Posted on 10/19/2014 4:13:49 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
City officials in Coeur d'Alene Idaho have told a married couple who are both ordained ministers that they will go to jail if they refuse to perform wedding ceremonies for gay couples.
The Alliance for Defending Freedom has filed suit against the city and asked for temporary restraining order to prevent officials from carrying out their threat.
Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys filed a federal lawsuit and a motion for a temporary restraining order Friday to stop officials in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, from forcing two ordained Christian ministers to perform wedding ceremonies for same-sex couples.
City officials told Donald Knapp that he and his wife Evelyn, both ordained ministers who run Hitching Post Wedding Chapel, are required to perform such ceremonies or face months in jail and/or thousands of dollars in fines. The city claims its “non-discrimination” ordinance requires the Knapps to perform same-sex wedding ceremonies now that the courts have overridden Idaho’s voter-approved constitutional amendment that affirmed marriage as the union of a man and a woman.
“The government should not force ordained ministers to act contrary to their faith under threat of jail time and criminal fines,” said ADF Senior Legal Counsel Jeremy Tedesco. “Many have denied that pastors would ever be forced to perform ceremonies that are completely at odds with their faith, but that’s what is happening here – and it’s happened this quickly. The city is on seriously flawed legal ground, our lawsuit intends to ensure that this couple’s freedom to adhere to their own faith as pastors is protected just as the First Amendment intended.”
The couple would face 180 days in jail and up to $1000 in fines per day if they dared to adhere to their religious beliefs.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
“I don’t even know anyone in Idaho, period.”
You do now... I’m from Idaho.
This is TRUE NON-separation of church and state =
and the gays are actively and deliberately seeking pastors that follow their faith -
please explain the separation of church and state again, thx
funny how the ‘separation’ only exists when the left wants to keep the churches from saying anything
meanwhile, we’re in the exact situation that promoted the religious exodus from Britian... religious persecution
those attempting to blackmail the churches should be thrown in prison themselves
Sounds like a return to the days of John Bunyan.
It has been there for a long time - I remember it when I was a kid in the 60s. Right across the street from the Kootenai County Courthouse. As far as I know, they have never done any church functions other than weddings.
Socially, Coeur d'Alene has changed a lot since my childhood. The quiet little town that I grew up in has become a popular tourist destination - great place to visit, lousy place to live. I moved away about 30 years ago and visit family every year but I don't have much desire to move back.
Now if we can get em to read ahead one more sentence to the NOT PROHIBIT part!
Heh, yeah no kidding.
We know that the moslims would kill them and burn down their fabulous houses (after raiding the closets, lol). The freaks only understand power, and know they won’t get any mercy from the ruthless, homo moslems.
What corrupt, pro-gay activist justices don’t want constitutionally ignorant voters to know about concerning the constitutionality of gay marriage is the following.
As mentioned in related threads, pro-gay, politically correct interpretations of the 14th Amendment’s (14A) Equal Protections Clause aside, city officials are in violation of Section 1 of 14A imo. Section 1 prohibits the states from making laws and policies which unreasonably abridge constitutionally enumerated rights of citizens, the 1st Amendment protected freedom of religious expression in this case.
And since the states have never amended the Constitution to expressly protect so-called gay “rights,” gay marriage in this example, the city is wrongly using constitutionally unprotected gay marriage to trump a constitutionally enumerated right.
Sarah Palin is a native of Idaho.
I agree and support that notion 100%.
They are not a church. But that shouldn’t matter. He’s a real minister, who has the right to refuse performing a sacred rite to anyone outside his faith tradition.
Prison is too good for them ....
They pretty well know they’ll lose this battle: it is the war of Kulturkampf that they are aiming to win.
Doesn’t matter. They should still tell the Government to rot in hell. This is a hill worth dying for.
It’ll stop as soon as a high court weighs in. It would be like asking, say, a Catholic church to perform weddings upon non Catholics.
However, Satan looks with great glee at the rage he has engendered among Christians that he once more has misdirected. When one is raging, one cannot also be looking for avenues for God’s love (yes, love) to reach out.
It does matter. I don’t like the situation either but civil business is a different ball of wax from religious ceremony. It needs to be fought with different arguments. Here in WA State, we are still fighting the Arlene’s Flowers case.
And since when has there been a sane attempt to frame the whole within the context of the miraculous, surprising, supernatural love of God. Noted very carefully that love does not mean indulging sin but it does mean a very classy approach in spite of encountering sin. Anyone can get low down and rage. Even Satan can do that.
Real hard to make the case it's a "Sacred Rite" when these ministers seem to be running a resort-town wedding chapel with no religious affiliation.
I was married in a similar chapel in a similar location and I'm not going to tell anyone it was a religious ceremony, although religious elements were mentioned.
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