Sen. Mike Lee: Churches Should Not Be Forced to Perform Gay Marriage

Newsmax ^ | 12/28/2013 | Audrey Hudson

[SeekAndFind]

Sen. Mike Lee says a bill he introduced would prevent the Internal Revenue Service from denying tax-exempt status to any person or group that refuses to perform gay marriages.

"What we're talking about here is the freedom of religious belief, the freedom of a church, for example, to adhere to its own religious doctrine so that it cannot be discriminated against by the government," the Utah Republican said in an interview with Newsmax.

Lee said the federal government's failure to protect religious liberty — citing Obamacare mandates for contraceptives and abortion-inducing drugs — was a key motivation for him to introduce the "Marriage and Religious Freedom Act," which protects clergy from being punished if they refuse to perform gay marriages.

"This is something that the overwhelming majority of Americans would support and the overwhelming majority of Americans would be disappointed if they discovered Congress would be unwilling to pass something like this," Lee said.

Lee's bill was introduced before Congress recessed for the holidays. It has the support of Republican Sens. James Inhofe of Oklahoma, Marco Rubio of Florida, and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. A bipartisan companion measure in the House is sponsored by Republican Reps. Raul Labrador of Idaho and Chris Smith of New Jersey, as well as Democrats Dan Lipinski of Illinois and Mike McIntyre of North Carolina.

[John Leland 1789]

This is a very big problem with contracting with the IRS for exemptions to begin with. The very purpose of 501©(3) is to control the churches-—to make them state churches.

[John Leland 1789]

There has never been any law requiring any church to file for 501(c)(3) status. When they do so, they do so voluntarily. Yes, it IS a money issue. To the IRS it is a CONTROL issue.

[EternalVigilance]

My apologies. These cases are coming so fast and furious that I conflated a couple of things.

Waddoups was not appointed by Obama, he was picked by GW Bush. Both Hatch and Bennett advocated heavily for him in the Senate, leading to a voice vote to confirm him. The Republicans didn’t oppose him at all. Softball questions and a rubber stamp. That’s it.

[EternalVigilance]

To clarify a bit more, it was Senator Lee who vouched for the nomination by Obama of the federal judge who ruled in the "gay marriage" case from earlier in the month. These two horrendous rulings came so close together, I got the two judges mixed up.

Robert J. Shelby: Judge who made gay marriage legal in Utah

He was nominated to the federal bench by President Barack Obama in November 2011 and was confirmed by the U.S. Senate on Sept. 22, 2012. During the process, Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, described Shelby as "pre-eminently qualified" and predicted he would be "an outstanding judge."

[SeekAndFind]

We all make mistakes. It is almost impossible to totally judge a person’s character, much less determine how he will decide on a case such as this.

Heck, we sometimes even choose the wrong investment, or worse, marry the wrong person.

[EternalVigilance]

While that’s certainly true, I still find Republican rubber-stamping of Obama judges to be egregious, and think that Senator Lee’s description of this guy as “preeminently qualified” was ridiculous. I looked at his resume and it was very, very thin. “Night manager at Macey’s grocery store” just doesn’t scream constitutional judicial heavy weight to me. But whatever...

[Terry L Smith]

I think that since you brought up the UCMJ, I request that you find me, exactly, where it says that.

Now, when you start mentioning church groups by their particular titles, you had better include every other church group in the book, because there will always be one, in all of them!

_I_ am a Unitarian ordained priest.

I am sick, sick, sick of all the self-hand-wringing, and woes-is-me’s, and I would like to see folks get up and bloody well DO SOMETHING!!

As for me, I can only do so much, since I am also a disabled veteran. Had I gone all “vietnam veteran hollywood supposed cuckoo”, I would not be alive, having done my duty to actually erase living Communists within this country, and in so doing my so-called patriotic part, the kind benevolent veteran-loving federal government, would have already applied the necessary current/voltage/amperes to make sure I never did it, again.

I say this, without meaning to sound detrimental, “churchians” are the most timid, scared to do anything outside the doors of whatever chapel, temple, tabernacle, or church, that I have ever seen, and I saw plenty between 1986 to 1994, when I was attending Smithtown Gospel Tabernacle, on Long Island, NY. They would not even go to the local V.A. hospital, when I questioned them, because they might get hurt!

WE do not need “churchians”, Christians with a backbone knwing it might be their last breath, yes, but not “churchians”!

And yes, I know x3, it will be that bad, to save the Republic!

[cva66snipe]

First of all Chaplains have been ordered to refrain from using Jesus Christ name in prayers. How is that falling under the UCMJ? Failure to obey orders. I also simply stated the Unitarian church is left leaning meaning politically. That said the author of The Declaration of Independence was also a Deist. On the negative side he edited a rather Christless Bible. His Constitutional right to do so but I wouldn't consider it spiritually a wise move.

I'll leave you to steam with these questions. Who is Barry Lynn? What political and church offices has he held?