Gay marriage and religious freedom
Although gay marriage was approved by the legislature on New York, opponents are vowing to fight on. They propose a state amendment to ban gay marriage, although my sense is that passage would be an uphill battle—especially since there is no referendum process available in New York.
The original legislation contained an important clause protecting (for now) churches from being forced to perform gay marriages if it violates their beliefs. But it lacked protection for any other group or individual that might have a similar problem. The repercussions could have been predicted, and actions such as that of Laura L. Fotusky, who resigned as town clerk of Barker, NY because performing such marriages would violate her religious beliefs, might be followed by similar actions on the part of others facing the same dilemma.
The result will be that religious people with a traditional belief system such as Ms. Fotusky’s will be effectively barred from serving as town clerks in the state of New York, or they will face the possibility of lawsuits or violating their consciences if they do stay in such positions. Would the same be true of caterers and others who specialize in servicing those who are getting married?
The situation for town clerks is clear:
City and town clerks are in an unusual position, because they are government officials. On Long Island, the Nassau County district attorney, Kathleen M. Rice, sent a sternly worded letter to clerks last week, warning that they could be subject to criminal prosecution if they declined to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples.
“I want to ensure that our local officials appreciate that there will be ramifications in our county for exercising a personal, discriminatory belief, rather than doing their job,” Ms. Rice said Tuesday.
Ms. Rice’s characterization of their attitude as “personal” and “discriminatory” is personal and discriminatory itself, because beliefs founded in a religion that’s been a going concern for two thousand years are more of a group/institutional thing than some personal idiosyncrasy. Plus—at least until the NY legislation was passed less than three weeks ago—the belief that marriage remained the province of man and woman was considered mainstream and nondiscriminatory.
No doubt Ms. Rice, who is a DA, chose her words carefully in order to downplay and/or ignore the real issue here, which is religious freedom, a supposedly protected right. It is the same issue involved in protecting hospital and health care workers who refuse on religious grounds to participate in abortions that run counter to their belief system.
Seems to me this is just part of the endgame anyway; forcing religious people to accept the gay “lifestyle”. It’s never really been about civil rights.
It will be interesting to see how this all sorts out, but I’m not hopeful that religion will be protected by the government.
The real issue is that the law is now clear that same-sex couples are entitled to get married in New York. If government officials can’t do their job of enforcing the government’s law, then they need to resign.
It’s not an issue of religious freedom– people can believe and practice their religion however they wish. And this bull that because Christians sanction something for 2000 years it’s okay is just nonsense– women were lawfully discriminated against for 95% of that time period, and racial minorities even longer. Salvery was alive and well for 85% of that time. So, if we learn anything from those numbers, the longevity of Christian-supported bigotry and discrimination makes it no less wrong.
If a government official can’t reconcile their faith with a government job, then they shouldn’t have that job.
Examples:
If a Hasidic Jewish man can’t touch or restrain a women because of his faith, he shouldn’t be a police officer.
If a white supremacist opposes interracial (or same-sex) marriage on religious grounds, he shouldn’t be a town clerk.
If a Catholic customs agent can’t force himself to allow a truck of condoms into the county because the Pope opposes their use, he needs to find another job.
Practice your faith as you wish; nothing in the Marriage Equality Act burdens ones religious practice or beliefs. But if you can’t uphold the law as it stands, then don’t work in government.
Bryce,
The law was clear before, when the clerk signed on for the job.
I wish gays had settled for civil partnerships. I’m really getting sick of hearing people claim there is no difference between a sexual relationship that can produce a child and one that can’t. And quite frankly I haven’t heard too much from the gay side of this issue on the needs of children. I have, however, heard voices saying fidelity is not important and relationships should be open. And yes , I know that heterosexual marriages also have problems, but at least there is some societal norm, reinforced by our laws, about responsibilities to offspring. Perhaps if civil partnerships had been accepted by the gay community, we might have had a little time to see whether their standards are compatible with child rearing.
Wow, Neo, you’ve opened a can of worms here. Still a very thoughtful post, as always.
