Wednesday, July 01, 2015

"I WAS ONLY FOLLOWING ORDERS”

This is all coming from someone on a religious board of directors who voted to SUPPORT gay marriage in his congregation.
These people’s consciences below were so affected by their surrounding society and it’s laws, they felt they had to leave that society and that culture to find religious freedom.


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They and Roger Williams came here to found PHYSICAL PLACES where religious (which is to say places where conscience dictated behavior) freedom was sacrosanct.


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Maybe you’ve heard of them.
Today there exist PUBLIC officials whose religious beliefs must be violated for them to follow the order of SCOTUS. We do not require those who believe they must be covered, or wear a yarmulke, of a cross to violate their belief, EVEN IN PUBLIC VENUES.
HERE
and HERE
“The notion that public employees get to pick and choose which laws they follow based on their religious beliefs is a really dangerous precedent and a terrible public policy, If you’re a public official, you need to carry out those laws, and you don’t get to decide whether they’re right or wrong.” - Marc Solomon, national campaign director at Freedom to Marry
We CANNOT require those public officials who have religious conscience over gay marriage, and those who operate businesses which connect with marriage to be COMPELLED to act against their religious conscience.
And we CANNOT compel them to jump through costly legal and regulatory hoops to PROVE they do.
If this means that we need to have a Constitutional Amendment to AGAIN require the First Amendment to provide what Roger Williams and the Pilgrims sought so desperately they left all they had and knew, then it’s time to raise the conscience of the nation by this effort.
This INCLUDES the horrific ruling in Oklahoma that the 10 Commandments granite tablet must be removed from public lands. If nothing else, the cultural and historical model for our behavior should have been respected for that reason alone.
It’s not that SCOTUS should have PREVENTED those who love the same sex from getting married, it’s that they now have VIOLATED the true religious freedom of those who believe OTHER.
I am not one of those who have such beliefs, but I MUST. ….MUST defend their right to find their own conscience, and act on it.

Permitting gay marriage is NOT the same thing as compelling people to take part in gay marriage.

3 comments:

Alec said...

"Permitting gay marriage is not the same thing as compelling people to take part in gay marriage."

Perfectly said. Glad to find your blog.

Always On Watch said...

Let me play devil's advocate for a moment....

If anyone can refuse to fulfill his job requirements because of religious conviction, then a Muslim clerk in the grocery store can refuse to check out the bacon which I've placed on the belt for checkout.

Epaminondas said...

AoW... yes. Don't HIRE such people. You'd probably have a hard time firing, but into the stockroom you go ...in my store.

However, you would also find a different gorcery, just as a gay person should find a different baker, pastor or rabbi, and I bet those folks would HELP the client find one