Dan Savage Takes NOM's Brian Brown to Task at Dinner Table Debate

In his opening statement, Savage, with piles of notes in front of him, asked Brown and those like him to simply tolerate the civil equality of LGBT people.

"I think that conservative Christians can learn to tolerate legal, civil same-sex marriage," said Savage. "The same way they've learned to tolerate legal divorce, which violates Catholic teaching, interfaith marriages, and nonreligious marriages. … Imposing your interpretation of the Bible on someone else is not religious freedom, as you try to redefine it, that is religious tyranny."

Brown avoided addressing any of Savage's substantive biblical critiques, instead arguing that Christianity accepts all people.

"Christianity is, if anything, radical," said Brown, who is Catholic. "It's radical in its view … of the human dignity of each and every one of us. The reason I'm here is because I believe in your human dignity. I'm willing to come and argue with you because of my respect for you. This notion of equality before God, of us all having this dignity before God, is key to the scriptures."