On April 9th, 2005, thousands of Canadians from all walks of life gathered on Parlament Hill to demonstrate against allowing a marriage between other than a Man and a Woman.

Our lawmakers had failed completely to act on their responsibilities. Rather than taking steps to ensure that the wording of the law is in keeping with common sense and the basic Christian morality that built our great nation, they stood in front of the public and said, incorrectly, that the courts had decided that the constitution gives homosexual couples a right to be married.

In fact, the courts are mandated to enforce the existing laws. What they decided is that the current wording of the constitution allows them to interpret the document as establishing this new right. Lawmakers are mandated to ensure that the wording of the laws allows the courts to correctly interpret the laws – but they’re not correcting the wording and that’s where the real problem comes from: The lawmakers don't have the courage to deal with issues such as homosexual marriage - so they pretend that the courts have already delt with it. They behave as if people don't know that they're just refusing to do their jobs.

There is clearly a flaw in the constitution that allows some judges to interpret the text of the document to mean that homosexual couples have a right to be married. Clearly, though, there was never any intent on the part of the public to grant such a right and there is no such right in international law, our Canadian (Christian) heritage or in any kind of common sense. Marriage was always an institution created by God and God says that a Man should be joined to a Woman.

These attacks on the traditional definition of marriage started many years ago and continue today in many forms. They are part of a general madness that seems to be taking over the whole world. Lately, Prime Minister Paul Martin has made the unfortunate statement that the job of the Prime Minister is to "protect the constitution," as if the document that defines who we want to be as a nation is somehow unchangeable and can't be edited when it's found to be defective. Mr. Stephen Harper has declared that, if elected, his government would not make any attempt to amend the constitution. Why not?

Personally, I remember the days when the politicians were editing that document. I don't remember them pretending to be perfect in their understanding of human nature or the morality of God. I certainly don't remember anybody suggesting that these guys were particularly wise. I'd like to know where the current crop of politicians got the idea that the document written by their predecessors is so unchangeable.

Again, the public debate sets aside the issue of right and wrong and pretends that the judges are somehow determining what our values should be. Even Stephen Harper - who says he agrees that marriage is an institution that was created for a Man and a Woman only - is implying that the constitution is somehow an unchangeable document. What's the point of publicly professing to know right from wrong if you're not willing to take the steps necessary to right various wrongs?

It seems to me that the politicians of twenty years ago were more up-front and responsible than the current crop. Our politicians now all seem to be completely lacking the courage even just to speak the simple truth and admit when they don't want to deal with an issue.

A more serious issue is with Canadians in general. We are supposed to cry foul whenever a politician makes an irrational statement, commits an immoral act or fails to perform his most basic duties. We are supposed to hold our leaders accountable. By failing to do these basic things, we are, in effect, keeping our heads in the sand. The implication is that we also lack the courage to deal with important issues.

The link below will pop-up a gallery of photos from the March for Marriage of April 9th, 2005. You will see thousands of people (the media reported hundreds, but it's obviously many thousands,) all of them from different walks of life and all of them agreed on one basic principal: Marriage is an institution created by God under which one Man and one Woman are joined together - and our lawmakers shouldn't be tinkering with it.

The speeches that were made that day were recorded by various groups of people and are available from a number of sources on the net.

Click here for to see the photos. (Note: This link opens a new window.)