Churches won't disappear but the churches that you will see on Main Street will be peddling a warmed over and watered down version of Christianity that is a combination soup kitchen and twelve step program sans belief in a higher power. Real Christian churches will go underground but it will be a rearguard action. Christianity that chooses to ignore the very Word of God is not a religion, it is a cultural artifact.
The real price will be paid by those of us who are not actually employed by our churches. Organizing to resist homosexual marriage will bring down the FBI upon you as surely as if you were organizing a KKK chapter and with more alacrity than if you were an al Qaeda cell or blocking a polling station in Philadelphia. If you work for a large corporation or are in the military you can look forward to having your affirmatively support of homosexual marriage becoming an item on your performance appraisal.
“Christianity that chooses to ignore the very Word of God is not a religion, it is a cultural artifact.”
Here's the money quote right here (with my emphasis), and this is exactly why I'm not agonizing over the Supreme Court decision as much as many others here.
What this article is saying (and I agree with it) is that religious institutions will actually have to go back and become truly religious institutions once again in order to protect themselves from the predations of the secular state. What, may I ask, is wrong with that? The only "religious organizations" under threat here are those that have done such a through job accommodating themselves with the secular world -- usually for the sole purpose of getting money from the taxpayers -- that they aren't even truly "religious" anymore.
If Catholic Charities (to cite an easy example) has become so secularized that it functions no differently than Habitat for Humanity, then it should be treated no differently under the law.
I can attest that many if fact do wish to drive not just Christianity, but all religion from the public square. I know an atheist who used those very words. Atheists are not so brave about confronting Islam of course, but that’s another matter.
Today, our priest made a point to say that being a Christian is not about “keeping it to yourself” and people that practice their faith publicly will be mocked or worse due to the recent happenings.
bump
Does anyone wonder why the dicta of a SCOTUS ruling that limits the 1A is somehow more powerful than the full 1A itself?
There is an answer.
It’s because THIS RULING IS ONLY FOR CORPORATIONS.
And right do not apply to corporations - only limited privileged granted by the government. So that’s what Kennedy is doing, granting a limited privilege based on PART of the 1A.
So connect the dots:
No corporation, no ruling.