Since the last gay rights thread got mired in religious talk, I thought maybe by putting correlative dialogue in the OP that we could avoid over-scrutiny of dragging discussions into yet more tangents of a "Hey, religion sucks!" nature.
So, it seems appropriate in the light of the newly-passed marriage laws in New York that we have another outlet for all the harblegarble. With that in mind, I give you
this from the NY Daily News:
Religious leaders slammed the state's new gay marriage law on Saturday, vowing to ban politicians who supported the measure from any Catholic church and parochial school events.
The city's top Catholic clergy released strongly worded statements in the hours after the state Senate voted 33-29 to legalize gay unions. Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio, of the diocese of Brooklyn, called on all Catholic schools to reject any honor bestowed upon them by Gov. Cuomo, who played a pivotal role in getting the bill passed. He further asked all pastors and principals to "not invite any state legislator to speak or be present at any parish or school celebration."
"This is a further erosion of the real understanding of marriage," DiMarzio told the Daily News. "The state should not be concerned about regulating affection."
"I believe the passage of same-sex marriage is another 'nail in the coffin' of marriage," DeMarzio wrote in an essay posted at NYDailyNews.com.
"It is destructive because we fail to view marriage in the context of a vocation: a calling to participate in the great enterprise of forming the next generation. Marriage is reduced to an empty honor," he wrote. "That there was virtually no public debate on the issue and that the entire matter was concluded in just over 30 minutes late on a Friday evening is disgraceful."
New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan said he was "very disappointed, very saddened and very worried" by the developments that will allow same-sex partners to legally wed. "I think for anybody, especially state government, to tamper with something as sacred and timeless and as much a part of the human condition as marriage is careless," Dolan said.
Again, familiar fallacies are being trotted out by the Brooklyn diocese, among them, that being that if marriage is a "sacred institution" (as they argue), this not only precludes members of the LGBT community from being married, but all non-Christians (non-Catholics?) as well. Atheists assuredly are out, but Jews, Muslims, Mormons, and members of any other Christ-denying sect are to be voided as well. The odd part here is that the Catholic Church (nor any evangelical institution, for that matter) never seems to take up this logically-consistent charge of removing marriage rights from heterosexual infidels and blasphemers.
Not to miss out on the oldest of the fallacious arguments, the Catholic bishops in New York again allude to the assertion that marriage is, at its root, a practical arrangement to produce and raise children. Yet I feel confident in betting against their support for LGBT adoption rights.
My favorite part of the article has to be Bishop DiMarzio's crocodile tears at the notion of the government getting involved in people's personal lives. Anyone framing an argument
against LGBT rights as a blow
against personal liberty has some pretty awesome cognitive dissonance going on.
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Hey look!
We agree!
So did the State!
WOO EVERYONE AGREES!!!!
That's not why I find the argument bizarre, though. The religious argument about same-sex marriage isn't settled within religious communities. There are religious groups, and not little fringe ones either, that recognize same sex marriages. So the fight isn't really about imposing Christian (or whatever) values on the secular world. The fight is about getting the government to step in and decide which Christian denomination is correct, and using the law to settle a theological argument.
Hence, it isn't just about the separation of church and state, it is about freedom of religion. It is saying that the Baptists and Catholics should be able to come into a Methodist church to tell the Methodists what their theological interpretation is going to be. The reverse situation doesn't apply, because, even where same-sex marriage is legal, no one is forcing churches to marry gay couples. Aside from the constitutional implications, there's no good explanation for why this can't be used to settle other arguments. Should there be female clergy? Why not get the government involved to sort it out. Is the Eucharist the Real Presence? An act of Congress should be able to determine this.
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Essentially, for as much as everyone loves to pretend that the 98% majority is entirely "Judeo-Christian-whatever-vaguely-agrees-with-me", treating religious and personal freedom like something to be gained at the expense of others opens you up to the question of what sort of laws we should enact to make sure that Catholics don't take power from whoever has a bigger denomination than Catholicism in the US. The end game of thinking in this sort of sectarian manner is that the largest minority faction fucks everyone over. And that faction isn't "Christians". It's a very particular sect, likely not yours.
