Now in Vermont, soon to come to New York. Two Catholic Innkeepers are being sued for refusing to host a gay wedding reception.
A Vermont inn violated state anti-discrimination rules by refusing to host the wedding reception for two New York City women, the couple said in a lawsuit Tuesday.
The lawsuit, filed by the American Civil Liberties Union’s Vermont chapter on behalf of Kate Baker and Ming Linsley, said the Wildflower Inn in Lyndonville turned away the couple last fall and that at least two other same-sex couples were also refused because of the inn’s owner has a “no-gay-reception policy.”
“When the Wildflower Inn told us last fall that they don’t host gay receptions, we were obviously saddened and shocked,” said Baker. “It was frustrating to be treated like lesser than the rest of the society, and we were also surprised that it happened in Vermont.”
Vermont has been a pioneer in gay rights, creating the concept of civil unions for same-sex couple in 2000. In 2009, it legalized gay marriage. Many of its tourism businesses actively market to gay clientele.
The inn’s owners, Jim and Mary O’Reilly, issued a statement saying they are devout Catholics who believe in the sanctity of marriage between one man and one woman.
Our religious liberty will be diminished as the gay rights agenda marches on. The useless conscience protections put in place in NY in order to pass the bill will not protect against the exact same thing from happening here.
They may not be forcing Catholic priests to marry gays yet because otherwise sympathetic people would turn against them were they to try. But trust me, five or ten years from now, that is exactly what they will be trying to do. My best guess is that states like NY and Vermont will stop recognizing the legal right to conduct marriages by any institution that refuses to go along. Church marriages would no longer be recognized. When that happens, many more people will choose to forgo a Church wedding altogether rather than get married twice. This is coming folks, this is coming.
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