If The U.S. Supreme Court ‘Goes Rogue’ ...

a reply to: beezzer

You might be right. It's too bad too because it could have been avoided and there are way more good Christians who will be harmed in this whole thing than the evil ones who've caused it all and actually deserve what they'll get.

Because it's them that are causing this. It's the Upper Management of Evangelical Christian Institutions that will cause the destruction of not only themselves but of countless others who are innocent of all this as well as their own institution as well.

By upper management I mean all the hypocrites running places like the Family Research Council, or American Family Association, etc. The one's who daily spread lies and hate and bigotry to their mentally stunted and morally bankrupted audience. The one's who think Religious ideas should trump Secular Law and Personal Freedom. The one's who claim ownership of "Legal Marriage" for their Invisible God. So sad.

a reply to: mOjOm

Yep.

It could have been avoided. You're right.

So here is my take on it, let's say either the state or the supreme court orders the marriages of LGBT people.
There will already be churches and religious organisations doing it, they will be either more liberal or feel compelled to do it. But the most conservatives ones won't, so if a gay couple wanted to marry they would already have plenty of options.

Would they really need to say I must be married by a Amish Bishop to prove my rights ?
See that's where their rights cross the line, it is just too much to make a point, and violate the conscience of another human. And that is wrong and disrespectful, even if you think they are 50 years behind the times.

IN times past, I couldn't imagine that the Supreme Court would approve any law that discriminated against a specific group based on race, age, gender, or sexual orientation.

Unfortunately, in today's United States, no only does your sexual orientation NOT protect you against being fired, discriminated against, or anything else, today's Supreme Court is so highly politicized that the law is almost secondary to politics.

SCOTUS should be interpreting every case that comes before it based solely on a LEGAL basis, and any Justice that brings political leanings into a decision should be fired.

Unfortunately, it appears that SCOTUS is above the law, and even the President would have a very very hard time removing a Justice from the Bench.

a reply to: beezzer
I would disagree with that. The only time that the church's and religions have been constrained, has always been when they break criminal law, or seek to get involved in politics.

There have been very few times that the courts or the government has ever gotten involved in telling the churches what they can or can not do. The first case for that was the 1800's case on polygamy, where it set a boundary. Then there have been a few other cases, like with the Anabaptists, where they were able to prove that some of the governmental laws would burden their faith. And the snake handlers, and the peyote use as well.

Each time that the government gets involved or constrains a religion, it has to prove that such is breaking a criminal law. Beyond that it is hands off. if it was not such, then it could move more freely and one would figures that it would be more on the EOC laws, where churches would have to consider hiring of those that they do not want to hire, or forcing them to wed people they do not want to. Even here recently this has been testes, with say the burning of the Quaran, or even with the WBC group picketing funerals. And each time the government case was shut down by the courts and the courts sided with the religious groups.

a reply to: Blue_Jay33

There are churches that will marry gay people now. If the SCOTUS makes it legal on the Federal level there will be even more. It will only be some hard nosed ones that will refuse like you say. Which it is perfectly legal for them to do as well.

However, some think that they will then push even more until they legally force all churches to marry gays. This however is just a theory which is unlikely but it's enough of a fearful idea to rally people behind it as if it were true.

Personally I think it's a bad idea to base your decision making on some unlikely possible future event rather than basing it off of what is reasonable, but that's just me. The way we are today I guess paranoia based decision making is what's in instead.

a reply to: Blue_Jay33

Once the Supreme Court rules, then it will be impossible to discriminate based on sexual orientation.

Religious institutions will not be protected.

There are/were religions that practiced human sacrifice. They obviously cannot do that because (in the grossest sense) it violates the rights of others.

Well, churches refusing to marry gay couples will violate (via discrimination) the rights of others.

And it'll be backed up by federal precedence.

a reply to: mOjOm

You may call my speculation, "paranoia", I prefer to it as a rational observation based on past precedence.

a reply to: beezzer

If that was true then why is it that we still allow for them to refuse to marry interracial couples or divorced couples, or couples of different religions????

Why would they allow those but all of a sudden change all that now???

If they were going to force churches to marry everyone regardless of their beliefs they would have already done it. But they haven't and because they haven't they've also set a precedent for it too making all the more difficult to change.

originally posted by: beezzer
a reply to: mOjOm

You may call my speculation, "paranoia", I prefer to it as a rational observation based on past precedence.

But past precedence actually says the opposite of what you're suggesting. The precedent has almost always favored Religion. In the case of forcing churches to marry people they don't want to, the precedent is in their favor not the other way around.

a reply to: mOjOm

Just because it'll be difficult to change, doesn't make it impossible.

