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Posted on 06/10/2012 2:51:07 PM PDT by markomalley
Christians are finding it increasingly difficult to practice their faith in the public sphere, as a number of recent cases demonstrate.
In New Mexico the Court of Appeals ruled that the refusal by a photo studio to photograph a same-sex couple is a breach of the state’s Human Rights Act, the Albuquerque Journal reported, June 5.
In 2006 Vanessa Willock asked Elaine Huguenin of Elane Photography if she would take pictures of a “same-gender ceremony.” She was told the studio only handled “traditional weddings.”
The studio also lost previous rulings by the New Mexico Human Rights Commission in 2008 and by District Judge Alan Malott in 2009.
The studio argued that their refusal to photograph a same-sex ceremony was not discrimination, but was motivated by the religious and moral beliefs of the owners.
The courts, however, ruled that as a business that provides services to the public it cannot refuse to serve on the basis of not only race, religion, color, and nationality, but also sex or sexual orientation, or gender identity.
The issue of Christians and same-sex unions is also a hot topic in England, as the government considers whether or not to legalize same-sex marriage. Christians are facing difficulties in defending their view, as the decidedly non-religious Economist magazine pointed out in its June 2 print edition.
Diversity
In March, it explained, a lobby group, Christian Concern, booked rooms for its conference at the Law Society. Their booking was cancelled on May 11 due to their position on same-sex marriage. They then booked at the Queen Elizabeth Conference Center, and once more, it was later cancelled as: “The event would conflict with our policy on diversity.”
Most Christian churches, Jews and almost all Muslims do believe that sex belongs inside heterosexual marriage only, the Economist pointed out. “Does diversity cover that?,” it asked.
Catholic schools in Wales ran into trouble when they were informed they could be breaking the law by inviting their students to sign a petition protesting the government’s proposal to legalize same-sex marriage, the Telegraph newspaper reported May 9.
Leighton Andrews, the Welsh Assembly Government minister for education and skill, said that the call to oppose a change in the law could constitute a “political” act, which is prohibited by the 1996 Education Act.
He not only directed schools in Wales to give pupils a “balanced” view on the same-sex marriage issue but he also ordered that they must tell pupils about his intervention.
“Our position remains that this is a religious view not a political view,” Maeve McCormack, policy manger for the Catholic Education Service, told the Telegraph.
Free speech on the issue of homosexuality also suffered a blow when in England Adrian Smith lost his appeal against a 2011 decision by his employer to demote him due to comments he posted on his Facebook page.
In his own time he posted his criticism about the government’s plans to allow same-sex marriages in churches. The posting, visible only to his friends on Facebook, led the Trafford Housing Trust to demote him from his £35,000 a year managerial post to a more junior £21,000 position, the Telegraph newspaper reported, last October 24.
Subsequently, on March 21, the Christian Institute reported that District Judge Charles Khan, at Manchester County Court, ruled that Smith could not use human rights arguments in his legal case against his employer.
He plans to continue his case, which could be heard sometime in the coming months, according to the Christian Institute.
Double rooms
The decision came shortly after another appeal loss, by the Christian owners of a Cornish hotel who sought to reverse a 2011 decision regarding their policy of restricting double rooms to married couples.
Peter and Hazelmary Bull took their case to the Court of Appeal, following the court order to pay damages in January 2011 to civil partners Steven Preddy and Martyn Hall, but they lost the case, the BBC reported February 10.
Later, on March 12, the BBC reported that the couple was considering an appeal to the Supreme Court.
“In a country where Christians can be sacked for manifesting their faith, are vilified by State bodies, are in fear of reprisal or even arrest for expressing their views on sexual ethics, something is very wrong,” warned Lord Carey, a former Archbishop of Canterbury, recently.
His warning was contained in a submission to the European Court of Human Rights regarding a case to be heard in September, the Telegraph newspaper reported April 13.
The hearing encompasses a number of cases, including a counselor sacked for saying that he was not be comfortable in giving sex therapy to homosexual couples, and a Christian registrar, who did not want to conduct civil partnership ceremonies.
Courts in Britain, Lord Carey said, have “consistently applied equality law to discriminate against Christians.” A situation certainly not limited to Britain and one that is rapidly spreading.
In my admittedly limited understanding of Revelation, we’ll have to lose a LOT of such battles to lead to Christ’s return and our ultimate victory.
