Ms. Wilson is an editor of “Same-Sex Marriage and Religious Liberty: Emerging Conflicts” (Rowman & Littlefield, 2008) and one of a group of legal scholars urging states considering legalizing same-sex marriage to include “robust” protections for religious conscience.
These scholars have divided views on the wisdom of same-sex marriage itself. Ms. Wilson, for example, has taken no position on it, while Douglas Laycock, another editor of that volume and a foremost analyst of First Amendment religious liberty questions, strongly supports it. Mr. Laycock considers that support compatible with his advocacy of religious exemptions. They are “parallel protections,” he believes, “for quite similar claims to individual liberty in matters essential to personal identity.”
Writing to officials in New York, Mr. Laycock pointed out that it was not “in the interest of the gay and lesbian community to create religious martyrs when enforcing the right to same-sex marriage.”
“It is far better,” he wrote, “to respect the liberty of both sides and let same-sex marriage be implemented with a minimum of confrontation.”
“…to respect the liberty of both sides and let same-sex marriage be implemented…”
Amen.
Leaving aside the questions about the service providers, the fundamental problem is that, when ministers solemnise civil marriages, they are agents of the state, which in turn leaves them open to anti-discrimination charges should they decline to marry two people.
One idea that’s been floated by the likes of Gene Robinson is to go to the same system they have in many countries where only the state legally marries people and the church simply blesses their union. [url=http://www.vulcanhammer.org/2009/04/20/civil-marriage-lets-take-this-to-the-next-level-gene/]I responded to that idea here[/url]; I think the better solution is to take civil marriage off the table altogether, [url=http://www.vulcanhammer.org/2009/04/13/some-more-thoughts-on-same-sex-civil-marriage/]as I elaborated here[/url].
[blockquote]when ministers solemnise civil marriages, they are agents of the state, which in turn leaves them open to anti-discrimination charges should they decline to marry two people.[/blockquote]
Ministers have ALWAYS been free to decline to marry ANY couple for ANY reason. I’m sure there are still “ministers” who refuse to marry interracial couples–and none has ever been successfully sued over the matter.
Anyone who claims clergy would be “forced” to perform a same-sex marriage is either willfully ignorant of all precedent or intentionally lying to propagandize against same-sex marriage. In neither case should such claims be taken seriously.
3, that’s your opinion. One need look to other countries that are forcing the acceptance of homosexual behavior. The narrow example of clergy being forced to marry couples may not happen, but it could and inventive minds could figure out a way to inforce it. But more likely people will be proscribed from following their religious beliefs in other areas. One need only look to the UK to see it in action.
[blockquote] Anyone who claims clergy would be “forced†to perform a same-sex marriage is either willfully ignorant of all precedent or intentionally lying to propagandize against same-sex marriage. In neither case should such claims be taken seriously. [/blockquote]
I’m sure that many school boards were similarly confident that their separate schools would endure before SCOTUS overturned [i]Plessey v. Ferguson[/i]. Given the traction the LGBT community is getting in equating their situation with that of blacks and other economically disadvantaged groups, and the nature of our judiciary, one is ill advised to make such triumphalistic invectives.
I also suspect that LGBT activists such as Robinson are advocating the “two marriage” system in part to head off the blowback from a court decision forcing ministers to perform same sex civil marriages. One may not agree with their idea or position, but at least someone is thinking ahead about something in this debate.
Charity towards religious institutions is necessary.
Vulcanhammer has some interesting ideas about marriage – but the issue has to do with the state’s interest in property. Marriage is the first form of the welfare state. When people make a promise to one another, there are broad social consequences that have to do with wealth and poverty.
I think the issue would become more clear if we recognized that the real interest of the church and state is about property and wealth, and it moved away from presuming that the tab-slot theory of sex had much to do with the divine.