cincydooley wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

If you want to take your extreme position that every pastor/revrend/rabbi etc. has to marry anybody then you get into actual govt oppression. A Jewish couple wants to get married in a Roman Catholic cathedral because the bride thinks its a beautiful place for a wedding, the Catholic revrend says no I'm sorry we only allow Catholic ceremonies between two Catholics in our church. A Catholic priest refusing to marry nonCatholics in a Catholic church in no way shape or form violates the separation of church and state. It would be horrible for the local, state or federal govt to force a Caholic priest to act in opposition to Catholicism upon threat of fines or imprisonment. That would be a violation of church and state, it would not be enlightened or just.

He's not saying that, I don't think.

Fairly certain he's saying that Rabbis, priests, ministers, any schmuck off the internet, etc. shouldn't be performing legally binding marriages.

 d-usa wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

We already have separation of church and state when it comes to weddings. Anyone, anyone, that can legally get married can do so with a justice of the peace at city hall. Nobody is prevented from having a civil ceremony for the wedding.

We don't have separation of church and state when it comes to weddings. Anyone, anyone, that happens to be a clergy member of an religious institution automatically becomes an officiant.

You can't claim that there is a separation of church and state when you automatically become a state actor simply by virtue of your position in your religion.

If you want to take your extreme position that every pastor/revrend/rabbi etc. has to marry anybody then you get into actual govt oppression.

Except that is not my position.

If a pastor/reverend/rabbi etc wants the ability to officiate STATE SANCTIONED weddings, then they have to marry anyone. They can have the right to use their religion as a justification to refuse to participate in a private ceremony, but they should not be able to use it as a reason to refuse to exercise their role as a state licensed officiant.

A Jewish couple wants to get married in a Roman Catholic cathedral because the bride thinks its a beautiful place for a wedding, the Catholic revrend says no I'm sorry we only allow Catholic ceremonies between two Catholics in our church. A Catholic priest refusing to marry nonCatholics in a Catholic church in no way shape or form violates the separation of church and state.

A Catholic priest refusing to to exercise his job as a state-sanctioned officiant and to refuse to participate in a state-sanctioned event to marry two people that are legally allowed by state law to enter into a state-sanctioned covenant to receive state-granted benefits because his religion doesn't like it seems to be violating the separation of church and state.

It would be horrible for the local, state or federal govt to force a Caholic priest to act in opposition to Catholicism upon threat of fines or imprisonment. That would be a violation of church and state, it would not be enlightened or just.

if the Catholic priest doesn't want to act in opposition to Catholicism then he can always give up his ability to officiate state sanctioned marriages.

He can be a priest.
He can be a state-licensed officiant.
He can be both if he wants to.
But he shouldn't be able to be a state-licensed officiant if he is not willing to carry out his role as a state-actor within the full scope of the law. If his religion doesn't allow him to marry everybody, then he shouldn't be allowed to marry anyone.

 Frazzled wrote:

You're actually arguing for civil unions. I thought you didn't like civil unions.
Weddings don't have to be government sanctioned. Indeed, you don't even need a ceremony to call yourself married, just hold yourself out as married.
if you want government contractual benefits you just sign the marriage certificate. BAM!

 d-usa wrote:


I don't have a problem with the concept of civil unions, in my mind all official marriages are just state-sanctioned contracts with certain legal benefits anyway. I just have a problem with calling them "civil unions" after all these years.

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:

I refuse to believe for one second that either of you would honestly do that or advocate that response from someone close to you. Granted, I know you will likely dig in and defend your stance to the death, so I am not looking for a public change of opinion here, but seriously...BS. If this was your wife or daughter, or grandson or nephew, you wouldn't be enraged that a business was refusing them service due to the business owner's own bigotry?

Honestly? No, I wouldn't. I'd teach them:

1. Why the person didn't want to serve them and why, to me, it's morally wrong.
2. I'd explain that while I think it's morally wrong, people are allowed to be bigots and donkey-caves.
3. I'd explain to her that we live in a country of boundless choices and options, so we're simply going to take our business elsewhere.

So you'd teach them that it was okay for people to arbitrarily break the law, but as long as there were other law abiding businesses to patronize the infraction should be ignored?

Seems like a bad message to instill on anyone you cared about. Passivity in these instances only breeds more bigotry.

 d-usa wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

You're actually arguing for civil unions. I thought you didn't like civil unions.
Weddings don't have to be government sanctioned. Indeed, you don't even need a ceremony to call yourself married, just hold yourself out as married.
if you want government contractual benefits you just sign the marriage certificate. BAM!

