Homosexual couples in the Netherlands will have the legal right to full-fledged marriages under a bill passed last week in the Dutch parliament’s lower house.  The historic vote, ending 109-33, is symptomatic of an even broader societal issue, says Pastor Henk Koning, president of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in the Netherlands.

Koning says that post-modernism, a philosophy that questions the concept of absolute truth, has impacted every facet of Dutch society, resulting in a largely post-Christian country. Although a majority in the Netherlands are nominally Christian, only a small minority actually visit a church on a weekly basis, he says, and the prevailing philosophy is that “everybody is free to have his own truth.”

Postmodern thinking, says Koning, both within and outside church groups, has resulted in a philosophy in which “all truth is relative; heterosexual truth is not better than homosexual truth.”

“In the past, as a church, we could recommend the philosophy of the state as far as marriage is concerned,” says Koning. “Since this new law has been accepted, it is clear that this is no longer the case.”

The Netherlands’ parliament has become known for its willingness to break with traditional social norms by legislating liberal drug laws, approving euthanasia, and legalizing prostitution. “Increasingly, social issues in the Netherlands are being decided on a basis of pragmatism rather than by reference to ideals,” says Dr. Reinder Bruinsma, a Dutch citizen and an Adventist leader based in St. Albans, England.  “The traditional influence of Christian thought and philosophy within the Dutch political system has been largely lost.”

When the homosexual marriage bill is affirmed by the parliament’s upper house, the Netherlands will become the only country to grant unions between same-sex couples that are equivalent, in law, to traditional heterosexual marriages.

Koning believes that the concept of tolerance in the Netherlands has undergone a transformation in the country’s new post-Christian society.  “Since the churches have declined and lost most of their members, tolerance now, without the influence of the Christian faith, seems to have become extreme,” he says.

While disagreeing with the decision of parliament, the Adventist Church will continue to treat homosexuals with Christian love, says Koning.

A 1999 official statement adopted by the Seventh-day Adventist Church affirms the church’s commitment to the Biblical principle that “sexual intimacy belongs only within the marital relationship of a man and a woman.”  According to the statement, Adventists will endeavor to follow the example of Jesus when he “offered caring ministry and words of solace to struggling people, while differentiating his love for sinners from his clear teaching about sinful practices.”