Separating church and state is the only way to guarantee that the state church doesn't remove your freedom to worship.
I had fun arguing this at work the other day. Most of my coworkers are pretty conservative, but not particularly educated about it. Someone mentioned how I don't eat at Chik-Fil-A due to their stance on gay rights and their campaign contributions, and I just said "Funny how when we discussed the California fast food thing you didn't want the government meddling in people's lives, but now it's ok, huh?"
Also, damnit Catholic church. I keep trying to tell people you're not all horrible then you do stuff like that. Seriously, don't accept awards from that senator because he supported gay marriage? What's wrong with you people?
I don't care if it's a hobo, that's ridiculous. Most Catholics I know would agree. Hell, a core tenant of Christanity is supposed to be kindness regardless of the other person.
Addttionally, religion is better protected when the government does not get involved. The entire purpose of free exercise is to ensure that minority religions and majority religions alike are protected in their ability to worship. Second, religion is a pretty important thing to the degree that all societies have some law that concerns religion in its establishment or its exercise. Despite the negatives for religious doctrines, as high lighted by Ross, religion is also very key to many individuals and provides social, moral, and in our history, democratic reinforcing characteristics.
Heh. Metropolitan Church is seen as a bunch of devil-worshippers here in America. They have a huge pull and following in major cities but they have no ground in our uh...less worldly areas (95% of Americuh).
For me, the most surreal part of the whole issue is that, in reality, Catholicism and Evangelical Christianity has been allowed to co-opt the legal definition of marriage despite the historical precedent of marriage A) originating separately in various cultures, and typically originating outside scriptural provision. There's not even a strong precedent for Church-ordained unions in Europe until around 400 A.D. The deification of marriage in the West is largely a Catholic institution in and of itself, so what we basically have now is centuries of Catholic influence and precedent, but not necessarily a biblical mandate. Certainly marriage occurred in the West before the rise of Catholicism, and occurred elsewhere as well in places that never heard of Catholicism. So what we have in practice now is the Catholic Church upset over not being recognized in secular society as the arbiter of who can and cannot be wed- a provision they've enjoyed for about 1600 years, directly or indirectly.
Yet it's taken until now for the most advanced Western cultures to examine the fallacious nature of such authoritative assumptions of powers not expressly given to any religious institution, let alone just the See. While here in America we allow individual sects the right to bar whomever they wish from being wedded in their sanctuaries, we don't have any legislative protection that states one sect's criterion for qualification presides over all others, ecclesiastical or secular.
The nearest analogy I can think of for such unfounded abdication of authority to unsubstantiated powers, on this level of magnitude, would be no less than being akin to something like restricting voting rights or private investment rights based on one's religion, race, or gender- based on nothing more than millennia-old sectarian religious interpretations. And I don't think the word "interpretations" is even the right word; it's more like "appropriations."
Part of the way that religious worship is protected is by the fact that our government in no way cares what their practices are.
Congress should step in if our nation's laws and practices support legalizing something.
That isn't regulation of religious practice, that's ignoring religious practice because it has no bearing on legality. We don't have a debate about whether or not the states should allow dancing because who cares what religions outlaw it.
Right.
The logic used in that argument is exactly the same that should argue that Catholic politicians shouldn't support hate-crime legislation against Jews or Muslims or whoever.
Gay rights laws don't restrict the Catholic Church's rights to refuse marriage to gay couples. They're basically condemning these politicians for following the goddamned constitution.
I went to a Church of Christ high school where dancing was a no-no. We didn't have a senior prom, we had a senior dinner, with assigned seating. That's right. Assigned. This is a perfect analogy though, one that I've used myself on a lot of my own co-workers and family members to no avail.
Their arguments basically boil down to "Well, my faith is the right one anyway. So what if my religious beliefs are being forced on people, it's not doing them any real harm, because we're right and in the end it will be good for them."
Well, to an extent. We still send people to jail if their spiritual practices end up hurting others physically. The people who run sweat-lodges that kill people through dehydration still go to jail for manslaughter; the polygamists who force children into marriages with grown adults still go to jail for child abuse.
The religious aspect always makes prosecution of those crimes more tricky, but it doesn't shield them outright from justice.