See my last post on that evolution.

I don't have a problem with the concept of civil unions, in my mind all official marriages are just state-sanctioned contracts with certain legal benefits anyway. I just have a problem with calling them "civil unions" after all these years.

Marriage is still the exact same thing it has always been: two people sign the marriage certificate, they get the same benefits they have always gotten, nothing has changed except for "who" can get married. So why change the name now except to appease people who don't want to share and who think that their religious definition trumps the legal function of "marriage" that has existed for a long time before now?

Prestor Jon wrote:

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:

I refuse to believe for one second that either of you would honestly do that or advocate that response from someone close to you. Granted, I know you will likely dig in and defend your stance to the death, so I am not looking for a public change of opinion here, but seriously...BS. If this was your wife or daughter, or grandson or nephew, you wouldn't be enraged that a business was refusing them service due to the business owner's own bigotry?

Honestly? No, I wouldn't. I'd teach them:

1. Why the person didn't want to serve them and why, to me, it's morally wrong.
2. I'd explain that while I think it's morally wrong, people are allowed to be bigots and donkey-caves.
3. I'd explain to her that we live in a country of boundless choices and options, so we're simply going to take our business elsewhere.

So you'd teach them that it was okay for people to arbitrarily break the law, but as long as there were other law abiding businesses to patronize the infraction should be ignored?

Seems like a bad message to instill on anyone you cared about. Passivity in these instances only breeds more bigotry.

As the OP did you just call me guilty of a thought crime?
Pfft, shows you. You have to be able to think to be guilty of a thought crime..oh wait!

More freedom is always better than less freedom. We're all equal and we should all be able to enjoy the freedom to be equally smart or stupid or ignorant or enlightened. A bigotted business owner is still just a person, same as me. I can easily explain to my children the problems with bigotry and point out nonbigotted businesses. It's not difficult to teach morality in a free society. Bigotry in business in a free market is never going to really prosper because by the nature of their bigotry they are only catering to a subset of the population rather than the whole. The level of bigotry being discussed in this thread is an inconvenience. If a subset of people have to go to a different store or restaurant because the one they wanted to patronize is owned by somebody that doesn't want their business it's not going to some kind of cataclysmic event that pushes society into chaos and anarchy with blood running in the streets. It's never been easier for people to publicize that kind of bigotry through social media and any business that turns away customers for silly reasons like that won't last long.

It's also 2014, there really aren't a whole lot of people out there who are running businesses that would put a "____ People Only" sign in their window if it weren't for those pesky anti discrimination laws. Seriously, does anyone actually know of a business that would start descriminating tomorrow if they had the freedom to do so? If there is a business owner out there that is that much of a bigot I wanted him/her to be overt about it so I can choose not to patronize their business rather than them keeping it hidden and taking my money. Back in the 1850s there was a large amount of anti Irish discrimination in Boston, NYC and other east coast cities following the large influx of immigrants due to the potato famine. To this day being Irish or of Irish descent doesn't make you part of a protected class yet there are no more Irish Need Not Apply or No Irish Allowed signs up in businesses. People got over their fears and stopped discriminating without having laws passed making it illegal.

The bigotry brought up by the OP and being discussed in the thread is a thought crime. Criminalizing thoughts is anathema to a free society and immoral. People should be free to think whatever thoughts they want and hold whatever opinions they want. I don't want the govt punishing people because they believe the "wrong" things. It's easy to say it's ok for the govt to punish bigots because bigotry is bad but that doesn't mean that bigots shouldn't have the same rights as non bigots. Society should only be concerned with criminalizing actions not thoughts. Actions affect others, thoughts are private. If you choose to commit assault, murder, robbery, fraud, embezzlement, etc. that's a crime regardless of the motivation so there is no need to criminalize the thoughts.

 d-usa wrote:
Only letting people officiate who are willing to follow the law isn't punishing anyone.

 d-usa wrote:
Only letting people officiate who are willing to follow the law isn't punishing anyone.

Prestor Jon wrote:

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:

I refuse to believe for one second that either of you would honestly do that or advocate that response from someone close to you. Granted, I know you will likely dig in and defend your stance to the death, so I am not looking for a public change of opinion here, but seriously...BS. If this was your wife or daughter, or grandson or nephew, you wouldn't be enraged that a business was refusing them service due to the business owner's own bigotry?

