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Christian Judge Forced Out for Not Doing Gay Marriages Awarded $300K Settlement
Christian Post ^
| 02/11/2018
| Anugrah Kumar
Posted on 02/11/2018 8:23:27 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Gayle Myrick, an evangelical Christian and former magistrate who was forced out after she refused to perform civil marriage ceremonies for same-sex couples due to her religious beliefs, has been awarded $300,000 by the state of North Carolina in a settlement agreement.
The settlement amount includes $122,660 in back pay, according to her lawyers at Becket, a Washington-based nonprofit.
The settlement comes a year after an administrative law judge ruled that the state violated civil rights laws by forcing Myrick to resign as a Union County magistrate in October 2014, soon after gay marriage was legalized in North Carolina.
Myrick is now 68.
"This case is about protecting the dignity of everyone in our diverse society," Becket counsel Stephanie Barclay told The Daily Signal. "Faith and sexual orientation are deeply important to the identity of many people, and these two things don't have to be at odds with each other."
"The state of North Carolina should not have discriminated against Gayle Myrick for her sincerely held religious beliefs about marriage," Ryan T. Anderson, a senior research fellow at The Heritage Foundation, and Emilie Kao, a lawyer who directs Heritage's DeVos Center for Religion and Civil Society, were quoted as saying in a joint statement. "Accommodating her conscience took nothing away from same-sex couples' ability to obtain marriage licenses."
Myrick's immediate supervisor proposed at the time that her shift could be rescheduled by a couple of hours so she wouldn't be at work when other magistrates did marriage ceremonies. However, the state government rejected the proposal two weeks before her retirement benefits vested.
"I have always wanted to find a way to protect everyone's dignity," Myrick said at the time. "The solution in my case would allow any couple to get lawfully married without facing rejection or delay, and magistrates with religious beliefs like me could step aside and still keep our jobs."
At least six North Carolina judges resigned from their benches because they did not want to go against their Christian faith and conduct wedding ceremonies for same-sex couples at the time.
"I believe that marriage was ordained by God to be between a man and a woman," Myrick said at the time. "For me to do what the state said I had to do, under penalty of law, I would have to go against my convictions, and I was not willing to do that. I want to honor what the Word says."
"It was something I had to do out of conscience," magistrate Bill Stevenson from Gaston County said at the time. "I felt like to perform same-sex unions would be in violation of the Lord's commands, so I couldn't do that."
TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: christian; gaymarriage; judge; romney2decide; romneyagenda; romneymarriage
To: SeekAndFind
Who was the governor at the time that the judge was removed, as well as who was the Attorney General (the same schmuck as the Duke case, etc)?
To: SeekAndFind
"...the state government rejected the proposal two weeks before her retirement benefits vested." Yep! One of the favorite tricks of government and industry. ...
3
posted on
02/11/2018 9:31:56 PM PST
by
SuperLuminal
(Where is another agitator for republicanism like Sam Adams when we need him?)
To: SeekAndFind
Homosexuality is an abomination because it steals from God.
God wanted mankind to procreate, to create new humans to fill His heaven, to fill His eternity. Homosexuality steals any children they might have had and focuses their whole lives on themselves and what they want.
Marriage becomes a method of getting their personal need or wants met, and the rest of creation can go hang.
4
posted on
02/12/2018 12:50:11 AM PST
by
wbarmy
(I chose to be a sheepdog once I saw what happens to the sheep.)
To: wbarmy
Human homosexuality is definitively a degeneracy.
The State has no business in marriage.
5
posted on
02/12/2018 12:54:15 AM PST
by
Gene Eric
(Don't be a statist!)
To: wbarmy
I certainly agree that homosexual practices are abominable, but I don't think the reason why is because all people are obliged to have children.
There are lifelong single people who do not procreate and are not obliged to.
And there are homosexual couples who engage in the various artificial reproductive technologies so that they SHALL have genetically-related children.
Homosexual pseudo-intercourse is perversion. But these reproductive technologies --- artificial insemination, IVF, surrogacy (reproductive concubinage) --- are perversions and abominations as well.
6
posted on
02/12/2018 9:10:52 AM PST
by
Mrs. Don-o
("For peace within your gates, speak truth and judge with sound judgment." - Zechariah 8:16)
To: Mrs. Don-o
I am just using the Biblical admonition to have children in the manner which God provided.
And the people who are single and childless in the Bible are either eunuchs made by men or eunuchs made by God.
I do not think I would describe any of the homosexual bunch as eunuchs.
And it is a separate conversation and debate about the other methods of reproduction.
7
posted on
02/12/2018 9:40:50 AM PST
by
wbarmy
(I chose to be a sheepdog once I saw what happens to the sheep.)
To: wbarmy
Some homosexuals --- not many perhaps, but some --- are chaste and single for the Kingdom. Bless them.
As for the artificial reproductive technologies, there is nothing wrong with them if used for veterinary purposes, e.g. breeding cattle, racehorses, etc.
However, when applied to humans, they are wrong for the same reason that the other perversions are wrong: they create radically different paradigm which splits sex from procreation. That's the core element of what perversion is.
8
posted on
02/12/2018 9:49:42 AM PST
by
Mrs. Don-o
("God bless the child who's got his own." - Billie Holliday)
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