Before you were arguing that because of the First Amendment the government could never force a church to change its religious beliefs. Now you are arguing that if you don't happen to agree with those religious beliefs then you should not have to be impacted by them. Guess what, you can't have it both ways.Imogen wrote:just because something is "traditional" doesn't make it right. discrimination is always wrong no matter what your reasons are. you may not like change, but that doesn't mean it's wrong. people thought integration was wrong. people thought giving women the right to vote was wrong. religion was used to defend those views. i'm sorry to break it to you, but sometimes religion is wrong. and people abuse religious principles and ideals because they are uncomfortable with something or disagree with it. well, guess what? we live in the united states, i disagree with your religious ideas, and i don't think laws should be made with them. it's unfair to the people who do not share those beliefs. live by your principles. practice what you preach for yourself. but don't say that someone is unequal to you because they disagree or don't want to live how you live.
and ps-only PART of their tax exempt status was taken NOT FOR THE WHOLE METHODIST RELIGION. it was ONE church in ONE state that was deemed to be violating an agreement. they DID say the land would be open to the public equally, and they went back on their agreement. that is HARDLY an attack on religion.
You misconstrue my remarks to imply that someone is unequal to me. Your definition of marriage may be different from mine, but that doesn't mean that your definition of marriage is equal to my definition of marriage.
What the Ocean Grove situation boils down to is this: the Methodists were faced with the choice of accepting the same-sex marriage as being equal to the traditional, religious marriages they performed, or they would lose their tax exempt status for their pavilion. IF they agreed to open the land to the public equally, they certainly didn't agree to accept a definition of marriage that was abhorrent to their religious beliefs. They were certainly NOT going back on their agreement. It is a case where the government is trying to force the church to accept the homosexual definition of marriage.
A defense of traditional marriage is not even a defense of a particular religion, or religion in general. This is the way marriage has always been defined. It is only today when a special interest group would like to cover their sins with the name of marriage to we see this push to redefine marriage.