The Senate on Tuesday passed the Respect for Marriage Act.
Let’s just go over how disingenuous this bill actually is. It claims to codify same-sex and interracial marriages.
The question is, of course, who the hell is coming after interracial marriages? You see, they throw that in there so that they can say that many Republicans voted against interracial marriage. It’s sickening to say this but that’s why it’s in there. So they can scare black people.
But the real point of this is to stomp on religious freedom.
Please remember back in 2015, Hillary Clinton, in talking about abortion, said, “Far too many women are denied access to reproductive health care and safe childbirth, and laws don’t count for much if they’re not enforced…and deep-seated cultural codes, religious beliefs and structural biases have to be changed.”
This is how the left thinks, folks. Your religious beliefs must be changed in order to accommodate their politics. She was talking about abortion but she might just as easily have been talking about the LGBTQ agenda.
This law is intended to erode religious liberty. It is intended to force Christians to accept and endorse same-sex marriage.
Before the passage of the bill, Senator John Cornyn urged for an amendment which would protect religious liberty. It was turned down.
“We all know that many Americans hold sincere beliefs, religious beliefs, objecting to same-sex marriage. Obergefell did not place any new requirement on those individuals or their religious institutions. The Obergefell decision coexists today with other Supreme Court precedents like Masterpiece Cakeshop, or Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, or Burwell v. Hobby Lobby.”
“Each of these decisions recognized that religious liberties shall and must be protected as required by our Constitution, namely the Equal Protection Clause.”
“If the Respect for Marriage Act becomes law as it is currently proposed without amendment, that would change. Unlike Obergefell, this legislation expressly empowers private litigants to sue religious institutions, faith-based organizations, and private parties who oppose, for sincerely held religious beliefs, same-sex marriage.”
“Individuals and organizations that are trying to do good works consistent with their faith would be forced to spend a small fortune defending themselves in court, just as the owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop did for ten years. This legislation could open the door for the government to take serious action against religious institutions for adhering to their sincerely held religious beliefs.”
“Cities and states could deny foster care permits and licenses to religious organizations that do an immeasurable amount of good, including Catholic Charities, Little Sisters of the Poor, or Buckner International. The Internal Revenue Service could seek to revoke the tax exempt status of organizations that fail to comply with this new secular mandate.”
Last week, Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan of New York, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee for Religious Liberty, issued the following statement:
“Senators promoting the Act have claimed that their amended bill ‘respects and protects Americans’ religious liberties,’ but the provisions of the Act that relate to religious liberty are insufficient.
“Obergefell created countless religious liberty conflicts, but the Act offers only limited protections. Those protections fail to resolve the main problem with the Act: in any context in which conflicts between religious beliefs and same-sex civil marriage arise, the Act will be used as evidence that religious believers must surrender to the state’s interest in recognizing same-sex civil marriages. Wedding cake bakers, faith-based adoption and foster care providers, religious employers seeking to maintain their faith identity, faith-based housing agencies – are all at greater risk of discrimination under this legislation.
“The bill is a bad deal for the many courageous Americans of faith and no faith who continue to believe and uphold the truth about marriage in the public square today. The Act does not strike a balance that appropriately respects our nation’s commitment to the fundamental right of religious liberty. Senators supporting the Act must reverse course and consider the consequences of passing an unnecessary law that fails to provide affirmative protections for the many Americans who hold this view of marriage as both true and foundational to the common good.”
Going after the Church’s tax exempt status will occur but private Christians with a business will be sued into either acquiescing to the spirit of the age or bankruptcy.
It will likely come to a point in which one is forced to choose between being a Catholic and an American.
It’s actually been heading this way for a long time. It’s just the paperwork is catching up to us. The left is just dotting their i’s and crossing their t’s. Their vision of a secularist utopia is taking shape.
It will turn into a nightmare. To stand up to this will take courage and faith. I pray for us all.
