But why is the present argument more intense and more shrill than the fashionable protests of preceding decades? Is this really the pinnacle of moral discourse in the churches and in democratic societies, or is time running out on moral discourse, whether fashionable or not?

Put ianother way: why has the liberal machine, in church and society, put its eggs in this basket? Whose approval do they seek, and what do they hope to accomplish? And why the note of desperation as they approach still another ideological victory on another hot button issue?

For many religious groups in America protest has become a religion. A few months ago as I drove past the local Unitarian Church in my hometown, I read on the marquis: "Freedom to Marry." At the time a number of states were considering legislation regarding same-sex unions. Here, then, was a cause du jour. Gay marriage was inserted into the blank where peace had been a few weeks earlier and some reference to the environment a few weeks before that. People's responses would be the same in each case. I realized that the cause fulfilled a need. People needed to feel outraged over the manifest aggression of some unseen Oppressor and empowered by their rage.

In America people often protest not because they believe in causes, but because they believe in protest. They "believe" in the ritual sense that the familiar form of protest mediates to them feelings of assurance and righteousness. Such ritualized mediation is the basis of religious practice. The cause doesn't matter, whether it be genocide or vegetarianism. The essence is: They are trying to oppress Us (again) and so we must assert ourselves and protest.

I whine, therefore I am.

It is noteworthy that there is no risk in today's protests. The new protesters are not accustomed to fighting for their lives but (at most) for their lifestyles. They are not the successors of the Civil Rights marchers in the '50's and early '60's, when protesters met with dogs, fire hoses, police clubs, and lynchings. Today's protesters are met with cameras and politicians. Furthermore, they're not fighting an upward battle against great odds like the marchers of old but, more likely, riding the crest of a popular wave. Most causes have been pre-approved by media outlets long before they make it to the streets.

Ironically, if protesters were to achieve their goals, they would be at a loss. The end of protest for them would mean the end of life as they knew it. Not so the protesters of the '50's, for whom victory meant the peaceful assimilation into society in order to get on with living.

Minority members from the early days have their own reasons for jumping on the bandwagon of contemporary protest. Jesse Jackson would be nobody if the dreams of Dr. King became reality, as would be his counterparts in bureaucratic offices throughout the country.

But what about keepers of the old majority who have bought into the religion of protest? What about silver-haired patricians, limousine liberals from the old school, like Episcopal bishops, who have recently shifted from the country club Right to the country club Left? At what point did they sense it was in their interests to equate the Faith with a cause - any cause - even if it meant throwing overboard the Faith once delivered?

It is a simple historic fallacy that the present ideology of "inclusion" is the natural development of the Christian gospel contained in the historic creeds and confessions of the churches. What's more, everyone knows it. Protest is, among other things, the moral equivalent to pitching a fit to confuse anyone who would press for a real explanation.

Keep in mind who is leading the charge in the present debate over sexuality. It is not the "wretched of the earth", but well heeled, over-indulged, upper-middle class advocates of the sexual revolution. Such a "revolution" makes a mockery of earlier revolutions, which its advocates would realize if they did not have so much at stake in their own histrionics.

What is at stake is maintaining their elitist position in church and society. This is why elitists take up the causes of "little people" everywhere: not to make the causes their own - they couldn't if they wanted to, as any hardened revolutionary would tell them, and as their own front-office activists tell each other in guarded tones around the water cooler.

The powerful sense the political ground shifting around them. Many fool themselves into thinking that they can maintain their present position in the social pecking order by appeasing the right angry mob. But when the ground shifts a little more, and the mob achieves critical mass, the elites will be among the first to be thrown overboard.

Soon Episcopal elites will have served the Revolution in the only real way they can: they have sold their Mother down the river. They have contributed admirably to the destabilizing of Western culture. There's not much more they can contribute, except their money. And even that is running out.

We must forgive the good bishops if their protests become shrill, even on such an unceremonious moral subject. The spirituality of protest is pretty down-to-earth after all. It's about survival.

--The Rev. Gary L'Hommedieu is Canon in charge of Pastoral Care at St. Luke's Cathedral in Orlando, Florida.