If gay marriage were legal and that were the primary reason for sending the couple somewhere else, there’d be screams of OUTRAGE in a heartbeat and pending lawsuits by daybreak.

Yes, some couples would have screams of outrage… at their own minister or denomination. They are entitled, just as any other parishoner else can be outraged about anything. Having grown up in a parsonage I can tell you that this is just the nature of churches and parishoners
But as for churches being sued, that is nothing but demonization and fear mongering. You know FOR CERTAIN that this isn’t true – marriage has been legal in Massachusetts for five years – but you say it anyway.

(Giving it the specific legal entitlement of marriage makes it automatically ‘discrimination’ if the pastors reason for referring them on is that they are a homosexual couple. A pastor could choose not to join atheists in marriage; he could not choose not to join gays.)

That is both nonsense and illogical. Completely irrational.
Every state in the union has protections against discrimination on the basis of religion. And nearly every church in the nation has some sort of religion-based restriction on who they will marry.
From the website of the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels (Los Angeles)

Requirements
At least one person needs to be Catholic for the couple to wed at the Cathedral.
Please note that the Archdiocese of Los Angeles also requires a preparation process of a minimum six months prior to a wedding date. No date can be scheduled until the priest or deacon has met with the couple to determine that nothing stands in the way of the valid and licit celebration of the proposed wedding (canon 1066) and to begin the preparation process.

There’s a pretty extensive list of who a priest cannot marry and ya know what? It’s perfectly legal – even though it is obvious and blatant religion-based discrimination.

I’ve seen or heard of pastors harassed or vilified for refusing to perform gay weddings and funerals.

No, Eddy, you haven’t.

Sure you have seen pastors criticized for their views on homosexuality or gay marriage. You have also seen them criticized for their views on baptism, divorce, the Trinity, socialism, communism, capitalism, ecumunism, litergy, papal authority, the women’s roll in church, being too lively, being too boring, real racism, imagined racism, a million different points of doctrine, and what color tie they wore last Sunday.

None of which has anything whatsoever to do with civil law. It is offensive to imagine that preachers should be immune to criticism from one group only and on one issue only.

This whole “gays can’t have civil equality because then some pastor may be villified oooh oooh oooh” argument is WAY beneath you.

Give me the name of a single solitary pastor in Massachusetts, Connecticut, or California who has had any threat to his constitutional freedom of religion and I’ll consider your argument. Otherwise, please apologize and don’t make that argument again. It’s only based on fear and dislike of gays, a motivation that I know for certain you are capable of resisting.

It is not homophobic to know and realize that there is a strategy being played out; I believe that most of the stragegy is by the books–but I hate the thought and speech censorship that is very much a part of it and is already rearing its head.

It most absolutely is homophobic to make false accusations and assert that gays want to censor thought and speech. Totally BS.

That is no less hateful than for me to say that all ex-gays want to reinstate sodomy laws accross the nation. Oooh, it sounds scary. And if I quote certain people in a selective way I could make it seem real. I could even argue that ex-gays shouldn’t be able to (fill in the blank) because they are trying to do this awful thing. But you and I both know that this is bogus (at least for many ex-gays).

Yes, gay people will continue to criticize those who criticize them. Duh!

And gay people will continue to fight without stop until there is equality. And gay people will seek to encourage folks to change their mind.

But that’s not censorship. And in no way will gay equality cause anyone to lose their constitutional rights to speech. Nor is that the goal of the gay movement.

And you really need to look at what your statement implies: You’re saying that gay people should be denied equality because you don’t like their “agenda”. Some gay people want “bad things” so all gay people should be denied fundamental rights.

Really? Is that the way we measure what rights people should have: if they agree with us? And you are saying that the gay folk have a censorship agenda?!

Muchas gracias… and have a pleasant holiday.

Lynn David – I am off to hunt for it.

Eddy…. re post 1: I’ve seen or heard of pastors harassed or vilified for refusing to perform gay weddings and funerals.

On first glance, harassment would appear to be illegal. Vililfication would appear to be a First Amendment right as is it the pastors’ First Amendment right not to perform a gay marriage. So where then are pastors giving up their supposed principles because of being “harassed and vilified?” Certainly not by law, and the harassment and vilification is supposed to be par for the couse for a Christian, that’s a Biblical promise.

Eddy…. re post 2: I don’t know who you’re talking to.

I was just talking to the board. I was not speaking of a marriage between atheists in a church, but to just be civilly married. Why is that allowed if marriage is sacred. I know a few couples who are both atheist and were married civilly and raised their kids as atheists. Isn’t that as damning to this sacred act of marriage which so many Christians say the government oversees? Why are not atheists relegated to a “civil union?” Then there are those persons who claim to have “open marriages,” who may or may not be atheist, pagans, or even Christian. What are they doing to this sacred act of marriage which so many Christians say the government oversees? Shouldn’t their unions be relegated to a “civil union?”

Eddy…… If gay marriage were legal and that were the primary reason for sending the couple somewhere else, there’d be screams of OUTRAGE in a heartbeat and pending lawsuits by daybreak. (Giving it the specific legal entitlement of marriage makes it automatically ‘discrimination’ if the pastors reason for referring them on is that they are a homosexual couple. A pastor could choose not to join atheists in marriage; he could not choose not to join gays.)

Like Timothy pointed out, this is pure whatever…. You are saying that the pastor could deny atheists because they did not believe in the pastor’s religious tenets. But he could just as easily point out that the same exact case for a gay couple. They do not believe in the tenets of his religion and the pastor has the First Amendment behind him to allow him to discriminate, to deny to marry two gays or lesbians. Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church does that right now. They deny homosexuals membership in their church lest they ‘give up their lifestyle.’ Now if Rick Warren can, with the full backing of the First Amendment, discriminate against gays and lesbians when homogenic sex has been made legal (earlier than Lawrence v Texas in California) then by what logic would the First Amendment not be in force to further allow him to discriminate against gays and lesbians who are given civil marriage. Which is to say that Rick Warren was, is, mistaken in the least, and a liar in the most extreme.
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