Well, it depends I guess on how many of your local politicians think that America is nation founded on equal opportunity, or think that their election position now gives them arbitration over the morality of others.
I really hate this line from the quote in the OP.
The first part is bullshit because the church has no problem with straight couples who cannot produce children getting married (Oh, but they could adopt! Well, so can gays).
The second part is just laughable.
True, true. But I mean, the basic idea is not that the church is protected from the state by being considered special and important and protected, it's protected from the state and the other churches simultaneously by being considered entirely unrelated to the state.
I don't like when people say that it's necessary to treat religious groups with special care in order to protect them. Protecting religious freedom depends on our not giving a shit what any individual church thinks. Otherwise when the Church of Baal becomes a majority, we're all screwed.
If you run a church that doesn't want to marry a gay couple, fine. You don't have to do it. Just as their loves lives are not anyone's to control, neither is your church. If you (as a pastor/bishop/whatever) or your congregation do not want that in your church, fine. That is your decision. No one can force you to marry people that you don't want to marry.
But you should also understand that since you have that freedom, gay people have the freedom to go get married at another church or at the courthourse or wherever they choose because that is what freedom is.
It's really a simple concept if you think about it.
- Yes those were paraphrased quotes.
I don't understand why this bothered you. Catholic priests telling members of their congregation that supporting, advocating, and advancing something the church opposes that they are being sanctioned by the church for their behavior...
Why is that bothersome? Is the Church supposed to give legislators a pass? If the Church frames your choice as one between faith and public opinion, and you don't choose faith, you ought to expect a response from your church.
A decision to deny Communion, or even excommunicate, seems an entirely appropriate, and entirely correct, decision to make. If a legislator is having conflicts between his faith and his job, he needs to choose one and face the consequences as he believes them to be.
The problem with this is the conflict between the duty as a person vested with the power to marry to do so for all who ask and have the right document, and the belief thar doing so violates your religious beliefs. Basically, it's the threat of losing your ability to marry anyone after a court battle arising from your refusal to marry a gay couple.
I think the NY law carved out an exception for religious objection that solves this issue for preachers and priests who object on religious grounds.
If anything, I think it's arguable that religious institutions enjoy too much leniency and legal protection; they get away with far more special pleading in litigious contexts than just about any other group.
The Constitution states plainly that the state will not condone any specific religion, nor will it restrict the practice of any religion in preference to another.
Other than that, religious groups should enjoy no additional freedoms or powers that are not awarded to any other secular group or association.
Meaning, using religion in the defense of objectionable and/or criminal acts should have some pretty strict limitations.
This Jewish guy was pretty important to the Catholic Church at one time, IIRC.
We in fact do have to treat religions with special care because of the dual nature of the first amendment. We must provide ample room for individuals to exercise religion (Free exercise) while at the same time ensure the government doesn't support one, some, or all religions or no religion (establishment clause). For example, when one religious group's practice conflicts with something like, compulsory education, we have to treat those religious views differently because we recognize the importance of free exercise (Yoder v. Wisconsin)
What you are focusing on is that the state cannot care about what an individual church thinks, which is an establishment clause issue. By and large the government can't legislate as to religion to prevent the government from attacking churches, or at least that is one primary rational of our establishment jurisprudence. BUT at the same time, the government must heed religious practice or run the fear of also violating free exercise. For example, mandating prayer in school is a violation of the establishment clause however, it is also an individual violation of free exercise because it requires individuals to profess a belief that they do not hold (Wallace v. Jaffrey, and I think abbington Township v. Schempp). At the same time we have to take care not to violate the free exercise of other individuals in non establishment cases, for example, mandatory pledges to the flag (Barnette) or Jehovah's witnesses who wish not to have the NH state motto on their license plates.
In the end, the argument that government should simply not care only resolves the government establishment aspect, which as far as it relates to gay marriage religion is an improper foundation for denying the equality of individuals right to marry. The other side of America's first amendment requires that we take extreme care to protect religious practice by acknowledging the many ways that religion tends to interact with our daily lives.
So, you'd be cool with the Pope kicking out any legislator who doesn't vote to outlaw Islam?
