Boldly refusing to sign marriage certificates of couples whose wedding ceremonies they didn't perform.

I think religion needs to get out of most things involving couples and children and back into the church where they belong. I read somewhere in Mississippi where a Catholic couple could not adopt a baby from a Protestant run agency. I have heard it's the other way around in some places too. These people have a financial interest in seeing abortion illegal. They are in the business of making a lot of money on adoption someone's religion should not be an factor. If they can't respect other people's beliefs then get out of the business. I think religion has become to involved in the secular world's business in this country and I personally do not like it. I see Gay's wanting to marry as a civil rights issue. I can't say I agree with the lifestyle. I just don't think it's any of my business what other people down the street do.

Thanks for posting! We were all wondering how to pair cougars and cubs! Here's some money! Here's some more money!!

Seriously, I was at a B & B in a state where straight people are more equal than gay people and a newly minted fiancee was wagging her ring in everyone's faces. Such wagging should be forteited until equality comes, so I'm all for pastors doing the decent thing and waiting for equality to marry folks.

Let me guess what the bloviating cow will say:

"It will make my marriage less special." (It wasn't special to begin with)

"It's not the way it's always been." (Hmmm....compared to what? Western European history only?)

"It will deprive us straights of our rights." (I can only say, selectively, if only).

Blah blah blah. Blah blah blah. Oh, and it's always offered up with "statistics say," however no one can figure out where she gets these "statistics." I think only they reside in some nasty, dank bodily orifice of hers.

Laurel, you are the Cliff Claven of Salon.

Waiting to read the shitload you drop on this one. I need a laugh today.

If you're an atheist, you aren't really married.

I mean, um, hm... oh, hey, Michael Jackson died...

I think this is particularly important because so many religious people have been frantically trying to erase the separation of church and state. For example:

Q: Should people you disagree with be able to HAVE INSURANCE?

Answer from anti-separationist: MARRIAGE IS A SACRED UNION.

Q: Should people you disagree with be able to FILE JOINT TAX RETURNS?

Answer from anti-separationist: MARRIAGE IS A SACRED UNION...

The reason for this, of course, is that they believe if the separation is erased, their own views will triumph, not only in their religion but in government.

The "sad" fact is, that is unlikely to happen. Gay marriage is coming. It's completely obvious to everyone with eyes and knowledge of history that in a few years, legal gay marriage will be the law of the entire land.

What people forget is that separation of church and state was instituted not to protect the government from religious interference, but to protect RELIGION from GOVERNMENTAL interference. Thus, these people are trying to end the very protections that have allowed their religions to flourish free of interference. If religious people don't backpedal frantically to reinstate the separation some of them been trying to erase, I believe that within 10 to 20 years, perhaps even sooner, religious institutions will no longer be allowed to choose what religious marriages they perform. A lawsuit will prompt the government to make that decision for them and subject them to harsh penalties for noncompliance.

laurel962 isn't the only bigot. She's shared many times that many of her friends and neighbors are bigots and that her state has made inequality the law. She's simply Salon's most verbose and persistent bigot. In the end, she's a typical bigot, as she demonstrated yesterday by sharing how some of her best friends are gay people.

Gawd, I hope you're wrong. If gay marriage comes, then I predict that nearly half of all straight marriages will fail! Mark my words! You'll see I'm right!

That's exactly it. We don't want to deny anyone the chance to marry-we simply want the same. The story I told yesterday in comments was true (even if Laurel thinks it's made up-get the impression she's never really been anywhere and lies out her fat ass about everything?). In fact, similar incidents have happened all over the US. In Chicago, some bars on Halsted even post signs saying that Bachelorette parties are not welcome. There was a story on in in the South Florida Blade as well. It's been a growing trend-women wanting to hold their bachelorette parties in gay bars because they won't have to worry about the attention of straight males. The problem, though, is that they are celebrating something that the patrons of the bar can't enjoy because they are denied that right. Offensive indeed.

Oh I know all too well about her and her type AND Ohio. I am from Ohio, even though I now happily reside in SF. The one thing she didn't mention is that Ohio is extremely repressed, Cleveland in particular (where she lives) is ass-backwards, and the whole state, economically, educationally, etc, is going down the shithole. I link it's intolerance and backwardsness to it's fate. Progressive areas are doing much better.

By the way, she doesn't have any gay friends. She is a liar.

Sounds like it is.

If it is only a matter that the couple will need to get a legal magistrate to sign the marriage certificate, it is just a symbolic act.

Sure. But that's their point -- all a church wedding IS or (should be) is a symbolic act. Heck, religion is composed largely of symbolic acts. It's the meaning that those symbolic acts have for those that perform them that give them significance.

I'm married. Since we are atheists, we did not get married in a church, and no clergy were involved at all. How does this "I won't" campaign apply?

In your case it does not. You're not the entire world.

How is any church "in the marriage business" when you don't need a church to get married?

How is any judge or ships captain in the marriage business if you can get married without them? By your definition just who IS "in the marriage business" Seriously. You? Not the whole world.

How on earth did the state get the right to determine who can and cannot get married?

Because it's a legal contract. That's a big reason to even have a government -- to clarify and enforce contracts.

Imagine if you needed a "single" license.

To do what? Own property with yourself? Inherit from yourself? Settle a custody battle with yourself? Make medical decisions for yourself?

I hope that this restructuring of our cultural symbols, led ironically by progressive churches, can help us see these rights as civil rights justly available to all equitably whether we be married or single.

There's nothing ironic about the leadership of progressive churches in this. Progressive churches (and other religions' organizations) have been promoting social justice for a long long time. In the Western world the entire concept of the inherent worth of the individual came largely from Christianity. And while religion has certainly been used as a justification for any number of evil acts by their perpetrators the flip-side has always been true too -- there have always been organizations trying to end slavery, care for widows and orphans and the sick, promote the autonomy of women, protect workers from abuse, etc. in the name of their particular flavor of God.

I think religion has become to involved in the secular world's business in this country and I personally do not like it.

I'm pretty sure that in the case of adoption its the other way around, it was churches and the like that were finding homes for unwanted/abandoned children and eventually the government stepped in.

Seriously, I was at a B & B in a state where straight people are more equal than gay people and a newly minted fiancee was wagging her ring in everyone's faces. Such wagging should be forteited until equality comes.

Can we just be done with the wagging altogether? It's nice that people are happy, but unless you're close to me I could really give a fig if you've just gotten engaged regardless of who has what bits. It's not actually some sort of achievement.

What people forget is that separation of church and state was instituted not to protect the government from religious interference, but to protect RELIGION from GOVERNMENTAL interference.

Oh HELLS yes. I can finally stop being a cranky pants and end this rant on and agreeable note! Not having a state religion came hand in glove with not having a king. Part of the reason this country is thrived is that from the start we've opted out of the particular battles that traditionally came into play when a change of soverign caused a change of religion (which included the oppression of the LAST soverign's religion). It was so effective and so many other nations adopted the practice that now we consider it the norm for a stable governement -- but the concept is really just a couple of hundred years old.