Honestly? No, I wouldn't. I'd teach them:

1. Why the person didn't want to serve them and why, to me, it's morally wrong.
2. I'd explain that while I think it's morally wrong, people are allowed to be bigots and donkey-caves.
3. I'd explain to her that we live in a country of boundless choices and options, so we're simply going to take our business elsewhere.

So you'd teach them that it was okay for people to arbitrarily break the law, but as long as there were other law abiding businesses to patronize the infraction should be ignored?

Seems like a bad message to instill on anyone you cared about. Passivity in these instances only breeds more bigotry.

More freedom is always better than less freedom. We're all equal and we should all be able to enjoy the freedom to be equally smart or stupid or ignorant or enlightened. A bigotted business owner is still just a person, same as me. I can easily explain to my children the problems with bigotry and point out nonbigotted businesses. It's not difficult to teach morality in a free society. Bigotry in business in a free market is never going to really prosper because by the nature of their bigotry they are only catering to a subset of the population rather than the whole. The level of bigotry being discussed in this thread is an inconvenience. If a subset of people have to go to a different store or restaurant because the one they wanted to patronize is owned by somebody that doesn't want their business it's not going to some kind of cataclysmic event that pushes society into chaos and anarchy with blood running in the streets. It's never been easier for people to publicize that kind of bigotry through social media and any business that turns away customers for silly reasons like that won't last long.

It's also 2014, there really aren't a whole lot of people out there who are running businesses that would put a "____ People Only" sign in their window if it weren't for those pesky anti discrimination laws. Seriously, does anyone actually know of a business that would start descriminating tomorrow if they had the freedom to do so? If there is a business owner out there that is that much of a bigot I wanted him/her to be overt about it so I can choose not to patronize their business rather than them keeping it hidden and taking my money. Back in the 1850s there was a large amount of anti Irish discrimination in Boston, NYC and other east coast cities following the large influx of immigrants due to the potato famine. To this day being Irish or of Irish descent doesn't make you part of a protected class yet there are no more Irish Need Not Apply or No Irish Allowed signs up in businesses. People got over their fears and stopped discriminating without having laws passed making it illegal.

The bigotry brought up by the OP and being discussed in the thread is a thought crime. Criminalizing thoughts is anathema to a free society and immoral. People should be free to think whatever thoughts they want and hold whatever opinions they want. I don't want the govt punishing people because they believe the "wrong" things. It's easy to say it's ok for the govt to punish bigots because bigotry is bad but that doesn't mean that bigots shouldn't have the same rights as non bigots. Society should only be concerned with criminalizing actions not thoughts. Actions affect others, thoughts are private. If you choose to commit assault, murder, robbery, fraud, embezzlement, etc. that's a crime regardless of the motivation so there is no need to criminalize the thoughts.

 TheMeanDM wrote:
I'm a bit on the fence...but I'm leaning toward backing the business.

First, I feel that there is a bit of under-handed deception here.

Other than sensationalism, why would a gay couple want to go to a publicized "one woman, one man" Christian-specific wedding chapel?

They could get married anywhere else. Outside. In a hotel. In a shack. They could get married anywhere else, but they purposely chose a very conservative place for a specific purpose.

I back marriage equality....but I also back business' rights to refuse service to anybody--with no explanation necessary.

...

 Ouze wrote:
At this point I feel obligated to point out the poor reporting.

Headline: "City threatens to arrest ministers who refuse to perform same-sex weddings"

Article: "He also told television station KXLY that any wedding chapel that turns away a gay couple would in theory be violating the law, “and you’re looking at a potential misdemeanor citation.” "

So... who was "threatened with arrest and jail"? Apparently, no one.

 StarTrotter wrote:


As per the argument, I'll agree with d-usa upon the fact that I like the whole "civil union" thing EXCEPT for one part. It seems very much like fine if we can't have it nobody can have it! *tosses something away so they can't have it*

That and it seems unnecessarily complex to then dig through every single law in existence around marriage to change it to civil union. But hey, who knows maybe they'll see some of the strange laws still in there and get a laugh

 agnosto wrote:


Yeah, but it's Fox "News" so hyperbolic extrapolation is kind of a given.

 d-usa wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

If you want to take your extreme position that every pastor/revrend/rabbi etc. has to marry anybody then you get into actual govt oppression. A Jewish couple wants to get married in a Roman Catholic cathedral because the bride thinks its a beautiful place for a wedding, the Catholic revrend says no I'm sorry we only allow Catholic ceremonies between two Catholics in our church. A Catholic priest refusing to marry nonCatholics in a Catholic church in no way shape or form violates the separation of church and state. It would be horrible for the local, state or federal govt to force a Caholic priest to act in opposition to Catholicism upon threat of fines or imprisonment. That would be a violation of church and state, it would not be enlightened or just.