What will change the paradigm is the Supreme Court ruling.

Religion will still be able to "believe" whatever they/we want.

They/we just won't be able to act on it anymore simply because the Supreme Court's job is to interpret rulings based on the Constitution and Bill of Rights.

originally posted by: mOjOm

originally posted by: beezzer
a reply to: mOjOm

You may call my speculation, "paranoia", I prefer to it as a rational observation based on past precedence.

But past precedence actually says the opposite of what you're suggesting. The precedent has almost always favored Religion. In the case of forcing churches to marry people they don't want to, the precedent is in their favor not the other way around.

This will change because it is a civil rights issue. An entire community is being discriminated against, simply because of their sexual orientation.

That's the game changer.

a reply to: beezzer

But they didn't change it for any other civil rights issue. When interracial couples started getting married they didn't make all churches comply. When people of two different religions want to get married they don't make the churches comply if they don't want to. So would they do it now???

In fact, by the Supreme Court making Marriage Legal for them it's even less likely they'll want a church to marry them anyway because there will be more churches who will chose to do it and they don't even need a church to marry them anyway. They can just get legally married and be done with it.

With it being so easy for them to get legally married there is no way the supreme court would demand that all churches comply. That is just not a reasonable conclusion to make.

a reply to: mOjOm

A good point.

But that was in a different time. I think that the "reinterpretation" of the 1st is already underway.

Just look at what they're doing with things like free speech zones.

Look, I may be wrong. Perhaps I should just speculate my conspiratorial thoughts on a conspiracy si-. . . wait, what?

I simply do not believe that rights as guaranteed by the Constitution and Bill of Rights means a damned thing to most people anymore.

a reply to: beezzer

It's true that sometimes the courts change stuff a little or reinterpret things. But in this case I find it very improbable that they would go that far. Think about it. This country is still like 60% Christian. Religion still enjoys a lot of extras by government decree. Plus most importantly, this whole thing is about "Legal Marriage" not "Religious Marriage". Legal marriage doesn't even involve the church anyway. Nobody is trying to change "Religious Marriage", only "Legal Marriage".

Law is determined by the courts not the churches. So none of this even involves the church. The church is trying to involve itself in legal matters however and they don't belong there. Legal Marriage isn't the churches domain because Secular Law is the Courts Domain.

a reply to: mOjOm

Imagine, though, a religious institution losing it's tax exempt status for discriminating.

Many religious institutions loves their money!

That's the government "stick".

The carrot being that all they have to do is have a "change of heart" and they can keep their money, tax free.

a reply to: beezzer

But why would they wait until now to make a case out of that??? There are a million ways in which a Religious Institution is already allowed to discriminate and those aren't being challenged. In fact they are repeatedly being upheld as the Right of Religious institutions.

So it makes no sense that for all this time and all the past cases where it's come up and found in favor of the church to discriminate that all of a sudden that would all change.

I guess I can't say it's impossible, but with 60% of the country being religious it's highly unlikely to happen any time soon.

The only reason they have a case for Legal Marriage of Gays is because it's a matter of Law and the law of the land says that we are all equal. Meaning that any two adults who want to marry should be allowed to legally. Regardless of Race, Religion, Past History of Divorce, etc. Legally, as long as you're an adult human and your partner is an adult human then you can legally marry.

Outside of the Equal under the law argument even this wouldn't have a chance, but to think it will go even further is just not very likely to happen. The majority being religious would be pissed off enough to stop that. The reason this isn't being stopped is because even within the majority of Religious people, some of them also think it should be allowed. If that whole 60% were against it this it would never happen. But the Religious community is also divided on this issue and that is why Equal Rights has a chance in this case.

a reply to: ketsuko

Isn't it discrimination if the church doesn't do it?

No it's not. A church has freedom of religion a for profit company doesn't.

You know they'll try it, and the feds were arguing that there could be loss of tax status involved if institutions don't comply. So, of course, no one HAS to comply, but like everything else the government gets its fingers into, they'll use money to punish people into it.

This would in no way take away the tax free status of churches. They only lose that if they get involved with politics.

a reply to: mOjOm

The rubicon is LGBT marriage.

Why didn't civil rights take place in 1900?

Why did it take as long as it did?

There were leaders just as impressive as Dr. Martin Luther King back then.

Sometimes change just needs a little nudge, a push. But not all change is good or positive.

Freedom, real freedom means having to put up with idiots and biases and different opinions. That is what we'll be missing, in my humble opinion.

a reply to: mOjOm

Also, to add, what do you think the percentage was of those who thought that "the negro" was fine right where he was in 1960?

I don't know, myself, but I'm sure the number was high.