The NY law was strong-armed through the legislature by some very, and I do mean VERY, wealthy hedge fund managers in Manhattan. the same men who have gay children and want to give them ‘legitimacy’ in life. But some of these so called ‘respectable’ heavy hitters also live a double life (besides in the Hamptons) with hidden compounds thousands of miles away where they leave their wives at home and have bi-sexual trysts. Many of them have gone for the paleo—-cave man—diet and lifestyle. They believe paleo men were same sex as well as hetero-sexual kind of lovers. Far away from their more respectable lives in NY they practice their paleo religion. They are eager to strong arm the rest of civilization into submitting to their bizarre behaviors.
So far, they’ve been successful in NY. But if only the majority of people knew they truth, the amendment might just pass.
The tail continues to wag the dog. The rights of gays trump all other claims.
Civil unions are a more reasonable position.
I wonder if Gloria Allred will file a complaint on behalf of fired city clerks,as she did on behalf of a fired bus driver in 1996:
LA Times June 11
“Attorney Gloria Allred filed a discrimination complaint Monday with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission on behalf of an Orange County transit bus driver fired last week for refusing to hand out coupons for free Carl’s Jr. hamburgers.
Bruce Anderson, a 38-year-old vegetarian, has said the demand by the Orange County Transportation Authority to distribute the coupons to bus riders violated his spiritual beliefs.”
What if a religious idiosyncrasy is inconsistent with the establishment and civil progress of our secular democracy .. I suppose it depends on which authority you care to hold.
Onyo: you may disagree with those who oppose gay marriage on religious grounds. You may even think that gay marriage represents progress. But you cannot possibly call the belief that marriage is between a man and a woman an idiosyncrasy.
To see it as that is, of course, the goal of moral relativists and a not insignificant number of gay marriage activists. And some day, if they get their way, it will increasingly become an idiosyncrasy. But at this point in time it cannot be defined as such. Nor has it ever been. Even in polygamist cultures, marriage has virtually always been between a man and women (or in the rarer polyandrous cultures, between a woman and men).
I read very recently that in some companies that were offering same-sex partner benefits, now that gays can be legally married, in those states the partners will now have to be married in order to avail themselves of those benefits.
Wonder how many partners may get cold feet?
One state, Illinois, iirc, has severed its connection with Catholic family services because the RCs won’t place kids with gay couples. Married or not.
I dunno. The RCs have been in a lot of trouble because of gays. Can’t think of why they’d want to get into more.
Fighting to end slavery wasn’t a matter of being a moral relativist, or idiosyncrasy, nor is gay marriage, we simply were not ready to face the former as a young Democracy, but in time we did, as in time we changed the law on Women’s right to vote and property issues, likewise with gay marriage it is a fulfilment of our Constitutional dream.
Civil progress of our secular democracy?
Who claims our secular democracy is progressing?
Our secular scientists lie for grants.
Our secular politicians lie for votes.
Our secular citizens prefer one world government and would subvert our sovereignty.
I guess it does lie in your point of view!
We don’t have a secular democracy; we have a constitutional republic founded on Judeo-Christian principles.
Democracy is an inherently unstable form of government, and its collapse is often followed by dictatorship.
Gays aren’t going to like it when that happens. Just sayin’.
Just supposin’ I refuse to accept as married anybody who isn’t married according to my beliefs Sure, they got the justice of the peace thing, and maybe the piskies actually married them and coughed through the bit about foresaking all others–not a stretch for the piskies as it is–but then I don’t accept them as married.
Legally, if I were not retired, I might have a problem. But I’m not doing much business. I might say, we don’t let unmarried couples sleep downstairs and you’re not married.
So we’d have less company. I survive. Legally… I don’t have a problem
What do militant gays, Al Sharpton, and Islamists have in common?
They demand special and priority status. They are deceptive in using equal rights to achieve tyrannical control. They are hateful. Not much of America wants any of them. They are their own religion. They bark like rabid dogs and run like scared ones. They see and portray themselves as victims. They are over the top in their reactions. They blame Christianity for everything while refusing to admit of the advances Christianity has made. They accuse America while never saying a word about the rest of the world. They refuse to acknowledge the basic goodness of a culture that has made the advances against AIDS a priority even above cancer.
