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The Gay marriage fight now becomes a religious liberty fight
Washington Examiner ^ | 06/30/2013 | BY TIMOTHY P. CARNEY

Posted on 06/30/2013 7:32:06 PM PDT by SeekAndFind

Today's talk of tolerance and acceptance of gay marriage will soon give way to intolerance and rejection of those who hold a traditional view of marriage.

The next offensive in this culture war will involve wielding government to force individuals to accept the new definition of marriage, falsely invoking analogies to civil rights.

As a prototype, consider the assault on the liberty of Elaine Huguenin, the wedding photographer in New Mexico. In 2006, a couple asked her to photograph their wedding. When she learned the couple were lesbians, she declined, explaining that pursuant to her faith, she only photographed man-woman weddings.

The couple got a different photographer, but they sued Huguenin. In New Mexico, there is no gay marriage. In a recent poll, most New Mexicans said they oppose gay marriage. But the state outlaws discrimination based on sexual orientation.

The New Mexico Human Rights Commission found Huguenin had broken the law, and ordered her to pay $7,000. Huguenin, with the aide of the pro-bono civil liberties law firm Alliance Defense Fund, has sued and the case is now before state Supreme Court.

Try to live your own life according to traditional values, and the state will come after you, and compel you live according to its values.

Florist Barronelle Stutzman owns Arlene's Flowers in Richland, Wash. A gay man, who was a long-time customer of Arlene's, asked Stutzman to arrange flowers for his wedding. She declined, citing her belief that marriage is a union between a man and woman. Now Washington Attorney General Bob Ferguson is coming after Stutzman, saying, in effect, she must participate in this gay wedding.

How does Ferguson justify using the power of the state to impose his morality? "If Ms. Stutzman sells flowers to heterosexual couples," the Seattle Post-Intelligencer quotes Ferguson saying, "she must sell them to same-sex couples."

But obviously Stutzman did sell flowers to same-sex couples, happily - that's why this particular client was a long-time customer. What she refuses to do is participate in a ceremony that the state calls marriage, but which she doesn't consider to be marriage.

This is why the civil rights analogy doesn't work. Hugeinin's case and the Stutzman's case aren't about small businesswomen refusing to serve gay people. They are about businesswomen refusing to endorse the novel definition of marriage.

Now a majority of the U.S. Supreme Court has asserted that the only reason to object to gay marriage is to "demean" gay people, expect this offensive in the culture war to escalate.

President Obama promised that he won't try to force churches to administer gay weddings. That's very kind of him. But Obama's contraception mandate has shown us how narrowly he views religious liberty.

Maybe Obama or his successor won't use an executive order to rewrite the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony, but government will go after churches all the same. The Cardinal O'Boyle Hall that your parish occasionally rents to outside groups? Better allow gay wedding receptions there or face the wrath of the state.

You're allowed to be religious, of course, but only on the Sabbath. If you dare step into the world of commerce or public service, the government will impose its morality on you.

You see it in Obama's rhetoric: he talks of "freedom of worship" rather than freedom of religion. It's a push to bring to heel all rivals of government. Liberal writer Kevin Drum made it pretty explicit during the contraception mandate debate:

"I'm tired of religious groups operating secular enterprises (hospitals, schools)," he wrote, "hiring people of multiple faiths, serving the general public, taking taxpayer dollars -- and then claiming that deeply held religious beliefs should exempt them from public policy."

The thrust: religious groups should only do religion--they shouldn't feed the poor, clothe the naked, educate the young.

And individuals who adhere to religions? Leave your faith at the church door. The Obama administration has argued in the contraception mandate cases that we lose our freedom of conscience the second we enter into commerce with other people.

The Left has long been the aggressor in the culture war. The crushing power of government has long been their weapon.

Many politically involved writers and advocates concerned with liberty and equality fought to open marriage to gay couples. Now that they've won, here's hoping that those who care about liberty will defend the liberty of cultural conservatives to live their lives according to their faith.

-- Timothy P. Carney is The Washington Examiner's senior political columnist


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Editorial; Front Page News; Government; US: Washington
KEYWORDS: 666; gaymarriage; homonaziagenda; homosexualagenda; homosexuality; liberty; persecution; religion; religiousfreedom; religiousliberty
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To: verga

good for her


41 posted on 07/01/2013 5:34:31 AM PDT by manc (Marriage =1 man + 1 woman,when they say marriage equality then they should support polygamy)
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To: manc

Should there be some punctuation in your post? Or proper syntax? Makes no sense.


