The annual Hands around the Capitol Rally and March took place this past Saturday in Augusta. The annual event, which is organized by Maine Right to Life, is intended as a public expression of mourning for the loss of life caused by abortion since the passage of the Supreme Court decision  Rowe v. Wade.

To judge from the standing-room only crowd, the Pro-Life movement is growing rapidly. The crowd was larger than in earlier years, and was estimated at 400 - 500 people. Further evidence for the growing strength of the Pro-Life movement are the buses going to the March for Life event in Washington on January 20 - 23rd. Seats on the buses have already been fully booked, and there is a waiting list for cancellations.

In January last year, the homosexual rights lobby used Senator Dennis Damon to introduce a bill to legalize same sex marriage. Not only did the bill legalize same sex marriage, it made all terms pertaining to the family, words such as 'husband and wife', 'father and mother,' gender neutral. It was a travesty to introduce such a bill at a time of deep economic crisis, a fact acknowledged by Governor John Baldacci, the most liberal governor in Maine history.
 
The bill was shepherded through the Maine Legislature by Larry Bliss, a homosexual activist from California, now head of the Judiciary Committee. During the campaign to repeal the law, the No on 1 side offered a sanitized view of same sex marriage, marketing their product with commercials which showed 'married' homosexual couples and their children, all smiling, healthy, and content in a typical Maine setting.

In a scene straight out of Caligula's palace or one of Nero's infamous garden parties,  Maine's Governor Baldacci  dined with same sex marriage supporters in Boston, while a pair of  homosexual acrobats, suspended from the ceiling by a sash, twirled round and round in the air, their colorful capes flowing out behind them. The $225 per plate affair was intended to honor politicians who have done the most to help the cause of same sex marriage, and came less than two weeks after the repeal of the same sex marriage law by the voters of Maine. 

Following the repeal of Maine's same sex marriage law, the public heard many angry comments from gay activists who claimed religion was the deciding factor in their loss.  Religion was indeed an important consideration for many voters, but it is not generally known that during the debate over the same sex marriage law, legislators in Augusta made frequent reference to their own religious principles. The following quotes, excerpted from speeches made in the Maine Legislature, show that lawmakers often invoked religion to justify their positions for or against gay marriage. The quotes provide a fascinating insight into the thinking of our lawmakers, and are on occasion unintentionally amusing, or in the case of the remarks by the Senate President, tragic.