He's not saying that, I don't think.

Fairly certain he's saying that Rabbis, priests, ministers, any schmuck off the internet, etc. shouldn't be performing legally binding marriages.

Pretty much this, or that they shouldn't be able to automatically be able to perform legally binding marriages simply by virtue of their religious status. .

It seems like I'm evolving into a form of the "make everything a civil union" argument, except for the whole "civil union" thing. I still think that getting rid of marriage seems like a kid taking his ball away because he would rather throw it across the fence than share it.

Make "marriage" and "weddings" a full blown state thing. Get a license by the state, get legally married, get the legal benefits. Everybody that wants to officiate over legally binding weddings cannot discriminate against any couples that are legally able to get married. If you want a religious ceremony then you can have your religious clergy perform one of those as well but it wouldn't affect the legal status of your marriage at all. Those private ceremonies can follow whatever rules their religion requires them to follow, at this point it's just a religious ceremony and not a legal state ceremony.

Clergy who are fine with marrying anyone can combine their two functions of "state-officiant" and "religious clergy" and have a ceremony that is both religious and legally binding.

 Frazzled wrote:

Oh bull That depends on the law and who determine's who's making it doesn't it.
You're directly contravening the First Amendment, to the extent it will: 1) be poured out of court; 2) you might start a real civil war.
Government can say: you want these benefits, you have to do X. But government can't say you can't call yourselves married. I mean I know California has a sudden desire to regulate the bedroom, but that crap won't fly.

Prestor Jon wrote:


Merely becoming an ordained priest doesn't make you lawfully able to sign off on a marriage license. I got ordained by multiple religions through a few minutes on the internet to prove a point to a friend. I'm officially ordained but I can't legally marry somebody unless I pay a fee and get registered by the state. I think history is pretty clear that the state chose to empower ordained ministers to legally marry people in order to make their religious ceremonies legally binding not in order to gain leverage to force religious leaders to act against their religion. If the state didn't want religious institution to perform lawful marriages the state wouldn't have empowered them to do so.

Prestor Jon wrote:

 d-usa wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

If you want to take your extreme position that every pastor/revrend/rabbi etc. has to marry anybody then you get into actual govt oppression. A Jewish couple wants to get married in a Roman Catholic cathedral because the bride thinks its a beautiful place for a wedding, the Catholic revrend says no I'm sorry we only allow Catholic ceremonies between two Catholics in our church. A Catholic priest refusing to marry nonCatholics in a Catholic church in no way shape or form violates the separation of church and state. It would be horrible for the local, state or federal govt to force a Caholic priest to act in opposition to Catholicism upon threat of fines or imprisonment. That would be a violation of church and state, it would not be enlightened or just.

He's not saying that, I don't think.

Fairly certain he's saying that Rabbis, priests, ministers, any schmuck off the internet, etc. shouldn't be performing legally binding marriages.

Pretty much this, or that they shouldn't be able to automatically be able to perform legally binding marriages simply by virtue of their religious status. .

It seems like I'm evolving into a form of the "make everything a civil union" argument, except for the whole "civil union" thing. I still think that getting rid of marriage seems like a kid taking his ball away because he would rather throw it across the fence than share it.

Make "marriage" and "weddings" a full blown state thing. Get a license by the state, get legally married, get the legal benefits. Everybody that wants to officiate over legally binding weddings cannot discriminate against any couples that are legally able to get married. If you want a religious ceremony then you can have your religious clergy perform one of those as well but it wouldn't affect the legal status of your marriage at all. Those private ceremonies can follow whatever rules their religion requires them to follow, at this point it's just a religious ceremony and not a legal state ceremony.

Clergy who are fine with marrying anyone can combine their two functions of "state-officiant" and "religious clergy" and have a ceremony that is both religious and legally binding.