42 posted on 07/01/2013 5:47:55 AM PDT by MayflowerMadam (I feel much better since I gave up hope.)
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To: MayflowerMadam

He can’t be forced to marry them. He should worry about what marriage is about and he should be preaching it.

Worrying about homosexuals who might be suing him for doing his job as a Pastor is plain silly and if the issue arises then he should stand tall and tell them as well as his flock every week, every day that marriage is between one man and one woman.

That is his job with the 1st amendment behind him.

Hope you can understand that.


43 posted on 07/01/2013 5:53:38 AM PDT by manc (Marriage =1 man + 1 woman,when they say marriage equality then they should support polygamy)
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To: Tzimisce
So you have two choices: either get nasty back or sit on your ass and watch them take over.

There's a difference between "getting nasty back" and cheating to beat the Leftists, and I'll admit that conservatives haven't been tough on the Left by calling out every violation. Obama's likely illegitimacy is exhibit one on this.

44 posted on 07/01/2013 7:04:40 AM PDT by fwdude ( You cannot compromise with that which you must defeat.)
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To: verga
“...We are not sloughing to Gomorrah, we are running at full tilt.”

We may be fully there already...or worse. Sodom and Gomorrah didn't even try to use the lying term of ‘marriage’ to legitimize their sins of homosexuality.

I personally believe we were already under judgment when this evil administration took the leadership of our nation. Many times in the OT, when the Lord was displeased with Israel, He would turn them over to their pagan enemies to discipline them. This administration follows its own lusts and wants to promote and legislate that everyone do the same.

God will not stand idly by and watch an individual, let alone a nation continually sin against Him. It is the law of sowing and reaping. Our nation's foundation is being rebuilt on the sinking sand of sin rather than the firm foundation of Jesus Christ. It is a terrible thing to witness.

45 posted on 07/01/2013 7:56:24 AM PDT by 444Flyer (How long O LORD? Psalm 112)
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To: Nachum

BTTT


46 posted on 07/01/2013 8:02:55 AM PDT by onyx (Please Support Free Republic - Donate Monthly! If you want on Sarah Palin's Ping List, Let Me know!)
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To: Nachum

THE GENIE IS OUT OF THE BOTTLE, THEY WILL GO TO STATES THAT FORBID IT AND START UP LAWSUITS. SODOM AND GORMORAH HAS RETURNED, MULTIPLE PARTNERS IS NEXT AGENDA. AND GOD IS ANGRY WITH AMERICA!


47 posted on 07/01/2013 11:31:18 AM PDT by GailA (THOSE WHO DON'T KEEP PROMISES TO THE MILITARY, WON'T KEEP THEM TO U!)
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To: verga

Any Baptist Church I have EVER gone to, and there have been many, certainly do.


48 posted on 07/01/2013 3:38:43 PM PDT by gidget7 ("When a man assumes a public trust, he should consider himself as public property." Thomas Jefferson)
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To: Prince of Space

Did not know that. Two of my brothers had to and also go to conferences before they could marry their wives. Granted has been about 19 years since then, but then again may depend on the Church.


49 posted on 07/01/2013 3:40:29 PM PDT by gidget7 ("When a man assumes a public trust, he should consider himself as public property." Thomas Jefferson)
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To: ivyleaguebrat

For now!! Anyone who trusts it will sty that way is foolish, as these people are redefining/shredding the Constitution daily!


50 posted on 07/01/2013 3:41:52 PM PDT by gidget7 ("When a man assumes a public trust, he should consider himself as public property." Thomas Jefferson)
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To: gidget7
Any Baptist Church I have EVER gone to, and there have been many, certainly do.

Did you look at the link I provided?

These were both a current and former baptist saying this, not me.

51 posted on 07/01/2013 3:56:18 PM PDT by verga (A nation divided by Zero!)
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To: 2banana
Muslims are exempted - of course

That's how the left's hypocrisy loses votes from the mushy middle.

52 posted on 07/01/2013 5:30:08 PM PDT by neverdem (Register pressure cookers! /s)
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To: manc

Just in case anyone still thinks that the reason homosexual activisists and other assorted leftists who push same sex marriage are doing so for reasons of “family togetherness”, I’m going to post the quotes I put together revealing in their own words, just why they want homosexual “marriage”. Unfortunately I was not savvy enough to have dates or sources but they’re all accurate quotes. Anyone feel free to copy and spread around.

