7 ms·

So what happens to clergy who refuse to perform such "weddings" on religious grounds? All major religions have at least a majority, if not uniform, disapproval

So what happens to clergy who refuse to perform such "weddings" on religious grounds? All major religions have at least a majority, if not uniform, disapproval of "marrying" any other than man & woman. We already have cases of punishing & re-educating bakers for adhering to their religious views on the subject, how much more so those who may face compulsion to perform a union they cannot religiously condone? ETA: to wit, how to reconcile the court's ruling with the court's claim none will be compelled to facilitate such unions against their faith?

clavalle 11y ago
Luckily their participation is not necessary.
- ctdonath 11y ago
  The question isn't about whether they're necessary, the question is what happens to someone whose services are solicited and they refuse.
  - dsr_ 11y ago
    Absolutely nothing. The government can't coerce religions to perform ceremonies. The right to marriage is not a religious right, it is a civil right, and will be provided by civil authorities. For example, in Massachusetts anyone can become a marriage officiant by applying to the governor. There's a form; permission is always granted. As a result, I have performed two marriages. The better question is, what happens to a civil official who declares that it is against their religion to perform their civil duty?
  - jcater 11y ago
    My old church refused to marry anyone who was previously divorced. Clergy have a lot of leeway in who they can refuse. No one is forcing them to do anything.
  - clavalle 11y ago
    Oh, I see. You are conflating a 'religious service provider' with, say, a business who bakes cakes. Religious institutions are not considered public accommodations so they are not required to offer their services without discrimination to protected classes.
    - hackuser 11y ago
      > Religious institutions are not considered public accommodations so they are not required to offer their services without discrimination to protected classes. What if their services are funded by the government, such as services to the poor? Can they refuse poor gay people?
      - clavalle 11y ago
        Is there any example of a religious marriage service being funded by the government? It seems like an unlikely, and possibly illegal, situation.
    - ctdonath 11y ago
      The baker in question specializes in weddings. They may refuse customers if the function at issue is not a wedding. The baker considers the formalized celebratory union of anyone other than a man + woman to be not a wedding. Now, based on no legislation (as one dissenting Justice makes scathingly clear), a new "protected class" has been created. The baker still considers a pair entering that "protected class" not a "wedding", a view the ruling notes still should be respected and free to hold & act on.
      - clavalle 11y ago
        Well, the SCOTUS just decided that same sex unions are, in fact, weddings and sex is an existing protected class based on actual legislation and precedent. That means the baker would be discriminating illegally as a public accommodation on a federal level if they refused their service based on the sex of that event's participants.
lisper 11y ago
I don't recall any bakers being punished for refusing to perform a gay marriage. When did that happen?
- ctdonath 11y ago
  Bakers specializing in facilitating weddings have been punished for refusing to provide wedding cakes to events which they consider not weddings. ETA: clergy have [citation needed] been prosecuted for refusing to perform weddings based on race.
  - lisper 11y ago
    But that is not the same thing at all. People can (and will) get married with or without cakes. A baker refusing to serve a gay couple is no different from refusing to serve a black couple or a handicapped couple or a fat couple. That's not religion, that's commerce. Religious beliefs do not entitle you to discriminate in matters of commerce.
    - EdSharkey 11y ago
      It sounds like our hypothetical baker can't object to giving service on any grounds by your explanation. Are there truly no limits in your mind? Must the Muslim baker need to bake the gay marriage cake and deliver it to the ceremony just because some customer wants one made? Must the Christian baker bake a cake with a pentagram and goat head on it and deliver it to the sacrificial altar just because some customer wants one made? Or, how about yesterday's lurch issue? Shall we force the black baker to bake a rebel flag cake with some racist epithet on it because some a-hole customer wants it? Can't we back off here and simply respect one another's personal or religious beliefs? Respect must flow in both directions in a civil society, in my opinion. If the baker doesn't want to participate in the target celebration based on personal or religious beliefs, why not just amicably part ways? Why the bent noses if the customer can find some other baker that will gladly take the money and participate. Why does this even rise to the legal challenge level?
      - 11y ago
smackfu 11y ago
Nothing happens to them. Even today, Catholic clergy won't perform many opposite-sex marriages unless certain conditions are met, like having it in a Catholic church and requiring pre-marriage counseling.
- ceejayoz 11y ago
  Hell, Catholic clergy won't marry non-Catholics, Catholics who've divorced, etc. They had those rights yesterday, and they have them today.
masklinn 11y ago
> So what happens to clergy who refuse to perform such "weddings" on religious grounds? Nothing. > We already have cases of punishing & re-educating bakers for adhering to their religious views on the subject, how much more so those who may face compulsion to perform a union they cannot religiously condone? Clergy are not public accommodations and are not subject to non-discrimination law. Clergy in the US can still refuse to officiate interracial marriage for instance. The bakers you're talking about were not "punished and re-educated for adhering to their religious views", they were punished for discriminating against a protected class in the state they operated in. Just as they would have been punished for refusing cake to an interracial marriage, even if condoning it were against their sincerely held religious beliefs. But you really shouldn't worry about that: this SCOTUS decision only forces states to issue and recognise marriage licenses to same-sex couples, it does not force them to make sexual orientation a protected class. And in all 29 states where sexual orientation still isn't a protected class, same sex couples can have a cake-less marriage in the morning because businesses aren't forced to serve them, and then get fired in the afternoon because their bosses can discriminate against them for reasons of sexual orientation.
- Torgo 11y ago
  The Mormon Church used to not allow black people to become priests, they probably changed that under threat of losing their tax-exempt status.
  - masklinn 11y ago
    Nope. They changed that because the LDS had started expanding outside the US and into very ethnically mixed countries (Brazil). I know of no source claiming the move was motivated by IRS intervention.
    - Torgo 11y ago
      The Mormon Church was expanding outside the US to non-white countries since the 1800s.
lmm 11y ago
Clergy have every right to refuse them. Other people have every right to express their views in peaceful, democratic fashion, e.g. picketing such churches, just as they would with a church that advocated any other distasteful view. No-one, those bakers included, is legally compelled to support gay marriage. Some people may find themselves economically compelled to do things they find distasteful, but to a certain extent that's always true for anyone who has to work for a living. There are some things that we consider it unfair to economically compel people to do, e.g. OHSA. Do you think that should be extended to e.g. making it illegal to make someone's job contingent on officiating gay marriages? What is the natural boundary there - should it be illegal to fire someone for doing something they're politically opposed to? Should a barman have the right to e.g. refuse service to women because they don't think women should be allowed to drink?
- hackuser 11y ago
  It's not that clear cut. Could a business refuse service because the customer is black? Could a town effectively segregate gays into separate but equal neighborhoods, with separate but equal businesses, churches, schools, etc?

