Fuiten of Cedar Park Assembly of God in Bothell told me days before the event.
Pastor Joe is the spiritual general of a chilling new coalition that is determined to freeze out those calling for expanding marital rights for homosexual couples.
It was formed weeks ago and first surfaced around Good Friday. At the helm are the political Pastor Joe, who heads Washington Evangelicals for Responsible Government, and Pastor Ken Hutcherson, a football star turned preacher. The two men drafted dozens of like-minded religious leaders into the operation.
Establishing an efficient command-and-control structure, they turned to parishioners for money, swiftly scooping up $120,000 to rent the stadium. More was raised to run a toll-free hotline, launch a Web site and air commercials for the event.
Saturday, they fired up the troops.
The lineup of speakers included Pastor Joe, Pastor Ken and James Dobson, a renowned pro-family advocate who has been warning of the scary fallout of gay marriage, which becomes legal in Massachusetts on May 17.
If the nation follows suit, he said, homosexuality will be taught in public schools and no marriage union will be rejected, not even that between "a man and his donkey."
Next, they’ll deploy the troops.
The objective was to register voters, on streets and in churches, and convince them to elect the "right" candidates to office and to the state Supreme Court.
Other skirmishes are expected. Money collected from Saturday’s offerings and in the future will help rebuff legal challenges to Washington’s Defense of Marriage Act, and will support nationwide efforts to pass a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.
Then they’ll zero in on the "hard targets."
Pastor Joe said those include "activist judges," such as the ones in Massachusetts, and "renegade politicians," including King County Executive Ron Sims and Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels, both of whom back legalized matrimony for homosexuals.
All of this effort, Pastor Joe said, is because homosexuals are crossing the line on marriage.
"The relationship between a man and a woman is the most fundamental of relationships. It is the part of the social structure under attack at this moment, and you rise to meet the attack."
Hundreds of protesters showed up at Safeco Field Saturday. They shouted down the message, but they had better not ignore the messenger.
Jerry Cornfield can be heard at 7 a.m. Monday on the Morning Show on KSER 90.7 FM.
Reporter Jerry Cornfield: 360-352-8623 or jcornfield@heraldnet.com.
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