about religion and the Supreme Court decision

[cellio]

I'd like to thank dglenn for bringing this to my attention:

"[...] as an Orthodox rabbi who does not officiate at same-sex marriages [...] My 'side' did not lose, because my side is never defined by any one position on a matter of ritual or liturgy, no matter how important that matter may be. My side, I hope, is God's side, and the God in whom I believe is infinite -- bigger and more complex than can be reduced to any single decision, or even any single tradition, for that matter." -- Rabbi Brad Hirschfield, I am an orthodox rabbi who doesn't perform gay marriages, but I celebrate today's Supreme Court decision, 2015-06-26.

I am heterosexual and religious. The Supreme Court decision to recognize a secular, legal status does not in any way harm my religious rights, nor anybody else's. Why should my gay friends be barred from the legal and financial protections, and obligations, that I and my husband have? (I do wish they'd declared "civil unions for everyone" and taken the term "marriage" completely out of the law, but I presume they can't do that on their own.)

No clergy with objections to gay marriage need officiate. That's proper; most rabbis won't perform marriages between Jews and non-Jews, Catholic priests won't remarry those who are divorced, and I presume there are other examples. The courts continue to uphold your religious rights.

Except for that one some claim of imposing their religious mores on others. That one took a little damage Friday.

Comments

[cellio]

Well, the Christians do use that word in a religious context, and I think that's a big part of the problem. The institution that the state claims an interest in, that requires a license from the state and has legal treatment, shouldn't, in retrospect, have been called "marriage" in the first place -- the church was already using the word in a more-restricted sense and what you get a license for isn't that. But they couldn't have known back then that this word would be so problematic.

So Christians do have a thing called "marriage" that is not the same thing as the secular legal "marriage", same as our kiddushin is religious and not the same as the secular thing. As far as I know getting the religious status also confers the secular status, but the reverse isn't true -- that's why a Justice of the Peace can effect a marriage without involving any religious institution. It's a secular marriage but not a religious marriage or kiddushin.

In the space of "defense of marriage" (sic), churches should be no more concerned with secular gay marriages than they are with secular atheist heterosexual marriages. Religiously speaking they don't recognize either. So what? That shouldn't be new. If they weren't threatened by one class of not-church-recognized marriage, they shouldn't be threatened by another.

Of course, if their goal is something else, like to force their views of what is or isn't proper behavior on a secular nation, then that wouldn't mollify them at all...

[goljerp]

As far as I know getting the religious status also confers the secular status

I think this varies from state to state, and possibly even within states. When Joy and I asked our friend the Rabbi to marry us, she said yes, but noted that she had already filled out the forms with the City of NY. I seem to recall that part of it was that she had to actually be employed as a religious leader at an institution where performing marriages was a normal part of her duties. I imagine other cities and states have different rules...