clavalle 11y ago

Luckily their participation is not necessary.

ctdonath 11y ago
The question isn't about whether they're necessary, the question is what happens to someone whose services are solicited and they refuse.
- dsr_ 11y ago
  Absolutely nothing. The government can't coerce religions to perform ceremonies. The right to marriage is not a religious right, it is a civil right, and will be provided by civil authorities. For example, in Massachusetts anyone can become a marriage officiant by applying to the governor. There's a form; permission is always granted. As a result, I have performed two marriages. The better question is, what happens to a civil official who declares that it is against their religion to perform their civil duty?
- jcater 11y ago
  My old church refused to marry anyone who was previously divorced. Clergy have a lot of leeway in who they can refuse. No one is forcing them to do anything.
- clavalle 11y ago
  Oh, I see. You are conflating a 'religious service provider' with, say, a business who bakes cakes. Religious institutions are not considered public accommodations so they are not required to offer their services without discrimination to protected classes.
  - hackuser 11y ago
    > Religious institutions are not considered public accommodations so they are not required to offer their services without discrimination to protected classes. What if their services are funded by the government, such as services to the poor? Can they refuse poor gay people?
    - clavalle 11y ago
      Is there any example of a religious marriage service being funded by the government? It seems like an unlikely, and possibly illegal, situation.
  - ctdonath 11y ago
    The baker in question specializes in weddings. They may refuse customers if the function at issue is not a wedding. The baker considers the formalized celebratory union of anyone other than a man + woman to be not a wedding. Now, based on no legislation (as one dissenting Justice makes scathingly clear), a new "protected class" has been created. The baker still considers a pair entering that "protected class" not a "wedding", a view the ruling notes still should be respected and free to hold & act on.
    - clavalle 11y ago
      Well, the SCOTUS just decided that same sex unions are, in fact, weddings and sex is an existing protected class based on actual legislation and precedent. That means the baker would be discriminating illegally as a public accommodation on a federal level if they refused their service based on the sex of that event's participants.

