A Florida LGBT rights group has
criticized Florida Senator Marco Rubio's recent comment that allowing
gay couples to marry threatens Christianity.
Rubio, a candidate for the Republican
presidential nomination, told CBN's David Brody last week that
marriage equality represents “a real and present danger” to
religious freedom.
“We are at the water's edge of the
argument that mainstream Christian teaching is hate speech because
today we've reached the point in our society where if you do not
support same-sex marriage, you are labeled a homophobe and a hater,”
he said.
“So what's the next step after that?”
Rubio rhetorically asked. “After they're done going after
individuals, the next step is to argue that the teachings of
mainstream Christianity, the catechism of the Catholic Church, is
hate speech. That's a real and present danger.”
In a fund-raising email sent to
supporters last week, SAVE compared Rubio to Anita Bryant, a former
singer and beauty queen who squandered her career fighting to repeal
Miami-Dade County's gay-inclusive human-rights law in the late 1970s.
“If Senator Rubio wants to be
president in 2016, he should know that Floridians won't support
anti-LGBT attacks at the ballot box – just ask fellow equality
opponent and Floridian celebrity Anita Bryant, whose effort to
legalize anti-gay discrimination in Miami-Dade County was overturned
by voters in 2002 with SAVE's help,” the
email states.