They are hucksters. Extremists. Rather than allow that some people have restrictions on marrying them, and just getting married somewhere else, militant gays demand that the person who doesn’t want to marry them must marry them. No, they must have total access, including the state teaching in inordinate amount and emphasis that their lifestyle is exactly the opposite of what is: unhealthy and unhappy. I would be willing to just let them alone, but it’s that access to children they have demonstrated which concerns me.
Why should gays, who can produce no children, get to raise and influence any?
Onyo: the slavery comparison is bogus. Even the Founding Fathers were against slavery back in the late 1700s; they grandfathered it in, as it were, because they thought the union was imperiled without the southern states that had become economically dependent on it (as had some of them, such as Jefferson). They knew it was wrong, and hoped it would wither away for economic reasons. Instead, it persisted, and the Civil War was fought. Plus, it had only persisted in one section of the country—the south. Marriage as a hetersexual-only institution is not a regional variant.
Christianity was used by both sides in the slavery debate; it by no means had a unified attitude towards slavery. The slave trade in England was abolished in 1807, mostly as a result of campaigning by the church.
The point is that slavery was economically popular in the south, but supported almost nowhere else in the US, and was widely recognized to be against the principles of the US from the start.
ricki
Especially since the liberal trend seems to be toward sharia law.
God help gays then
God, I’m sick of hearing about perverts and perversion non-stop.
I’ve lived too long.
Webutante Says:
July 13th, 2011 at 3:18 pm
So far, they’ve been successful in NY. But if only the majority of people knew they truth, the amendment might just pass.
Hyperlinks to evidence would help me evaluate what you claim is the truth.
“”God, I’m sick of hearing about perverts and perversion non-stop.””
OB
Amen. Homosexuality and radical feminism have been recognised as deviancy for a hundred thousand years. Now we get governments full of high school monitor types and they are smarter and more enlightened than all that. We need to reinstate bitch slapping.
Kevin Williamson was right. The state shouldn’t define marriage in any way.
Isn’t gay marriage a perfect example of the absurdity of taking an idea (civil rights) to an extreme? It is a short step from sublime to the absurd.
Well, I must agree that the state should have nothing whatsoever to do with marriage. Most state laws requiring marriage certificates were drawn up largely to insure that inter-racial marriages were forbidden.
Of course, the problem now is that there exists a large body of both estate law and divorce law that is predicated on a certain definition of marriage. Civil unions really do offer a legal way around such laws, as they are basically legal contracts, which is what marriage effectively is to heterosexual couples.
I can’t say I have a strong opinion about this issue. However, I do see it as the gay folks trying to insure that their agenda is considered special.
Calling marriage a religious idiosyncrasy is just another indication that Political Correctness is Willful Stupidity and Acquired Ignorance.
GS, the only hyperlink is what I’ve said here…hot off the Webutante reliable source press. Just close your eyes and pretend it ain’t so darlin’ cause I’d give anything to un-know what Inow know….let’s put it another way, if you’re hetero and a man asks you to join him for a paleo-man weekend, run as fast as you can in the other direction. On the other hand, he may be importing raw foods from all over the world for your dining pleasure. You know how those cave men loved to fly in food….
This redefinition of marriage for the first time in history (no other civilisation ever did this, non of the great minds of the past, whether secular or religious, ever defended it) is a horrificly dangerous thing. Marriage is an institution that is -as an institution of civilisation-older than the state.
The comparison with mixed race marriage is bogus. Moses already married a black woman. The arguments against interracial marriage in most of Western history were only prudential, not fundamental. The Catholic Church was against racism and slavery (in principle) but it always furiously defended monogamous marriage between man and woman as the bedrock of civilisation.
The gay-advocats are crazy. Marriage is not about discrimination. Gays can also marriage.
However, now they can no longer, since they abolished marriage.
The consequences of this will be far reaching, they will go to every aspect of life. It will always be true: a small minority forced the destruction of the most fundamental institution of society, and all the religious, social and judicial aspects that go with it.