Merely becoming an ordained priest doesn't make you lawfully able to sign off on a marriage license. I got ordained by multiple religions through a few minutes on the internet to prove a point to a friend. I'm officially ordained but I can't legally marry somebody unless I pay a fee and get registered by the state. I think history is pretty clear that the state chose to empower ordained ministers to legally marry people in order to make their religious ceremonies legally binding not in order to gain leverage to force religious leaders to act against their religion. If the state didn't want religious institution to perform lawful marriages the state wouldn't have empowered them to do so.

 d-usa wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

Oh bull That depends on the law and who determine's who's making it doesn't it.
You're directly contravening the First Amendment, to the extent it will: 1) be poured out of court; 2) you might start a real civil war.
Government can say: you want these benefits, you have to do X. But government can't say you can't call yourselves married. I mean I know California has a sudden desire to regulate the bedroom, but that crap won't fly.

What the feth happened to you there.

I never said anything about not being able to call yourself married. I never said anything about not being able to have whatever marriage ceremony or wedding ceremony or "Uniting of the Schlongs" ceremony or "happy clambake" ceremony. Call it whatever the hell you want.

I said two things:

1) That I think it's stupid to no longer call the official government sanctioned version marriage and to switch it to civil unions.
2) That to officiate over an official government sanctioned and recognized wedding you have to be willing to officiate over the official government sanctioned and recognized wedding of everybody without discrimination.

If the Church of Frazzled wants to have Wienderdog weddings and officiate over that and quote the good book of T-Bone and present the dogs as a married couple then more power to the Church of Frazzled.
If the Catholic Church wants to preach that only a man and woman can get married, and have wedding ceremonies that only include man and woman, then more power to them.
If a couple wants to have a dog officiate their wedding more power to them.
If a couple thinks that actually getting married is stupid, but they wear rings and present themselves as married to people more power to them.

But that doesn't mean that the state has to legally recognize any of them as legally married unless the had a legally binding wedding officiated by a licensed officiant. Just like it doesn't mean that the state can keep them from calling it whatever they want even if they don't recognize it legally.

 d-usa wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

Oh bull That depends on the law and who determine's who's making it doesn't it.
You're directly contravening the First Amendment, to the extent it will: 1) be poured out of court; 2) you might start a real civil war.
Government can say: you want these benefits, you have to do X. But government can't say you can't call yourselves married. I mean I know California has a sudden desire to regulate the bedroom, but that crap won't fly.

What the feth happened to you there.

I never said anything about not being able to call yourself married. I never said anything about not being able to have whatever marriage ceremony or wedding ceremony or "Uniting of the Schlongs" ceremony or "happy clambake" ceremony. Call it whatever the hell you want.

I said two things:

1) That I think it's stupid to no longer call the official government sanctioned version marriage and to switch it to civil unions.
2) That to officiate over an official government sanctioned and recognized wedding you have to be willing to officiate over the official government sanctioned and recognized wedding of everybody without discrimination.

If the Church of Frazzled wants to have Wienderdog weddings and officiate over that and quote the good book of T-Bone and present the dogs as a married couple then more power to the Church of Frazzled.
If the Catholic Church wants to preach that only a man and woman can get married, and have wedding ceremonies that only include man and woman, then more power to them.
If a couple wants to have a dog officiate their wedding more power to them.
If a couple thinks that actually getting married is stupid, but they wear rings and present themselves as married to people more power to them.

But that doesn't mean that the state has to legally recognize any of them as legally married unless the had a legally binding wedding officiated by a licensed officiant. Just like it doesn't mean that the state can keep them from calling it whatever they want even if they don't recognize it legally.

 StarTrotter wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:

I refuse to believe for one second that either of you would honestly do that or advocate that response from someone close to you. Granted, I know you will likely dig in and defend your stance to the death, so I am not looking for a public change of opinion here, but seriously...BS. If this was your wife or daughter, or grandson or nephew, you wouldn't be enraged that a business was refusing them service due to the business owner's own bigotry?

Honestly? No, I wouldn't. I'd teach them:

1. Why the person didn't want to serve them and why, to me, it's morally wrong.
2. I'd explain that while I think it's morally wrong, people are allowed to be bigots and donkey-caves.
3. I'd explain to her that we live in a country of boundless choices and options, so we're simply going to take our business elsewhere.

So you'd teach them that it was okay for people to arbitrarily break the law, but as long as there were other law abiding businesses to patronize the infraction should be ignored?

