“Your constitution.” You’re not an American? That might explain why you just don’t get this concept.
Do you think religion is a valid excuse for bigotry? All the rest of your response had nothing to do with what the man said.
Jesus Christ on rollerskates… a couple of different formative experiences and you’d be an ultrafundamentalist Jack Chick type counting on everyone of a church other than your own going to Hell.
What does it feel like to go through life knowing you are absolutely right?
regards church organizations and profitability…any group can manage their finances in a way to minimize taxes from ‘profits’. Just pay higher wages, make donations to ‘causes’, etc. And, they retrench excess income back into the structure and property. I think the real test is whether property tax should be paid by churches. They absorb services, generally, in most places, don’t pay any fees for those services.
I would bet there have been almost zero prosecutions for religious groups having long term capital gains, and finding a way NOT to let the government put their hands on it. "Hey, we’ve got a million bucks here from our property sale and we’d like to donate it to your charitable organization…I understand you are looking for a new manager of charitable giving and that the salary is $100000 a year…??? I’ll need to assistants…$50K each. …
Civil marriages can create an undue financial burden. In what became Germany, early 1800’s, the famines were so frequent and people were starving. Population control was required, so the govt. forced a big marriage fee through. Poor people, like my ancestors there, were secretly married by the Catholics, probably by the Lutherans, too, so the kids would be legitimate in the eyes of the church. So far as the civil authorities were concerned, they were all bastards until Mom and Dad could raise 6 months earnings as day laborers to pay the civil fee.
Whoah there. From the church’s point of view, what they’re doing is not bigotry at all. They believe homosexuality is a sinful behavior and is not consistent with God’s view of what a marriage should be. A homosexual marriage is not the only kind they won’t allow. Some churches/pastors won’t even marry people that are living together before marriage. If you were to show up with a mail-order bride who doesn’t speak English, the church would not marry the two of you either. The pastor normally meets with the couple and gets to know them and makes sure their relationship and faiths are consistent with getting married in that church. In fact, a LOT of churches won’t marry people who do not share the same faith as the church.
Forcing the church to ignore all these objections, and treating them like a business offering “Marriage ceremonies for all!” is completely missing the point. That is not how church marriage works.
Society is free to disagree with the church. But by telling the church, “You must allow all who desire to be married to get married” it’s like you are telling the church members, “You must believe that God approves of and blesses ALL of these marriages, regardless of your religious tradition of what marriage is and isn’t. If the govt says it’s a marriage, you have to give it God’s approval.” That’s what is happening in a religious ceremony by the way. Have you been to a church wedding? It is nothing like a civil ceremony.
Trying to enforce govt beliefs on churches is what caused people to leave their European countries in the first place. It’s one of the pillars this country was founded on, RELIGIOUS FREEDOM, and it’s extremely important.
It’s my experiences with those sort of people that made me realise how dangerous religion can be.
I doubt I think I’m always right any more than most other people here.
That’s not a fair question. What specific bigotry?
I don’t think, for instance, that a business owner can use his religion as an excuse for illegal discrimination in hiring.
I do think a person may believe, or say, they hate blacks or gays or whatever and say that’s due to their religion.
This thread is about something in between that - religious groups or institutions, and how they act. I believe the above two principles apply there. Perhaps a church shouldn’t be allowed to discriminate in certain situations, such as when hiring someone for a business function that doesn’t relate to religion, such as an accountant. But when it comes to the religion, religious freedom includes the freedom to be bigoted - and, obviously, it’s absurd to say that simply following ANY religious belief, and excluding those who don’t share it, is bigotry. That pretty much defines all religion as bigotry, which is stupid. But not to Steophan, of course. He’d love that.
What a bigoted statement.
Their point of view is wrong. That’s what this really comes down to. If it’s your point of view that black people don’t deserve an education, you should not be allowed to start a college that only educates white people. Likewise, a church should not be allowed to only provide it’s services to straight people.
Oh, and to the people who keep saying “the Constitution allows it”, that’s irrelevant. If I was calling for people to be punished for not providing marriages to gay people, then it might be, but I’m talking about the morality of bigotry, not the legality of it.
Its not so much that I love it, as I observe it. Most religion is bigoted. I wouldn’t go so far as to say all religion, because there’s no doubt some counter examples.
But just to be absolutely, clear, you do think religion is an excuse for bigotry, then? So, you are fine with bigoted behaviour, then? Why?
Their point of view is religion. Legally, it’s neither right nor wrong. It’s a fundamental constitutional concept that makes this whole discussion moot.
Has it been proven conclusively so? Has homosexuality been proven conclusively to be a genetic condition, like race? Or could it be just a behavior?
When it comes down to it, “Wrong” no matter how much you bold or italicize it, is just an opinion. Oftentimes, society’s opinions are different from individual church’s.
Do we force the churches to admit members of different faiths too? Isn’t it bigotry for them to say only Catholics can be members of their Catholic churches? How dare they?!
YOU think it’s wrong. But sometimes we leave room for people to disagree about things rather than regulating every little thing. At least we do in modern democracies.
But this is where morality and legality collide. I doubt anyone here thinks bigotry is moral. This is about what kinds of acts the state should regulate and what kinds it should leave to people to decide for themselves.
So why don’t you try a new angle and tell us what issues of morality you do NOT think the state should regulate? Speech? Thoughts? Personal decisions such as who to marry or associate with? Is anything sacred to you?
Many Constitutions demand it, it’s a crime to marry gay couples in quite a few jurisdictions … are you advocating defiance of the law if our personal morals are offended. We’re talking about your morals, which apparently includes marching people at gun point into their place of worship to perform a “church” marriage.
The truth is you don’t give a rat’s damn about gay rights. You’re just using them to hide behind so you can spit out your anti-Christian hate. It’s always the bigot who screams “you’re a bigot” first, buck-o, you sure as hell don’t stand in that fire. I feel sorry for the gay community having you nail them to the cross.
Those questions indicate that you just don’t understand the concept of freedom of conscience.
I oppose bigotry, of course. I’m not “fine” with it. However, I don’t believe I have the right to impose that belief on everyone else in every single situation.
Tell me - do you think ANYTHING is a good excuse for bigotry? Would you outlaw it in all situations? What if someone simply said they hate blacks? Or what if they refused to marry a black person because of race? Would you regulate that somehow? (I already asked you a similar question but we never seem to get deep into the answer).
If you say you would leave personal decisions like what race to marry to an individual, and you wouldn’t forbid people from bigotry in decisions on who to marry, does that mean that YOU think bigotry is perfectly fine?
So, to be clear, if you don’t mind, how much is it again that the Church of England charges in the United States of America for a marriage?
This one appears to charge $200 to those in the parish, and an additional $500 to those outside.
Feel free to check more places, it’s not exactly hard to Google “episcopal wedding”.
Last I checked, the Episcopal Church in the United States of America is, in fact, not the Church of England. Also, the organist is not a party to the marriage, nor is the sexton. Also, I note that your very own link specifically states that the fee you mentioned is for operational expenses. Nice weasel words in your post, though. I’ll grant you that.
Get back to us when you, in fact, do have a clue.
Ha ha ha. Accusing me of using weasel words, when you’re the one trying to weasel out of accepting that weddings have to be paid for. It also appears you don’t know what the episcopal church is… you’re not doing very well here.