I propose to think about the Weimar republic, that had equally destructive leftwing politics on social issues. When the great collapse came, they went not only after the Jews, but also after the gays…
Then as now, large selfsacrificing families were mocked and abused as ‘breeders’ by selfish, narcissistic ‘swingers’. Those that actually brought the sacrifices for the next generation were looked down upon by coldhearted hedonists. This brought about a seething anger that exploded once disaster stroke. The same thing is going on now. O tempora o mores…
The state has to defend real marriage: the very existence of a civilised people, not only of the state depends on it.
The notions of ‘father’ and ‘mother’, ‘son’ and ‘daughter’, are far more fundamental than any legal or statist concept. Manmade legality has to bow down to these fundamentals; when you refuse that, reality will take its revenge: you will get a society that will make Kafka tremble…
Wonderful comment, Wandriaane, and ever so true. The state and its individuals must defend this bedrock institution against the ever-increasing shrill tantrums of this well-funded, intimidating group. The consequences will be catastrophically far-reaching, beyond anything any of us can imagine.
Excellent commentary.
It’s quite clear that the left is willing to go to crazy extremes, no matter what the issue. I guess it’s human nature. There will always be people who want to push boundaries as far as they can go. Human sacrifice, anyone?
Sometimes we just have to draw a line and say, “Enough.” I personally think forcing adoption agencies to pass children onto gay couples is enough. No one can honestly say that there are or aren’t important effects on the children involved.
The story about the black gay man in Atlanta who used his adopted boy as a prostitute was suppressed, for example. How many other examples are there? The public discussions of this issue have been amazingly weak, considering the importance of the subject.
The MSM wants us to think that “the children are OK,” but are they?
Ditto for using textbooks to show that gay marriages are “normal.” I shudder to think about what kind of education my two little grandchildren are going to get. Will they learn in school that being a catamite is a good career move?
Look how little attention has been paid to Afghanistan, where boy sex is considered normal, and the drugs flow freely. What kind of hell-pit is this place? Does the MSM cover this subject?
Just ranting a bit while I enjoy my alcoholic beverage, listen to music, smile at my husband, and worry about my grandchildren.
Perhaps curses will rain down upon me but…
Marriage is a religious concept. Religious institutions should be free to decide what constitutes marriage. Civil unions are a different matter all together. Relationships between consenting adults be they heterosexual or homosexual in nature or based upon freely chosen acceptance of polyandry or polygamy are not the business of the state. All should be equal before the law.
This is not to say that we as individuals have to accept choices made by individuals that affront out religious beliefs, but we must tolerate those choices. I’m firmly committed to a long term heterosexual, monogamous relationship but have no desire to impose my choice upon others.
“I’ve got my own life to live. I’m the one that’s gonna have to die when it’s time for me to die, so let me live my life the way I want to.”
So sayeth Mr. Hendrix
Gay activists are trying to deceive the public by equating tolerance with acceptance, which are two quite different things. We do not need to tolerate anything we accept, but we really need a lot of tolerance to coexist with something which we do not accept. But coexistence is two-way road and requires tolerance from both parties of the dispute: we can tolerate gays only on condition that they tolerate our non-acceptance and our repulsion of their sexual practices.
No minority should ever provoke the majority by open hostility to the customs and beliefs of the majority. This is a dangerous game. Aggression always causes an aggressive response, and all these gay pride parades can result in activists being paraded along the streets tarred and feathered, and even non-aggressive gays could find themselves locked up in mental institutions for moral insanity. Glass houses and stones, remember.
Hold down the thesis while pumping up and promoting the antithesis to construct a new socialist synthesis…
Push Pop Hegel
“One state, Illinois, iirc, has severed its connection with Catholic family services because the RCs won’t place kids with gay couples. Married or not.”
That was on the 8th. On the 12th, an Illinois judge allowed Catholic Charities to continue its foster care work. He mentioned that termination letter smacked of “gamemanship”. I must note that the state never had a problem with their practice of refusing to place children with co-habiting single people.
I like the idea that’s been going around Christian radio and the religious blogosphere: Surrender the term “marriage” to the civil unions and call the religious ceremony “Holy Matrimony.”
This gets to the heart of the question, why would gay marriage have any impact at all on MY marriage? It’s about religious freedom. And the majority of people simply don’t get it.