Seems like a bad message to instill on anyone you cared about. Passivity in these instances only breeds more bigotry.

More freedom is always better than less freedom. We're all equal and we should all be able to enjoy the freedom to be equally smart or stupid or ignorant or enlightened. A bigotted business owner is still just a person, same as me. I can easily explain to my children the problems with bigotry and point out nonbigotted businesses. It's not difficult to teach morality in a free society. Bigotry in business in a free market is never going to really prosper because by the nature of their bigotry they are only catering to a subset of the population rather than the whole. The level of bigotry being discussed in this thread is an inconvenience. If a subset of people have to go to a different store or restaurant because the one they wanted to patronize is owned by somebody that doesn't want their business it's not going to some kind of cataclysmic event that pushes society into chaos and anarchy with blood running in the streets. It's never been easier for people to publicize that kind of bigotry through social media and any business that turns away customers for silly reasons like that won't last long.

It's also 2014, there really aren't a whole lot of people out there who are running businesses that would put a "____ People Only" sign in their window if it weren't for those pesky anti discrimination laws. Seriously, does anyone actually know of a business that would start descriminating tomorrow if they had the freedom to do so? If there is a business owner out there that is that much of a bigot I wanted him/her to be overt about it so I can choose not to patronize their business rather than them keeping it hidden and taking my money. Back in the 1850s there was a large amount of anti Irish discrimination in Boston, NYC and other east coast cities following the large influx of immigrants due to the potato famine. To this day being Irish or of Irish descent doesn't make you part of a protected class yet there are no more Irish Need Not Apply or No Irish Allowed signs up in businesses. People got over their fears and stopped discriminating without having laws passed making it illegal.

The bigotry brought up by the OP and being discussed in the thread is a thought crime. Criminalizing thoughts is anathema to a free society and immoral. People should be free to think whatever thoughts they want and hold whatever opinions they want. I don't want the govt punishing people because they believe the "wrong" things. It's easy to say it's ok for the govt to punish bigots because bigotry is bad but that doesn't mean that bigots shouldn't have the same rights as non bigots. Society should only be concerned with criminalizing actions not thoughts. Actions affect others, thoughts are private. If you choose to commit assault, murder, robbery, fraud, embezzlement, etc. that's a crime regardless of the motivation so there is no need to criminalize the thoughts.

Just gonna interject to say you can probably run just fine actually The best projections for the clusterfeth that is the LGBTqblarkaslarka is, at most, somewhere around 15% of the population. And that is after assuming the highest percentage possible. Overall, it's likely significantly less (maybe pushing 5%. Maybe? In some pretty concentrated places?), almost un-noticeably small to the point where it doesn't cause a single hoot.

As per the argument, I'll agree with d-usa upon the fact that I like the whole "civil union" thing EXCEPT for one part. It seems very much like fine if we can't have it nobody can have it! *tosses something away so they can't have it* That and it seems unnecessarily complex to then dig through every single law in existence around marriage to change it to civil union. But hey, who knows maybe they'll see some of the strange laws still in there and get a laugh

 Frazzled wrote:

ON the positive I discovered something called Jim Beam Select. Yum

 StarTrotter wrote:

 d-usa wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

Oh bull That depends on the law and who determine's who's making it doesn't it.
You're directly contravening the First Amendment, to the extent it will: 1) be poured out of court; 2) you might start a real civil war.
Government can say: you want these benefits, you have to do X. But government can't say you can't call yourselves married. I mean I know California has a sudden desire to regulate the bedroom, but that crap won't fly.

What the feth happened to you there.

I never said anything about not being able to call yourself married. I never said anything about not being able to have whatever marriage ceremony or wedding ceremony or "Uniting of the Schlongs" ceremony or "happy clambake" ceremony. Call it whatever the hell you want.

I said two things:

1) That I think it's stupid to no longer call the official government sanctioned version marriage and to switch it to civil unions.
2) That to officiate over an official government sanctioned and recognized wedding you have to be willing to officiate over the official government sanctioned and recognized wedding of everybody without discrimination.

If the Church of Frazzled wants to have Wienderdog weddings and officiate over that and quote the good book of T-Bone and present the dogs as a married couple then more power to the Church of Frazzled.
If the Catholic Church wants to preach that only a man and woman can get married, and have wedding ceremonies that only include man and woman, then more power to them.
If a couple wants to have a dog officiate their wedding more power to them.
If a couple thinks that actually getting married is stupid, but they wear rings and present themselves as married to people more power to them.