From LA Times of March 12: ...
“Divided over gay marriage” by Roy Rivenburg Paula Ettelbrick, a law professor who runs the International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission, recommends legalizing a wide variety of marriage alternatives, including polyamory, or group wedlock. An example could include a lesbian couple living with a sperm-donor father, or a network of men and women who share sexual relations.
One aim, she says, is to break the stranglehold that married heterosexual couples have on health benefits and legal rights. The other goal is to “push the parameters of sex, sexuality and family, and in the process transform the very fabric of society.” ... [snip]

An excerpt from: In Their Own Words: The Homosexual Agenda:
“Homosexual activist Michelangelo Signorile, who writes periodically for The New York Times, summarizes the agenda in OUT magazine (Dec/Jan 1994):

“A middle ground might be to fight for same-sex marriage and its benefits and then, once granted, redefine the institution of marriage completely, to demand the right to marry not as a way of adhering to society’s moral codes, but rather to debunk a myth and radically alter an archaic institution... The most subversive action lesbian and gay men can undertake —and one that would perhaps benefit all of society—is to transform the notion of family entirely.”

“Its the final tool with which to dismantle all sodomy statues, get education about homosexuality and AIDS into the public schools and in short to usher in a sea change in how society views and treats us.”

Chris Crain, the editor of the Washington Blade has stated that all homosexual activists should fight for the legalization of same-sex marriage as a way of gaining passage of federal anti-discrimination laws that will provide homosexuals with federal protection for their chosen lifestyle.

Crain writes: “...any leader of any gay rights organization who is not prepared to throw the bulk of their efforts right now into the fight for marriage is squandering resources and doesn’t deserve the position.” (Washington Blade, August, 2003).

Andrew Sullivan, a homosexual activist writing in his book, Virtually Normal, says that once same-sex marriage is legalized, heterosexuals will have to develop a greater “understanding of the need for extramarital outlets between two men than between a man and a woman.”

He notes: “The truth is, homosexuals are not entirely normal; and to flatten their varied and complicated lives into a single, moralistic model is to miss what is essential and exhilarating about their otherness.” (Sullivan, Virtually Normal, pp. 202-203)

Paula Ettelbrick, a law professor and homosexual activist has said:
“Being queer is more than setting up house, sleeping with a person of the same gender, and seeking state approval for doing so. . Being queer means pushing the parameters of sex, sexuality, and family; and in the process, transforming the very fabric of society. . We must keep our eyes on the goals of providing true alternatives to marriage and of radically reordering society’s view of reality.” (partially quoted in “Beyond Gay Marriage,”

Stanley Kurtz, The Weekly Standard, August 4, 2003)
Evan Wolfson has stated:

“Isn’t having the law pretend that there is only one family model that works (let alone exists) a lie? . marriage is not just about procreation-indeed is not necessarily about procreation at all. “(quoted in “What Marriage Is For,” by Maggie Gallagher, The Weekly Standard, August 11, 2003)

Mitchel Raphael, editor of the Canadian homosexual magazine Fab, says:

“Ambiguity is a good word for the feeling among gays about marriage. I’d be for marriage if I thought gay people would challenge and change the institution and not buy into the traditional meaning of ‘till death do us part’ and monogamy forever. We should be Oscar Wildes and not like everyone else watching the play.” (quoted in “Now Free To Marry, Canada’s Gays Say, ‘Do I?’” by Clifford Krauss, The New York Times, August 31, 2003)

1972 Gay Rights Platform Demands: “Repeal of all legislative provisions that restrict the sex or number of persons entering into a marriage unit.”

[Also among the demands was the elimination of all age of consent laws.]


53 posted on 07/01/2013 5:46:48 PM PDT by little jeremiah (Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point. CSLewis)
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To: manc

Obummer’s former White House aid and “body man” Reggie Love, who accompanied him on vacation in Palm Beach (without Michelle and kids), now tweets from South Africa -— where Obozo just happens to be currently. The perverse sodomy fest continues:

http://instagram.com/p/bLUA9_Alfn/


54 posted on 07/01/2013 5:54:29 PM PDT by TheBigJ
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To: verga

Yes I did, my comment still stand. There are baptists and then there are Baptists. Heck the westboro cult has the nerve to call themselves Baptists. Ha.


55 posted on 07/01/2013 8:42:57 PM PDT by gidget7 ("When a man assumes a public trust, he should consider himself as public property." Thomas Jefferson)
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To: TArcher

Consider that the survival of much of the animal kingdom depends on the preponderance of heterosexuality.