lisper 11y ago

I don't recall any bakers being punished for refusing to perform a gay marriage. When did that happen?

ctdonath 11y ago
Bakers specializing in facilitating weddings have been punished for refusing to provide wedding cakes to events which they consider not weddings. ETA: clergy have [citation needed] been prosecuted for refusing to perform weddings based on race.
- lisper 11y ago
  But that is not the same thing at all. People can (and will) get married with or without cakes. A baker refusing to serve a gay couple is no different from refusing to serve a black couple or a handicapped couple or a fat couple. That's not religion, that's commerce. Religious beliefs do not entitle you to discriminate in matters of commerce.
  - EdSharkey 11y ago
    It sounds like our hypothetical baker can't object to giving service on any grounds by your explanation. Are there truly no limits in your mind? Must the Muslim baker need to bake the gay marriage cake and deliver it to the ceremony just because some customer wants one made? Must the Christian baker bake a cake with a pentagram and goat head on it and deliver it to the sacrificial altar just because some customer wants one made? Or, how about yesterday's lurch issue? Shall we force the black baker to bake a rebel flag cake with some racist epithet on it because some a-hole customer wants it? Can't we back off here and simply respect one another's personal or religious beliefs? Respect must flow in both directions in a civil society, in my opinion. If the baker doesn't want to participate in the target celebration based on personal or religious beliefs, why not just amicably part ways? Why the bent noses if the customer can find some other baker that will gladly take the money and participate. Why does this even rise to the legal challenge level?
    - 11y ago

smackfu 11y ago

Nothing happens to them. Even today, Catholic clergy won't perform many opposite-sex marriages unless certain conditions are met, like having it in a Catholic church and requiring pre-marriage counseling.

ceejayoz 11y ago
Hell, Catholic clergy won't marry non-Catholics, Catholics who've divorced, etc. They had those rights yesterday, and they have them today.

masklinn 11y ago

> So what happens to clergy who refuse to perform such "weddings" on religious grounds? Nothing. > We already have cases of punishing & re-educating bakers for adhering to their religious views on the subject, how much more so those who may face compulsion to perform a union they cannot religiously condone? Clergy are not public accommodations and are not subject to non-discrimination law. Clergy in the US can still refuse to officiate interracial marriage for instance. The bakers you're talking about were not "punished and re-educated for adhering to their religious views", they were punished for discriminating against a protected class in the state they operated in. Just as they would have been punished for refusing cake to an interracial marriage, even if condoning it were against their sincerely held religious beliefs. But you really shouldn't worry about that: this SCOTUS decision only forces states to issue and recognise marriage licenses to same-sex couples, it does not force them to make sexual orientation a protected class. And in all 29 states where sexual orientation still isn't a protected class, same sex couples can have a cake-less marriage in the morning because businesses aren't forced to serve them, and then get fired in the afternoon because their bosses can discriminate against them for reasons of sexual orientation.

Torgo 11y ago
The Mormon Church used to not allow black people to become priests, they probably changed that under threat of losing their tax-exempt status.
- masklinn 11y ago
  Nope. They changed that because the LDS had started expanding outside the US and into very ethnically mixed countries (Brazil). I know of no source claiming the move was motivated by IRS intervention.
  - Torgo 11y ago
    The Mormon Church was expanding outside the US to non-white countries since the 1800s.

lmm 11y ago

Clergy have every right to refuse them. Other people have every right to express their views in peaceful, democratic fashion, e.g. picketing such churches, just as they would with a church that advocated any other distasteful view. No-one, those bakers included, is legally compelled to support gay marriage. Some people may find themselves economically compelled to do things they find distasteful, but to a certain extent that's always true for anyone who has to work for a living. There are some things that we consider it unfair to economically compel people to do, e.g. OHSA. Do you think that should be extended to e.g. making it illegal to make someone's job contingent on officiating gay marriages? What is the natural boundary there - should it be illegal to fire someone for doing something they're politically opposed to? Should a barman have the right to e.g. refuse service to women because they don't think women should be allowed to drink?

hackuser 11y ago
It's not that clear cut. Could a business refuse service because the customer is black? Could a town effectively segregate gays into separate but equal neighborhoods, with separate but equal businesses, churches, schools, etc?