From Joan Frawley Desmond:
http://www.thecathoholic.com/the_cathoholic/2009/04/mesex-marriage-bill-religious-freedom.html
“The impact of legalized same-sex marriage on religious freedom has been a critical issue for the Becket Fund, a non-profit legal research group that looks at religious freedom issues around the world. Last year, the Becket Fund published an important study on this subject that made the follow points:
“The study found that all 50 states prohibit gender discrimination in some way, and only 37 states have explicit religious exemptions to these provisions, many of them quite narrow. This lack of robust exemptions could become a problem if (as has happened in some instances) religious objections to same-sex marriage are treated as a kind of gender discrimination. In addition, 33 states prohibit at least some discrimination based on marital status, and only 13 of these states provide religious exemptions, some with a wide latitude of exemption, others with only narrow exemptions. Of the 20 states that prohibit sexual orientation-based discrimination, 18 provide exemptions for religious objection.
“Based on the data, The Becket Fund concludes that if same-sex marriage is recognized by courts or legislatures, people and institutions that have conscientious objections to facilitating same-sex marriage will likely be sued under existing anti-discrimination laws–laws never intended for that purpose…”
I also recommend the writings of Princeton Professor Robert George on this topic:
http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/marriage/mf0139.htm
To all the: It’s the law. Do your job or quit. Does that include the President of the US and the War Powers Act?
Going back to the original issue of the Town Clerk, what part of “Render unto Caesar…” did we miss?
“Dick Weld” wrote:
Going back to the original issue of the Town Clerk, what part of “Render unto Caesar…” did we miss?
You missed the part about rendering to God, son. Stop telling lies about the Bible before you burn for it.
NR said:
To all the: It’s the law. Do your job or quit. God also has a law. Why does He have to move over for Andrew Cuomo (LOL) and the likes of you?
Neo: the burning comment to Mr. Weld is not intended to advocate violence.
It seems that most laws that ban gender discrimination violate one or another liberty which most people used to accept as natural right. Most of them also are actually “thought crime” laws, since in most cases it is impossible to assess motives on which the decisions are made by any objective means, so everybody can be accused in gender discrimination without a need to prove something. May be, it is time to abolish all these anti-discrimination laws as a totalitarian infringement of personal freedom.
No other nation was founded on a secular constitutional democracy like america … If you play then welcome.
It is the same story all over again. Leftists want to sacrifice all human freedoms to false gods of equality, human rights and social progress, just as Communists did. But these concepts are self-contradictory and can not be formalised in any legal sense. Down with equality, progress and human rights – that should be a rallying cry of all those who loves liberty!
Onyo shows the liberal disease: stating whatever they want as fact.
Founded as a secular constitutional democracy?
Whew.
Ah, is THAT why our constitution makes reference to “endowed by a piece of paper with certain alien rights”? 😉
@ Sergey 1:42 pm and 1:54 pm. Excellent.
@ Onyo. “Secular constitutional democracy” is in form a very specific phrase but in substance quite amorphous.
America is secular in that no religion is the official, state-sponsored religion; it is not secular in that Judeo-Christian values have been the foundation of its laws since the beginning.
Of course, we have federal and state constitutions, but at the federal level in particular the courts have unjustly been allowed to arrogate to themselves, and to the other federal branches, a great deal of power and authority that is simply unauthorized in the federal constitution. (For practical purposes, they have superseded most of the constitution with their extravagant abuse of the interstate commerce clause, and all branches of the federal government operate continually as if the Ninth and Tenth amendments do not exist.) This arrogation has included an attempt to remove Judeo-Christian values as the foundation of law, by abusing the First amendment, though the people who drafted and adopted the First amendment believed Judeo-Christian values were, and must be, the foundation of law.
Although, as a general, non-technical term, “democracy” does describe the system of government under which we live, it is not a “democracy” in a strict sense, but rather a democratic republic.
News Flash ! ! !
I just heard on my car radio that California is requiring the teaching of gay studies in social studies classes.
I predicted this in my post of 12:41 am, but did not expect it to happen so quickly.
