NeoNotes — Marriage revisted
❝❝Pardon, but Christians (and yes, it was Christians) brought this on themselves. The push to make marriage "legal" took the definition and control of marriage away from the churches and put it squarely in the hands of the state. Before the 1930s, marriages were registered by the state, not licensed. That is when marriage ceased to be religion and control shifted to the state.
A big part of the push was to prevent mixed-race marriages, another part was to prevent certain mixed-faith marriages. And part of it was to prevent certain religions from performing marriages.
Talk about reaping the whirlwind.
The only solution is to get government out of the marriage business. Go back to registering instead of licensing.
Some Christians tried to use the law to prevent freedom, based not on what someone had done, but what they were. It's the law of unintended consequences, or if you prefer the Christian version, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. If banning interracial marriages was wrong, then so is banning same sex marriages and poly marriages (which in turn raises some interesting questions about Utah's statehood).
Long story short, it's wrong give your religious beliefs the force of law.
Supreme Court decisions can be overturned later. I still think the only real solution is to take marriage away from the law. That means no special legal recognition of marriage.
If you use government to cram your religion down someone else's throat, you're crossing the line. Religion can not be allowed the coercive power of the state and the state can not be allowed the moral justification of faith.
It's amazing how many forget that. It's the only sure way that YOUR beliefs won't be outlawed.
I'm sorry, I wasn't clear.
I wasn't talking about forcing a church to do anything.
I was talking about people like Roy Moore, former Chief Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court, who commissioned a Ten Commandments monument for the Court building and regularly informed defendants appearing before them how they had violated "God's Law." Which of course was a Higher Law beyond "man's law."
I was talking about some offshoots of CAIR and their European counterparts that are advocating installing Sharia law in some primarily Muslim communities.
I was talking about some American groups who have been denied tax-exempt status because they aren't a "real" church.
Speaking of tax-exempt status, there's the "Devil's bargain" that trades tax-exempt status for restraining political commentary.
For the record, I don't approve of either income taxes or selected tax exempt status, but that is another topic.
I agree.
But fundamentalist Christians should not control the law!
No one religion should. No one group should.
I think the fundamentalist Christians are losing influence.
If the still had it as strongly as they had it in first half of the 20th, do you think the Supreme Court would have made the decision it did?❞❞
NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.
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