We’ve entered a time where mandatory acceptance of any and everything queer trumps the Bible, the Constitution and trumps any conscience some individuals may still have. Right or wrong positions in every such debate have been decided. They’ve been decided by the president, by the Department of Justice, by Federal Judges, by the media, by the mainstream church denominations and by the pope. The pope has yet to sanction homo-matrimony, but given the blurring of traditional moral postures by the present pontiff, it could happen.
Currently, the whole country is in an uproar over a newly passed law in the State of Indiana declaring protection for religiously held beliefs. What an outrageous concept! The idea that individuals or businesses would be legally free to decide what job to take, if there’s any chance in the world that “homo-couples” might take offense, is an outrage.
It turns out that nineteen other states already have similar laws. You might wonder, with the protection of the First Amendment why such additional protection would be necessary. Think no further than Obamacare. The Federal mandate that individuals, businesses and corporations must pay into a nationally run insurance system that mandates access to abortion drugs or procedures ran into a lawsuit that went all the way to the Supreme Court. Hobby Lobby won the case, much of which revolved around the issue of whether a corporation should be treated as a person, and as such retain the right to hold religious values. It would have seemed a slam dunk, since corporations are described as “persons” in U.S. Code dating back to 1791.
But the case ended in a split decision, with four of the justices predictably voting their ideology rather than the merits. You can see the same split on nearly every issue that has some effect on the government’s power to force compliance of the individual or business. Four will go with government authority over personal freedom every single time, a couple are tossups, and the other three can be expected to rule on the merits of a case in light of the Constitution.
The national Religious Freedom Restoration Act was passed unanimously by the House, and by 97 out of 100 in the Senate in 1993. It was signed into law without any national uproar of protest by Bill Clinton in 1994. A burning issue attributed to the need for such a law was that native Americans should have the right to possess or transport peyote for religious ceremonies, even though it is an illegal substance under State and Federal laws. At the time, no one had ever heard of “gay marriage.”
Ten more states have passed Religious Freedom Restoration Acts since the Hobby Lobby case, presumably to bolster the legal positions of individuals and businesses in instances where some mandate or other might force compromise with one’s beliefs or conscience or end up in court. Somehow, the law got passed in all those states without anything like the uproar that’s going on over the passage of basically the same thing in Indiana.
But that was before people and their companies got put out of business for refusing participation in homo-nuptials. It got national attention when a photographer in New Mexico opted out of a request to photograph a ceremony between two women, was sued and lost. News was also made when an Oregon baker politely declined to decorate a wedding cake for two men. She lost the case brought against her, and may yet face additional liability. Never mind that she didn’t believe it would be right to profit off something that offended her religious sensibilities. Too bad! Doesn’t she know that “gay rights” supersede her right to practice business in a manner she believes to be in line with God’s Word? She found out the hard way, and may not have learned her lesson.
We don’t know for sure, but several of the states may have been inclined to pass “Religious Freedom” laws because of these kinds of recent cases. The homo-lobby apparently thinks that may be the case, and the activist organizations decided to draw the line at the Indiana law declaring it an invitation to practice “discrimination” against you know who.
But the pressure being exerted against the legislature and governor of Indiana is not legal in nature. It is financial. Companies headquartered in the state are threatening to move out. The NCAA is threatening to hold basketball tournaments somewhere else unless the new law is repealed immediately. Other large concerns, employing thousands of people and operating large businesses with lots of locations are protesting the law. Indiana may be under special scrutiny because the Federal Courts just ruled the State’s ban on homo-matrimony unconstitutional in November of 2014.
Now, rather than a legal issue, it is starting to look like economic blackmail. The message is, “Either get on board with ___-marriage, or you’ll be destroyed.” Either by the courts, or failing that, you’ll be boycotted, labeled a “bigot” and starved out by your other customers who fear being painted with the same brush. The Indiana Governor is quick to say this law has nothing to do with discrimination against anybody, but the argument isn’t working. He says it’s the same law with the same language that’s in the Federal Statute, duly passed by Congress and signed by the president. That doesn’t work either.
There is no defense left for standing against homosexuality. It seems that everybody from the politicians, to the corporate CEO’s to the clergy and parishioners of mainstream “Christian” churches have caved in to cultural pressures. Why? Is it because someone’s made a compelling argument that every appearance of the subject in scripture is the result of mistranslation? No. So why does everybody in public life believe they have no choice but to back down and proclaim that they are comfortable with everything homosexual, including Holy Matrimony?
Nobody has the guts to say, “God’s Word condemns homosexuality, repeatedly in the Old Testament and repeatedly in the New Testament, as an abomination and a cardinal sin!” What kind of reception might that get in the mainstream debate? It is beginning to look like we’ll never find out. As wild-eyed conservative as some in the upcoming presidential field of candidates are regarded, you won’t hear this out of any of them.
You won’t hear it out of the pope either. Not this pope anyway. It’s highly unlikely that any Sunday services will feature any of the pertinent biblical passages; it might spark a walkout or a boycott. Worse yet, there could be a gay parade in the parking lot by the next week, replete with TV cameras and breathless correspondents.
It has become dangerous, even in the land that enshrined religious liberty, to practice or preach the Word of God. Modern culture forbids it, and will punish those who dare. Welcome to persecution.