56 posted on 07/01/2013 9:03:39 PM PDT by windsorknot
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To: windsorknot
Consider that the survival of much of the animal kingdom depends on the preponderance of heterosexuality.
 
Heterosexuality increases adaptation.
 
What does the survival of a colony of bees, or termites, or ants -- depend upon the preponderance of?

That seems to bee the social structure desired by the occult (well, actually not so occult these days) proponents of Transhumanist / Postgenderist doctrine.   
 
http://www.google.com/#sclient=psy-ab&q=Transhumanism+postgenderism
 
It was all out in the open when the theocratic eunuchs were breeding slaves for the Babylonian, and Egyptian, and Roman.... empires. 
 
Meet the new Ubermensch, same as the Old Ubermensch
--The Who?

57 posted on 07/02/2013 4:03:19 AM PDT by TArcher ("TO SECURE THESE RIGHTS, governments are instituted among men" -- Does that still work?)
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To: little jeremiah

Dn't need n Weatherman t see which waybama's wind

blws.

 

"Behind the Violence, Says Jane Alpert, Was Sex"

--November 09, 1981--
"The leaders of the Weather Underground, she believes, followed a similar pattern of constantly shifting sexual alliances..."

http://www.people.com/people/archive/article/0,,20080637,00.html

"He [Bill Ayers] also writes about the Weathermen's sexual experimentation as they tried to 'smash monogamy.' The Weathermen were 'an army of lovers,' he says, and describes having had different sexual partners, including his best male friend."

Source: New York Times, September 11, 2001: "No Regrets for a Love Of Explosives; In a Memoir of Sorts, a War Protester Talks of Life With the Weathermen"
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F02E1DE1438F932A2575AC0A9679C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=1

"...the Weathermen, when not engaged in group sex, committed such revolutionary acts as parading with a Viet Cong flag through a local park on Independence Day and spray-painting the walls of a high school with the slogans, "Off the Pigs," "Viet Cong Will Win," and "F#$k U.S. Imperialism."..."

Campus Wars: The Peace Movement At American State Universities in the Vietnam Era

 

"What happens next bears watching closely, as does the response of the president, ex-Speaker Pelosi, and others on the left.  Encouraged by leftists in the Democratic Party and funded by left-leaning nonprofit organizations and celebrity contributors, Occupy Wall Street may in time morph into something resembling the radical factions of the late 1960s and 1970s."

http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/10/predicting_the_weatherman.html

The Osawatomie Coincidence

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2818309/posts

 

"According to my opinion, and the opinions of many defectors of my caliber, only about 15% of time, money, and manpower is spent on espionage as such. The other 85% is a slow process which we call either ideological subversion, active measures, or psychological warfare. What it basically means is: to change the perception of reality of every American that despite of the abundance of information no one is able to come to sensible conclusions in the interest of defending themselves, their families, their community, and their country.
 
It's a great brainwashing process which goes very slow and is divided into four basic stages.
 
The first stage being "demoralization".
 
It takes from 15 to 20 years to demoralize a nation. Why that many years? Because this is the minimum number of years required to educate one generation of students in the country of your enemy exposed to the ideology of [their] enemy. In other words, Marxism-Leninism ideology is being pumped into the soft heads of at least 3 generation of American students without being challenged or counterbalanced by the basic values of Americanism; American patriotism. "
--KGB Defector Yuri Bezmenov
--Soviet Subversion of the Free Press (Ideological subversion, Destabilization, CRISIS - and the KGB)
 

58 posted on 07/02/2013 4:12:04 AM PDT by TArcher ("TO SECURE THESE RIGHTS, governments are instituted among men" -- Does that still work?)
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No reference to sodomy in the 1st Amendment.


59 posted on 07/02/2013 11:16:03 PM PDT by Gene Eric (Don't be a statist!)
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To: SeekAndFind

This article is correct, but that’s what it has always been. At the same time that we argue the Right to Conscience we also need to emphasize:

1. The same sex lifestyle is physically and mentally unhealthy.

2. It is not genetically deterministic, that is once homosexual is not always homosexual.

3. It has major environmental drivers - molestation - as well as an epigenetic effect caused by hormonal changes in the womb. This means that it is reversible.

4. Despite their apparent functioning, homosexuals, like those suffering from other mental illnesses like manic-depression, are suffering from a treatable disease.


60 posted on 07/03/2013 3:21:28 AM PDT by 1010RD (First, Do No Harm)
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