When the American Family Association sought to declare its support of biblical and traditional marriage as the union of one man and one woman, it bought a full-page ad in the Washington Post featuring the art of Michelangelo with the message that "marriage was neither manmade nor created by any law or Constitution."
The ad was directed to the U.S. Supreme Court justices who will hear arguments in a few weeks concerning whether citizens can be coerced to acknowledge and endorse same-sex "marriage" in violation of religious beliefs.
Responding to the ad, homosexual activists said, essentially, "Gotcha," claiming Michelangelo was "gay."
But the evidence that the revered artist, the master of the David statue and the Sistine Chapel fresco, was homosexual is lacking.
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Some homosexual advocacy websites contend he was a homosexual. The North American Man-Boy Love Association lists Michelangelo among its "15 Famous Men Who Had Boy Lovers," saying the artist was "thought to have had" boy lovers.
But even some of the advocacy sites admit a lack of evidence. The LGBTQA page for the University of Illinois-Springfield says: "Despite occasional instances of gossip and innuendo (e.g. Pietro Aretino's suggestions of pederasty), there is no clear evidence of Michelangelo’s homosexuality or, at least, none indicating overt sexual activity."
And at LifeInItaly, the question about Michelangelo's homosexuality is answered this way: "A very common myth about Michelangelo is that the artist was gay. He may have had homosexual leanings, and he had a close relationship with a good-looking, young man, Tommaso de Cavalieri. Professor Beck, the author of 'The Three Worlds of Michelangelo,' told Dalya Alberge of The Times in the article, 'Michelangelo is not gay, says scholar' in February 1999 that this contention is 'without solid, historical support.'"
So why the "gotcha" from homosexuals, which appeared most recently in EdgeBoston, which posted a report about the AFA ad and then wrote, "Ironically, the image used in AFA's ad is the 'Hand of God' which was painted by Michelangelo – a gay man."
Michael Brown, author of books including "Can You Be Gay and Christian" and "A Queer Thing Happened to America," said that first of all, the sexual preference of someone who's been dead for generations is beside the point.
"Michelangelo's artwork belongs to all humanity," he said. "It has nothing to do with his sexuality."
Then he also warned of the consequences of homosexual activists making such claims, because then they will have to deal with the issue of pedophilia, too.
He noted in his "A Queer Thing" that it was no less than Jim Keppner, former curator of the International Gay and Lesbian Archives in Los Angeles, who tried to avoid that subject.
Get your copies now, of "Can You Be Gay and Christian" and "A Queer Thing Happened to America."
"If we reject the boylovers in our midst today we'd better stop waving the banner of the ancient Greeks, of Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Oscar Wilde, Walt Whitman, Horatio Alger and Shakespeare. We'd better stop claiming them as part of our heritage unless we are broadening our concept of what it means to be gay today," Keppner said.
In his book, "The Marketing of Evil," David Kupelian points out the advantage activists have in claiming historic figures were homosexual is that they are not around to sue for libel.
"Another important technique … and employed repeatedly to great effect in recent years, is to claim that famous historical figures – 'from Socrates to Eleanor Roosevelt, Tchaikovsky to Bessie Smith, Alexander the Great to Alexander Hamilton, and Leonardo da Vinci to Walt Whitman' – were homosexual or bisexual," Kupelian writes. "Although the authors [of gay-rights marketing bible "After the Ball"] know these claims are unproven at best and often baseless (they refer to them as 'suspected 'inverts''), that doesn't stop them from advocating the tactic.
"A recent example of this was the highly publicized, though utterly unsubstantiated, speculation that Abraham Lincoln was a homosexual. Even more outrageous was the suggestion by openly 'gay' New Hampshire Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson – a comment he quickly retracted after a firestorm of protest – that Jesus Christ was a homosexual!"
"The Marketing of Evil"Â includes an explanation from iconic "gay" activists Marshall Kirk and Hunter Madsen: "Famous historical figures are considered especially useful to us for two reasons: first, they are invariably dead as a doornail, hence in no position to deny the truth and sue for libel. Second, and more serious, the virtues and accomplishments that make these historic gay figures admirable cannot be gainsaid or dismissed by the public, since high school history textbooks have already set them in incontrovertible cement."
The AFA, founded by Donald E. Wildmon, reaches millions of constituents and owns and operates nearly 200 radio stations.
Its ad explained to the justices, two of whom – Elena Kagan and Ruth Ginsburg – already publicly have endorsed same-sex "marriage" by officiating at such ceremonies: "Will you bend what God designed merely to suit the desires of man, knowing that you do so at the expense of children, perhaps even civilization itself? If you decide to affirm marriage as between one man and one woman, you breathe life into the natural order and stand as an example to generations that will arise after your decision.
"But if you decide differently, you are choosing a path that will put the state on a legal and administrative collision course with hundreds of millions of Americans from all religious and faith practices who believe only God can define marriage. You would say by such a decision that mothers and fathers together are no longer relevant in the lives of children, and that religious expression about the sanctity and purpose of marriage would now become illicit. You would be saying that God has no place in our public square and, in a nation founded to secure freedom for those being persecuted for their faith, such a decision would be a tragic irony."
AFA Executive Vice President Ed Vitagliano told WND there is a "tendency for gay activists to want basically the whole world to be gay."
"That is what they are seeking more than anything else … validation. We are aware of that."
But he said true validation comes only from Jesus Christ.
"Whether or not Michelangelo was gay … the image of God bringing life in his image to mankind, this is what we wanted to highlight," he said. "What we believe is the ad clearly states marriage is an institution designed by God who is our Creator," he continued, "regardless of broken human sexuality."
The AFA ad concluded: "Before you now is a great challenge: If your decision to resolve this matter forces same-sex marriage on America, you will have settled nothing. We urge the court to adjudicate rightly that which is God's alone to decide."
The Edge article, ironically, cited the AFA as the "Southern Poverty Law Center designated anti-gay hate group American Family Association."
Southern Poverty Law Center, however, is one of few groups in the nation legally tied to a domestic hate crime in a court case. Floyd Corkins, who was convicted of domestic terror for walking into the Family Research Council in Washington armed with a pistol and the intent to kill "as many people as I could," identified the SPLC as the resource he used to pick his target.