Posted on 02/23/2014 11:31:35 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Conservative Christian groups in Arizona cheered the passage Thursday of legislation that would allow individuals and businesses in the state to deny service to same-sex couples due to religious beliefs.
All eyes have shifted to Governor Jan Brewer, who must now decide whether to sign the bill. Similar legislation died in Kansas last week, but has also been introduced in Ohio, Mississippi, Idaho, South Dakota, Tennessee, and Oklahoma.
The Arizona law seems to apply to services beyond those tied to weddings, but same-sex weddings are the impetus for these bills. Specifically, they are in response to lawsuits against three different Christians who refused to photograph, bake a cake, and sell flowers for same-sex weddings. The backers of these laws claim that a Christian cannot, in good conscience, provide a good or service for a same-sex wedding because it violates the teachings of Christianity.
If these bills become law, we could see same-sex couples being denied service not just by photographers and florists, but also restaurants and hotels and pretty much anyone else who can tie their discrimination to a religious belief.
Many on the left and right can agree that nobody should be unnecessarily forced to violate their conscience. But in order to violate a Christian’s conscience, the government would have to force them to affirm something in which they don’t believe. This is why the first line of analysis here has to be whether society really believes that baking a wedding cake or arranging flowers or taking pictures (or providing any other service) is an affirmation. This case simply has not been made, nor can it be, because it defies logic. If you lined up 100 married couples and asked them if their florist “affirmed” their wedding, they would be baffled by the question.
(Excerpt) Read more at thedailybeast.com ...
As usual, the author wants to nuance the issue to death.
Her argument is that Christians seem to have little interest in this level of analysis and jump right to complaints about their legal and constitutional rights.
She argues that Christians wrestling with this issue must first resolve the primary issue of whether the Bible calls Christians to deny services to people who are engaging in behavior they believe violates the teachings of Christianity regarding marriage.
And her conclusion of course is .... IT DOES NOT.
WHY AM I NOT SURPRISED !!
As usual, the author wants to nuance the issue to death.
Her argument is that Christians seem to have little interest in this level of analysis and jump right to complaints about their legal and constitutional rights.
She argues that Christians wrestling with this issue must first resolve the primary issue of whether the Bible calls Christians to deny services to people who are engaging in behavior they believe violates the teachings of Christianity regarding marriage.
And her conclusion of course is .... IT DOES NOT.
WHY AM I NOT SURPRISED !!
What a bald faced lie.
A liberal moron preaching about Christianity when one of the root tenets of liberalism is to ridicule Christianity and religion..Thanks but I get my daily comedy stuff from the white house.
I’m no biblical scholar and can’t quote scripture but I seem to remember that Jesus did not take kindly to some money changers and merchants who were trading in sacrificial animals.
Frankly, I don’t think how you can nuance “man shall not lie down with another man.”
Sold. Where do I sign?
(Especially hotels. Yuck.)
One basic tenet of freedom is that you can’t be forced to work for someone against your will.
The author’s argument is that providing a service should be construed as participation or affirmation. Why? Because if Christians truly believe that a vendor service is an affirmation, then they need to explain why it is only gay and lesbian weddings that violate their conscience.
Her argument is that Christians are applying their beliefs INCONSISTENTLY or UNFAIRLY. She then gives examples...
For instance, Before agreeing to provide a good or service for a wedding, Christian vendors must verify that both future spouses have had genuine conversion experiences and are “equally yoked” (2 Corinthians 6:14) or they will be complicit with joining righteousness with unrighteousness. They must confirm that neither spouse has been unbiblically divorced (Matthew 19). If one has been divorced, Christian vendors should ask why.
But Christians don’t do that in the latter case, so, her question is this, why simply target refusal of service to gays and lesbians and ignore other Biblical violations?
The courts are going to knock down these laws unfortunately.
RE: One basic tenet of freedom is that you can’t be forced to work for someone against your will.
I guess this would include not being forced to provide a service for someone because you don’t like his race...??
However, there are specific verses that make it quite clear that just because a couple says they are divorced, or even if the state and their "church" say the are divorced, does not necessarily mean they are divorced in the eyes of God.
Any subsequent marriage on the part of either of the parties of a false divorce would constitute bigamy. One would think that Christian wedding service vendors would at least seek not to supply services to bigamists.
We worry that polygamy will be the next wall to be breached in the culture war, but maybe that wall got breached decades ago.
