In Matthew 19, the Pharisees, always trying to trap Jesus, cornered Him on the subject of marriage and sexuality. He replied, “Have you never read that He who created them from the beginning made them male and female?”
This week, the U.S. Supreme Court, in its majority opinion on women’s sports and the definition of sex, spent 45 pages explaining that “females and males have inherent physical differences relevant to athletic performance.” What Jesus said in one sentence took the highest court in the land 45 pages to explain.
But there is a reason.
The court gave judicial sanction to this cultural race to the bottom when it redefined marriage in its 5-4 decision in Obergefell 16 years ago. Some of us, despite the hate labels and deplatforming, warned that redefining marriage was never just about “marriage equality” or allowing people to marry the one they loved. It was about a radical reordering of society as human sexuality became something viewed as infinitely customizable.
We have short memories, so let me take you back about 11 years. Less than six months after Obergefell, the Charlotte, North Carolina, City Council ignited the bathroom wars by allowing men who identified as women to use women’s restrooms. The state legislature intervened, only to face boycotts from the NBA, NCAA, and other sports organizations. The agenda then moved into the schools, where parents who opposed bathroom policies or objected to schools hiding a child’s social transition from parents were increasingly marginalized, even called domestic terrorists by those working with the Biden administration.
Women’s sports became the point where the public drew a clear line, as more girls lost championships, scholarships, and opportunities to male-bodied competitors — sometimes suffering physical injuries in the process.
Now return to the court’s decision in West Virginia v. BPJ. The majority states, “Females and males have inherent physical differences relevant to athletic performance.” In acknowledging biological reality in athletics, the court has exposed the tension within its own jurisprudence. Many Americans now recognize that redefining marriage opened a Pandora’s box, leading to efforts to redefine human sexuality throughout education, sports, medicine, government, and other areas of public life.
If females and males have inherent physical differences that matter on the playing field, do those differences not also matter in the family? The social sciences consistently confirm what Jesus reminded the Pharisees: God made humanity male and female. He then declared, “for this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and shall be joined inseparably to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” That one-flesh union produces children, who were designed to have both a mother and a father. Decades of research have repeatedly found that, on average, children raised by their married mother and father who love one another experience better outcomes across numerous educational, behavioral, and economic measures than children raised in other family structures.
The court should not stop with women’s sports. If biological reality matters on the playing field, does it not matter in the family? The truthful answer to that question requires reexamining Obergefell, a decision that conflicts with biological reality, the well-being of children, and the design for marriage that Jesus affirmed.
