The Christian Civic League of Maine has launched what amounts to a pre-emptive strike in the war it has declared over the relative rights of homosexuals in this state. Despite the league’s actions, this battle is largely over and this campaign is a step backward.

The league has submitted a proposed referendum question which, if approved by the Secretary of State and then supported by the signatures of 55,000 residents, would appear on the November 2009 ballot.

The referendum intends to remove the category of sexual orientation from the Maine human rights law, define marriage as an act of one man and one woman, prohibit civil unions, ban same-sex couples from adopting, and eliminate funding from the state attorney general’s school civil rights team program.

“It is time for another referendum on gay rights,” Michael Heath, the league’s director, declared last month on the organization’s Web site. “We have been licking our wounds long enough. I’m not going to sit by doing nothing really meaningful … .” As several BDN letter writers have opined, surely the league could find meaningful work in these financially challenging times, perhaps helping the elderly and children.

Mr. Heath defends the urgency of this latest mission, writing: “We must launch a referendum to stop Maine from endorsing the special legal right to sexual promiscuity.” If that were so, the league would be calling for a legal ban on premarital and extramarital sex.

It’s true that gay advocacy groups want to push for a vote in Maine to allow civil unions or same-sex marriage. But no such proposal has been made, so it’s hard to understand why the Christian Civic League is picking a fight here.

The most troubling part of the proposed referendum is the attempt to excise sexual orientation from the state human rights law. It’s hard to imagine what harm the league believes comes when gay people are given the same access to housing, education, credit and employment as everyone else.

The Christian Civic League, like other groups that carry the banner of faith into the civic arena, makes a critical error. It crosses the line from advocating that Christians live according to biblical principles – perfectly acceptable – to insisting that nonbelievers follow those same rules, which is out of bounds.

The Bible has something to say about this. In the Apostle Paul’s letter to the church at Corinth, he urges there be strict consequences for those who indulge in sexual immorality within the church. But to be clear about whose morality is to be addressed, he adds: “What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside.” (I Corinthians, 5:12-13, New International Version.)

Christians who try to insist on dictating how those outside the church should live is like Burger King insisting McDonald’s use its recipes. Mind your own business, McDonald’s would correctly respond.

Civil rights are not limited to those who hold certain values. The U.S. Constitution, and indeed the very social contract implicit in our civilization, protects against those who would deny rights to minorities, whether they be Taoists, the left-handed, crossword puzzle enthusiasts, redheads, Yankee fans, those who like Simon Cowell, people who put ketchup on hot dogs, and, yes, those who fall in love with people of the same sex.