Things are going to get much worse before they get better forever.
It has been foretold that it will get much worse than losing a job, or being scorned by neighbors.
What I sense though is that, in the battles, more folks will come to believe, so in those losses, we will still win, just saying.
A good point, and I do hope you’re right.
It will take civil disobedience and secession.
Freep-mail me to get on or off my pro-life and Catholic List:
Please ping me to note-worthy Pro-Life or Catholic threads, or other threads of general interest.
queers lived in a closet because there was life there.
They will learn again the old lesson...... to stay alive they must return to the closet.
we are. but your condescending sarcasm is noted.
PM and SOL,
This is another example, as p-marlowe predicted, of the state infringing on religion. One wouldn’t think that clear religious beliefs would be a topic within a court room, but they are.
A private business that deals with the public is still a private business. The courts ruled that the boy scouts, a private club, does not have to violate its principles, but that is an older case.
These independent American citizens were told they had to violate change their practices to accomodate that which they found immoral. This is not turning down a gay for a hamburger at Wendy’s, for the gayness of the purchaser is not an issue in a hamburger joint.
To prepare a photo session, however, is a business that requires preparation, planning, and intentionality to best frame the event.
It would be no different than requiring a conservative Jewish photographer to cover Akmandinejab’s visit to mosques in America. That should be his choice, not a dictate ordered by a court.
Amen! He told us to expect this.
That’s the plan. One thing about the devil, he’s not lazy. God be with us.
Over the past about 1/2 decade or so libs have convinced too many Americans that ‘gay’ (the new term is LGBT) is equivalent to a ‘race’. This is a dramatic shift from when Clinton tried to push homosexuality on the military in 1993 and hit a brick wall. Much of their success was with kids who have now grown. They never saw aids like we did.
The ‘gay is a race’ argument seems seriously flawed to me but now many states treat ‘orientation’ in it's non-discrimination law as if it is sex or race.
Treating ‘gays’ like a discriminated race is like equating apples and oranges because gays are being defined by their ‘feelings’(desires) not their physical or visual appearance and feelings cant be measured, so they make their actions, for example homosexual sodomy, a new right.
A big part of the problem is that with so many homosexual friendly shows on television, the public thinks that about 25% of the population is homosexual when the truth is the percentage is less than 2%.
Sorry I’m late to the game in responding to this one but I wanted to point out that a Christian woman in Iowa is bei g sued by a lesbian couple for refusing to make their “wedding” cake. I’ll try to find the article.
Some days, I feel very alone in the persecution I face as a Catholic nurse. Stories like this remind me that it dosen’t stop at healthcare.
Pick up your cross & follow Him.
Kinda like the "spanking is child abuse" argument, eh?
Are you still on that ‘beat infants with a rod’ preacher from week ago on this homo-rights thread? I think we 'beat that one to death' on that thread.
There is no right in the US constitution to homo-activity, nor is there a right to torture your kids leaving society with mental cases who do the same to their kids. I don't see the logical connection.
So spanking is torture?
That is a really modern/extremely liberal position you have taken. The same people that claim that homosexuality is a protected right are the same people who claim that spanking children should be a felony.
The problem is simply this, Christianity is under attack and it is now a tort to refuse to take pictures at a homosexual marriage and you can lose your business if you express your moral beliefs about homosexuality in regard to your photography business. The pastor we were discussing merely expressed his biblical understanding that using a "rod" on a child is a correct method of bringing up a child in the way he should go and he was convicted of 9 felonies for expressing that belief.
It will soon be a felony to express the belief that homosexuality is a sin. Do you not see the slippery slope that we are on?
Beating infants with rods is torture. The same perverts who do such things were likely victims of themselves, much like incest child victims have been known to abuse their own kids. Abuse like that is perversion much like homosexuality is. No right to that in my book.
So is every spanking a "beating"? Having your butt slapped with the flat end of a wooden spoon is much less traumatic to a child than having it slapped with an open hand.
What kind of spanking would not be "torture" in your opinion. What kind of "spanking" can a pastor advocate without having to fear that if the parent follows that advice that he will not be found guilty of felony conspiracy?
And what will you say when a pastor tells a young congregant that homosexuality is a sin and then the young congregant later commits suicide? Would that be considered MURDER in your liberal world?
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