What is Arthur's Gay Wedding Really Teaching Us?

Social media is abuzz this week after the beloved PBS Kids show, Arthur, featured a gay wedding on its season premiere. Though Christians found this incident alarming, it was by no means surprising.

We live in a culture that not only celebrates the LGBTQ lifestyle but aggressively seeks to indoctrinate our children into it. What are we to do? How can we appropriately prepare our children to navigate our world in truth and love? The answer, my friends, lies in equipping our children to understand two root errors behind this cultural tide.

1. Humans are Only Physical Beings

Our culture has so quickly rallied behind the LGBTQ movement because of a belief that has permeated Western thought for the past two centuries - the belief that humans are purely physical beings, the product of blind, unguided evolution. This ideology claims there is no design, no purpose. Humans are pure accident. If this is true, it logically follows that there is no moral right or wrong for how we humans use our bodies. Therefore, any romantic or sexual relationship we enter into is fair game.

We need to help our children see that this view of humanity does not line up with reality. The evidence all around us points to humans being more than just bodies. Our thoughts, our emotions, our temperaments – these are all parts of us that are not physical. They point to humans being both material and immaterial.

An easy way to help our children see this is to have them come up with a list of their physical features (hair texture, eye color, skin color, etc.) as well a list of their non-physical features (kindness, imagination, joy, etc.) These lists point to us being both physical and spiritual beings. We can then take our children to Scripture and show them that God’s Word tells us that we are both body and soul. Scripture lines up with reality, giving us an accurate picture of who we are and how we are to live.

2. Our Feelings Determine Reality

Another idea that has led our culture into the LGBTQ current is the belief that our feelings determine reality. If our emotions always give us an accurate picture of reality, then they become our guide for truth. No one can tell us that we are wrong because our feelings, not objective evidence, determine reality. Therefore, if I am female and I feel attracted to other females, entering into a romantic relationship with another woman is the right thing for me to do. My feelings, rather than my biology, determine truth.

We need to equip our children to understand that this view of emotions does not line up with reality. Truth is objective. It is outside of us. It is not dependent on us. Sometimes our feelings align with what is true, but other times they do not.

One easy way to help our children understand this is to bake a batch of cookies together and have them list different feelings people might have about these cookies (delicious, disgusting, too soft, etc.). After that, we can ask our children if there are any truths about these cookies that will always be true, even if someone believes something different (shape, size, ingredients, etc.). We can then take them to God’s Word to show them that God is the source of truth, and He always provides us with an accurate description of reality.

We can rest assured that Arthur is only one of many cultural influencers that will attempt to indoctrinate our children. But we need not circle the wagons, throw out our remotes, and get rid of internet service. Instead, we must prepare our children to understand why our culture’s view of humans does not align with reality.

For more practical activities to help your children understand the errors in our culture's view of humanity, get a free sample of Foundation Comparative Worldview Curriculum.