But that doesn't mean that the state has to legally recognize any of them as legally married unless the had a legally binding wedding officiated by a licensed officiant. Just like it doesn't mean that the state can keep them from calling it whatever they want even if they don't recognize it legally.

May I request this Church of Frazzled marriage? It sounds truly amazing although I do hope cake is a necessity. Maybe two even

If the Church of Frazzled wants to have Wienderdog weddings and officiate over that and quote the good book of T-Bone and present the dogs as a married couple then more power to the Church of Frazzled.

 cincydooley wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:


Merely becoming an ordained priest doesn't make you lawfully able to sign off on a marriage license. I got ordained by multiple religions through a few minutes on the internet to prove a point to a friend. I'm officially ordained but I can't legally marry somebody unless I pay a fee and get registered by the state. I think history is pretty clear that the state chose to empower ordained ministers to legally marry people in order to make their religious ceremonies legally binding not in order to gain leverage to force religious leaders to act against their religion. If the state didn't want religious institution to perform lawful marriages the state wouldn't have empowered them to do so.

While I agree....a whole big part of me thinks that there should be more to legally joining someone than paying a fee and taking an online Buzzfeed quiz

 d-usa wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

ON the positive I discovered something called Jim Beam Select. Yum

That explains so much.

Also: will it be a required serving at any future Church of Frazzled wedding ceremonies?

 d-usa wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

 d-usa wrote:

 cincydooley wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

If you want to take your extreme position that every pastor/revrend/rabbi etc. has to marry anybody then you get into actual govt oppression. A Jewish couple wants to get married in a Roman Catholic cathedral because the bride thinks its a beautiful place for a wedding, the Catholic revrend says no I'm sorry we only allow Catholic ceremonies between two Catholics in our church. A Catholic priest refusing to marry nonCatholics in a Catholic church in no way shape or form violates the separation of church and state. It would be horrible for the local, state or federal govt to force a Caholic priest to act in opposition to Catholicism upon threat of fines or imprisonment. That would be a violation of church and state, it would not be enlightened or just.

He's not saying that, I don't think.

Fairly certain he's saying that Rabbis, priests, ministers, any schmuck off the internet, etc. shouldn't be performing legally binding marriages.

Pretty much this, or that they shouldn't be able to automatically be able to perform legally binding marriages simply by virtue of their religious status. .

It seems like I'm evolving into a form of the "make everything a civil union" argument, except for the whole "civil union" thing. I still think that getting rid of marriage seems like a kid taking his ball away because he would rather throw it across the fence than share it.

Make "marriage" and "weddings" a full blown state thing. Get a license by the state, get legally married, get the legal benefits. Everybody that wants to officiate over legally binding weddings cannot discriminate against any couples that are legally able to get married. If you want a religious ceremony then you can have your religious clergy perform one of those as well but it wouldn't affect the legal status of your marriage at all. Those private ceremonies can follow whatever rules their religion requires them to follow, at this point it's just a religious ceremony and not a legal state ceremony.

Clergy who are fine with marrying anyone can combine their two functions of "state-officiant" and "religious clergy" and have a ceremony that is both religious and legally binding.

Merely becoming an ordained priest doesn't make you lawfully able to sign off on a marriage license. I got ordained by multiple religions through a few minutes on the internet to prove a point to a friend. I'm officially ordained but I can't legally marry somebody unless I pay a fee and get registered by the state. I think history is pretty clear that the state chose to empower ordained ministers to legally marry people in order to make their religious ceremonies legally binding not in order to gain leverage to force religious leaders to act against their religion. If the state didn't want religious institution to perform lawful marriages the state wouldn't have empowered them to do so.

And if a priest doesn't want to perform a legally binding secular state sanctioned wedding then he is not compelled to apply for a license to do so. He can perform as many non-legally binding church weddings as he wants to.

But if you apply for a secular license to perform an act sanctioned by a secular government then you should be required to follow secular law.

 TheMeanDM wrote:
Alcohol and opioids do not mix, Frazz. They do not mix, because they're both depressing to the CNS.

I know it was accidental on your part...just cautioning others too

Would hate to see Mrs. Frazzled making a post about your demise.

Prestor Jon wrote:

But that ignores the whole reasoning behind the priest becoming licensed. The priest gets the license in order to make the religious ceremony legally binding so that the couple getting married gets the paperwork done easier.