If none of Elizabeth Taylor's divorces was a proper one, isn't it the case that she was a polygamist? Ditto for everyone else married several times with only bogus divorces intervening between the marriages.
Were any of Taylor's photos, cakes, reception facilities, flowers, etc. provided by Christian businesses?
That principle was conceded when society accepted forcing white people to do business with black people. You either have freedom of association, or you don't. Once limits are accepted, the state decides for you what is "officially" right or wrong and how you are required to deal with it.
That principle was conceded when society accepted forcing white people to do business with black people.
Good point and I thought about it as soon as I wrote it.
I remember the bad old days and the practices of those times disgusted me then and do to this day. I remember cafes who would do take-out orders for black people but they weren't allowed to come in and sit down, for example.
I obviously don't see this in the same light because I don't see homosexuality and race as in any way equivalent.
You are not allowed to refuse service to someone because of their race but you can refuse if someone is a jerk, for example.
So I don't see a legal equivalence. But good luck I suppose finding a court that will agree with me.
Let’s hope Jan Brewer doesn’t cave and signs the bill. I always thought she was pretty strong - this will tell.
Genius in its simplicity. Turn the liberal's on tactics back on them. They are liberal, do not believe in the bible, there fore they are incapable of having ANY discussion on Christianity because they are UNQUALIFIED.
I know a couple of people I have engaged in the past that I will use this tactic on :-)
RE: There was one interesting point that the essayist brought up that wasn’t fully explored. It is the concept that every heterosexual marriage, even those that don’t follow all of scripture, are in some way acceptable to God. If this is the case, then Christian wedding vendors are within their rights to deny services to gays and not look too deeply into the specifics of heterosexuals who seek their services.
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The problem I see with the author’s argument is she IGNORES the Biblical definition of MARRIAGE itself.
Granted that there are marriages frowned upon by scripture, however such marriages are RECOGNIZED as marriages... just nor ideal ones. For instance, the Apostle Paul does not tell the Christian woman married to an unbelieving man to divorce him simply because of his unbelief. He asks her to STAY with him and pray for him and through her character, influence him to believe. THUS, such marriage is still considered a MARRIAGE. Not ideal, but a marriage nonetheless.
However, Jesus, when he talked about marriage, never considers same-sex relationships to be marriage.
In response to a question about divorce, this is what Jesus said...
“Haven’t you read,” He replied, “that at the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female,’ and said, ‘For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh’? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.” ( Matthew 19:4-6)
With this, Jesus recognized marriage as TAUGHT by the Torah, to be between a man and a woman, not between people of two similar sexes.
So, a Christian refusing to service a “marriage” that by his belief in scripture is not considered one, is not being inconsistent with servicing a non-ideal matrimony between a believer and unbeliever. Why? Because the latter is recognized and allowed for by scripture ( albeit, not ideal ).
“This is why the first line of analysis here has to be whether society really believes that baking a wedding cake or arranging flowers or taking pictures (or providing any other service) is an affirmation. This case simply has not been made, nor can it be, because it defies logic. If you lined up 100 married couples and asked them if their florist “affirmed” their wedding, they would be baffled by the question.”
There is a qualitative difference, and it resides NOT in any general difference between “one couple” and “another couple”, GENERALLY - the typical case between various “married couples” - but it the foundational meaning of “marriage”. With heterosexual couples for whom their is neither a historical, foundational or moral question about “marriage”, a baker’s, or photographer’s actions neither affirm, or do not affirm their marriage, but the baker’s or photographer’s actions DO affirm acceptance of the definition of marriage as represented by the couple. That is not the case, for many religious people, when it comes to a “same-sex” marriage. They do not, in their beliefs, affirm the very foundational redefinition of marriage presented by a “same-sex marriage”, nor should they have to take actions that pretend that they do.
I agree with you that racial discrimination was wrong, marron. However, once the principle was established, of compelling private citizens to serve others because not doing so was wrong, you get what we have now. Legislatures and courts are ruling that “gay” is an identity category, like race or physical handicap, and not a behavior category, like being drunk-and-disorderly.
From the standpoint of Christian morality, the situation is not at all black and white. Yes, it’s clear that homosexual behavior is wrong. However, as someone pointed out above, a lot of things are wrong. Suppose an unmarried couple wanted to order a cake or rent a facility to hold a baby shower. Is a Christian business person morally required to deny them because they are in an immoral relationship?
I think it should be individual choice on the part of business owners.
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