Is California going to teach the details about how gays and lesbians “do it”? One of Obama’s czars wants kids to learn about “fisting.” I have no idea what that is (though I could google it, of course). Will fisting be included in these social studies?
Will they tell kids which online sites they can go to to learn more?
Promethea, if they teach “fisting” and the like, they’d better teach about injuries and illnesses associated with such practices.
Honestly, I think that “gay history” is pathetic, considering American students have little time for in-depth history. Not to mention we’ve already had Shakespeare labeled gay and secret female sailors characterized as transvestites. Can you imagine the inflation of minor roles in history and the outright revisionist fantasies that will be necessary to put homosexuality in EVERY era?
But since California’s state board controls the output of many textbook companies, we in other states can expect our next history books with little sidebar boxes with gay heroes and heroines. Or we can choose books influenced by Texas, the other big textbook manipulator.
“The original legislation contained an important clause protecting (for now) churches from being forced to perform gay marriages if it violates their beliefs.”
A solution for them might be to renounce their officinal status with the state. They won’t perform any marriages in the eye of the state. Only [real] ones for their church members. The ultimate punch in the eye would be if the people married then decline state marriage licenses and simply wrote a contract that they consider themselves to be married and waited for common law to kick in.
Sergey Says:
“and can not be formalised in any legal sense. Down with equality, progress and human rights — that should be a rallying cry of all those who loves liberty!”
Umm, down with forced equality, progress via the planning of a few [idiots] forced on everyone else, and human rights as judged and enforced by the state (we will have more human rights under a weak state).
No one likes conscientious objectors.
Thoughts from an American, mainline preacher regarding gay marriage:
1. Marriage has always been a Christian sacrament. Wrong. Marriage is not a sacrament in all Christian traditions. It is a serious exchange of vows; a public statement of personal relationship; and a verbal contract. The straw man is the idea that marriage is essentially a religious statement within the Christian community. No, it isn’t.
2. Marriage of one man and one woman is an eternal truth. Wrong. There is no marriage ceremony in the Bible. Engagement parties and wedding receptions, yes. But not the wedding ceremony. The straw man here is the idea that marriage on earth mirrors God’s marriage to His Bride, the Church, in Heaven. But the Church is not the Bride and God does not marry Her in heaven. If the wedding were indeed “instituted by God” as an eternal verity, wouldn’t there be at least a basic template for the ceremony in the Bible?
3. What was the earliest purpose of marriage in the Judeo-Christian Scripture? The purpose was the orderly conveyance of real property from generation to generation. Israel was to enter, hold, and keep the Promised Land. To do that, it was necessary to marry within your own extended family (tribe); to return real estate to original owners and forgive debt every seven or fifty years; and to keep track of individual maternal genealogy. The focus was on neither sexuality nor procreation. The focus was on holding and keeping the Promised Land and assuring its distribution among the Twelve Tribes. So, if you’re not Jewish you don’t have to marry your cousin. But if you were Jewish and lived in the Middle East 3,500 or so years ago, marriage was a matter of proving ownership of real estate. Here, the straw man is the assumption that marriage was originally a religious statement. Wrong. Marriage was initially a civil contract.
The emotionally charged argument about gay marriage seems to come from people who make whopping straw man arguments, who universalize beliefs held by many but not all, and who are then caught up in some kind of fear- based statement like, “Secular government is taking over religion” or “All homosexual people are hated by God and going to hell.”
Some communities will allow gay marriage and some will not. It’s a matter of cultural preference, not divine ordinance.
Like the claim that Global Warming is caused by human use of fossil fuels and will destroy the planet, the Gay Marriage argument seems to feature the least informed with the loudest voices on both sides. Every nitwit with a key board becomes an instant expert. We’ve dumbed-down necessary, credible information to the point that many of us are willing to get into the face of family and friends with scathing statements like, “The earth’s going to die and it’s your fault!” or, “God hates you, pervert!” That’s not a good thing.
One state, Illinois, iirc, has severed its connection with Catholic family services because the RCs won’t place kids with gay couples. Married or not.
I dunno. The RCs have been in a lot of trouble because of gays. Can’t think of why they’d want to get into more.