We live in a pluralistic society. A religion that attempts to enforce via law rather than persuade via conversion is violently opposed to that idea.
This is objectively Wrong.
Legislators and public servants are not representatives of specific religious sects, and to act officially in such a manner is arguably unconstitutional. Federal and State representatives' primary duty is to delineate, protect, and define the freedoms of ALL their constituents, not just the ones that subscribe to their particular spiritual faith.
A Catholic politician voting in favor of gay rights is not representing the Holy See in his or her actions, ergo any punishment from church hierarchy based on those acts as an elected representative should only be considered if and when said politician acts against the actual institution of the Church.
To wit: Voting to allow secular marriage of gay couples while protecting the Church's ability to deny that right within its own confines is not an act against the Holy Church. Voting to force the Catholic Church in America to confirm marriage rights to any gay couple that requests it would be acting against the Church.
It did create an exception for priests who object
of course your example of a religious leader being obligated to perform a marriage is total bunk. Find one example of a religious leader being taken to court for refusing to perform a marriage.
Really though, no one who can marry a couple is in anyway obligated to marry a couple if they don't want to. And I doubt same-sex couples are going to choose a gay hating church as their initial venue.
It varies by the priest but I've heard everything from giving them total control of the ceremony to being forced to take couple's classes beforehand
It's especially ridiculous when discussing the Catholic church, which is one of those denominations where you can have a straight couple where both partners are practicing members of church and still be denied a valid church wedding due to the nuances of Catholic law. The notion that the church can get away with effectively arbitrarily denying whomever they wish from getting married, except for gays, is ridiculous.
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The examples you give don't seem to be evidence of any special care needed, or taken, with religion. They seem to be the application of our legal system to the citizenry. The fact that our legal system is non-sectarian being what allows it to be applied to people with minority religious beliefs.
Edit:
I suppose I feel like most examples I've seen of "free exercise of religion" fall under the larger heading of "free speech", rather than being an extra category.
I'm not really sure what you're trying to say here. Are you saying that priests/pastors or other religious officials are going to be taken to court after they refuse to marry a gay couple?
Because if you are, I would have to strongly disagree. No one is going to be taken to court over that. Mainly because there is no way a priest is getting thrown in jail for adhering to his religious freedom in a nonviolent way and also because if a gay couple wanted to be married, they would just find someone who was cool with it instead of going through a long and drawn out court proceeding.
The bill passed that the latter is now legally obtainable, not the former. Fancy that, the state can't actually define what marriage in the eyes of God is. It can, however, define what it considers to be marriage, and if they decide that GLBT fit within that definition, well and good.
It really is about time we just got around to seperating the two across all parts of society. I kinda wish governments would just change their legal marriage laws to be a civil union for everyone, no matter their sexual orientation, and let marriage be a social or religious thing. Just like, you know, weddings are. You don't have to have a ceremony to get married in the eyes of the state, all they want you to do is sign a bit of paper and go through some legal hoops.
I also object to a church's attempts to reign in their political members by threatening punishments for legislative behavior. However, as a matter of right, the churches are free to do so.
I agree. While it's not an easy choice, if your church espouses views that you do not agree with, and seeks to punish your membership in said church when you state your own views, then it's time to find a new church.
Reason does not halt the wharblegarble.
Also I believe that those legislators have every right to pull the Church's tax-exempt status under Section 501C, which prohibits religious organizations from directly attempting to influence legislation in such a manner.
As was once said, "He who should live like a dick, shall pay out the ass."
Unfortunately, supporting gay rights is in opposition to the Catholic Church, and thus they are from their point of view "justified" in performing this excommunication. The church does not support the idea of gay marriage as in their eyes allowing that is allowing a sin or abomination or whatever strong word you want to use. The Church does not acknowledge the separation of Church and State, they would rather the Pope be running the world's governments. In their eyes, supporting gay marriage, in any capacity, especially if you are a catholic and a politician, is speaking in a public forum in direct opposition to their teachings.
Hell, my Catholic high school told the choir (of which I was part) that we couldn't sing "Seasons of Love" from RENT, because the musical is about gay people. Is the song? Not even a little.
Heh
This