October 03, 2004|By Susan Baer | Susan Baer,SUN NATIONAL STAFF
Aside from associating mostly with other Christians - "We're more comfortable doing things with people who believe similarly," Mike says - they read mostly religious material. They believe the mainstream press is too liberal, so they don't read any daily newspapers. Instead, they watch Fox News and read the journal of the American Family Association, a conservative Christian organization that publishes articles like "Homosexual Agenda Warping the Word."
It is from the AFA journal that the Gordys say they get most of their information about politics and culture. As they see it, the gay agenda aims to "desensitize people toward that lifestyle over time through TV and movies to where it's considered to be normal," Mike says, noting that the Gordys boycott any show with a gay character or sexual themes.
They would never go to a Disney theme park because of the company's policy of hiring gay men and lesbians, and extending health benefits to same-sex partners.
"It makes it tough," Vicki says of the rules she and her husband have chosen to live by. "I'd like to go to Disneyland."
But she says friends and neighbors have come back from such trips saying they'd seen gay couples holding hands and smooching there. "They're going to be really sorry come Judgment Day, and they don't realize that," Vicki says.
Mike views gay marriage as a step toward the disintegration of the family unit and societal disorder. "If it's OK for same-sex individuals to get married because they have a special relationship, why would it not be OK for a brother and sister to get married because they have a special relationship? Or a man and four women? Or an adult and a child?"
Mike and Vicki believe people are not born gay but choose to be so. "Somebody may be predisposed to that lifestyle," Mike says, "but they don't have to act on it."
Vicki says she knew of a child "headed in that direction." "Somebody recognized that he wasn't acting like a normal little boy," she says. "He was counseled, and today he's totally heterosexual. I believe they make a choice. I believe we all make a choice."
Mike knows he risks being called bigoted or intolerant for espousing such views, but he makes no apologies and believes God calls upon him and other Christians to speak out.
"The bottom line is, I believe the Bible is the inspired word of God," he says. "My beliefs and my values are based on what the Bible teaches. I can't pick and choose to believe one thing and not something else."
The Gordys can cite multiple examples - from Romans, First Corinthians, Leviticus - where they believe the Bible condemns homosexuality as "shameless," "detestable" and a sin carrying "the due penalty."
"The Bible says it," Mike says. "I believe it."
Shirley Bryan spends one Sunday in July another way. Straightening up her home with its velour rocker-recliners and country-style decor, she is preparing to have 14 neighbors in the community of mostly retirees over to her house for a private screening of Outfoxed, a documentary about Fox News promoted by a Democratic group, MoveOn.org.
Although at 70 the mother of three has never missed voting in an election - and has joked to her 18-year-old grandson that if he doesn't vote, she'll remove him from her will - "I never did anything in politics before this year," she says.
She has volunteered at the local Kerry office and canvasses door to door on weekends. In midsummer, she manned a Democratic Party booth at the St. Peters Olde Tyme Picnic, where the Gordys sang with their church choir.
When the St. Charles County Council held its first hearing on the proposed ordinance banning gay marriage, Shirley alone showed up and told the Republican panel, "Your job isn't to guard our morals. It's to take care of the sewers and traffic."
Laughing at the fact that she voted against Truman because he cussed, Shirley says she and Roy have grown increasingly liberal and partisan as the Republicans, in their view, have become more "extreme," appealing to their base of religious conservatives with issues like gay marriage.
"It's very divisive," Shirley says. "Bush said, `I'm a uniter, not a divider,' and yet what has he come up with? Same-sex marriage. What could that do but divide people?"
Roy Bryan, a fit 71-year-old with thin white hair and the straight bearing of the Army man he once was, says he thinks gay men and lesbians "should be left alone" to live their lives as they want to, even if it includes marriage. "Let them enjoy their life," says Roy, who retired after 33 years with McDonnell Aircraft. "We've been fighting discrimination for how many years, and now we have to single out a few more people to discriminate against?"
Like his wife, Roy believes abortion should be a decision between a woman and her doctor, hates the way the Republicans hounded Clinton over an inconsequential sex scandal and feels the war in Iraq was ill-conceived.
