Talk about discrimination…
If a person, business, or state government refuses to do business with or in the state of Indiana solely because of its recently signed Religious Freedom Restoration Act, are they not engaging in the same kind of unfair denying of rights they accuse Indiana of fostering?
Never mind how signs and sentiments like this completely misrepresent the facts.
The law is meant to protect business owners from being required to compromise their closely-held religious beliefs, most often seen when a same-sex couple approaches a florist, photographer, or baker to provide items for their wedding. The business owners, believing that doing so would involve being complicit in a sin against God, refuse to provide the service. They make a decision not to do business with the couple because of their beliefs.
So what’s so different about folks making a decision not to do business with or in Indiana because of their belief that to do so would compromise their support for same-sex marriage?
In both cases you’ve got people wanting not simply to hold to a belief but to live it out. The champions of same-sex marriage are lauded for their stand, but the Christians are castigated for theirs. This is an injustice.
I wrote about the issue last March, and in my response to a comment on St. Patrick’s Day I noted the duplicity of gay rights supporters in approving the decision of brewers and New York City’s mayor not to participate in the annual NYC parade because the organizers would not allow gay groups to march as a parade participant. And I said, “Imagine a big city mayor refusing to participate in a gay pride parade because he opposes homosexuality.”
It seems to me we’ve got a double standard at work here. I would love to know how it’s not.
Incisive and succinct. Well done.
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Thank you, Seth. That is an encouragement to me. 🙂
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Caroline, the Indiana law is a problem because it is the government now allowing discrimination that has been proscribed by existing laws and executive orders in Indiana. That is action by the government to permit discrimination on religious grounds against otherwise protected groups.
If individuals, groups, organizations and other states refuse to do business with Indiana, they are voicing their objections to what the state of Indiana has done. They are not discriminating against people on account of their religious beliefs.
The Christian objection to same-sex marriage seems to be rooted in the belief that homosexuality itself is a sin. To condone homosexuality by providing services, the reasoning goes, is a substantial burden on religion. If so, the Indiana law might allow a Christian run restaurant or accommodation to refuse service to homosexuals. How do you feel about that?
If a mayor refused to march in a parade because he or she opposed homosexuality, it would be his/her right to do so. The mayor would have a hard time being reelected, since he/she would not be representing all of the city’s citizens.
Is Walmart’s request to the Governor of Arkansas to veto a similar law an example of discrimination against Christian religious belief in your view?
What about the greatest commandment: “Love thy neighbor as thyself”? Are not people who practice homosexuality and want to formalize a loving relationship our neighbors?
Sincerely,
Ken
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If individuals, groups, organizations and other states refuse to do business with Indiana, they are voicing their objections to what the state of Indiana has done. They are not discriminating against people on account of their religious beliefs.
Ken, they are not just voicing their objections, they are acting on them…because of their beliefs. It is virtually a response in kind to what Christian business owners do in refusing to contribute to a same-sex wedding. And in every case I’ve ever read about, these businesses had and continued to serve gays as customers without hesitation. It was when they were asked to contribute to a specifically homosexual activity…the same-sex wedding…that they felt they in good conscience must refuse. No one wants or is trying to legalize refusal of service to gays simply because they are gay. And I’m sure if that was being done, that business would not find recourse in this law.
Your remark about our hypothetical mayor having “a hard time being reelected” makes the point that I and others have made regarding the conscience-driven Christian business owners: let them run their businesses as they see fit and if the community won’t support them because of it, they’ll reap the financial consequences. But their First Amendment rights won’t be infringed.
Walmart made a blanket statement about respecting all individuals. I and most Christians concur with that statement about values.
The first and greatest commandment is to love God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength. Choosing to obey him is how we love him. The second “is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”1 The best thing we can do for those we love is help them see and know God better. It’s when our lives are radically different and we are willing to stand up for what we believe in the face of opposition that we truly shine as lights.
1 Matthew 22:39
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Kenneth, I appreciate how you took time to interact on my friend’s blog. I’d like to offer an alternative, secular reason that people can conscionably decline to affirm same sex marriage. It is not because it is sinful. It is because in treating same sex pairings identical to heterosexual pairings, government is ignoring the significant distinction that only hetero pairings as a class naturally produce children. THis has ramifications for things like family courts of law.
Carly Fiorina has pointed out that marriage is not about government benefits. Neither do I think government’s role in marriage is to affirm the dignity of the couple. Government can’t do that. We already have our dignity from God. We should let same sex couples get civil unions, but it is simply a falsehood to say that those couples are identical to hetero couples. So I am sympathetic with any conscientous objector who doesn’t want to be seen as affirming that falsehood. Standing for truth, even this bare secular truth, and taking flak in the public sqquare for it, is a manifestation of love.
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