I’ve seen a lot of discussion lately on the subject of marriage and religion. Some suggest that, should marriage of gay couples be legal, it would attack religious freedom; that the government may attempt to force churches to participate in these weddings, and force the LDS Church to open temples to gay couples. This notion is false and without merit.
Long before you or I were born, people have been getting divorced in America. Many of those people also later remarried, legally. However, Catholicism has always viewed divorce as sin, and considers divorcees who remarry to be adulterers. To this day, the Catholic Church refuses to officiate marriages in which either party is a divorcee, and no person or government agency in the U.S. has ever forced the church to perform such marriages. So, we see that even though divorcee marriage is legal, the religious freedom of Catholics is upheld. The same is true for gay marriage. It’s been legal in Massachusetts for nearly a decade, yet the LDS Church has never been forced to seal gay couples in the Boston temple.
If anyone says a gay couple getting married is somehow an attack on your personal religious liberty, they’re either ill-informed or playing to your fears, to manipulate how you view the subject. I haven’t lost any freedoms. I can still believe and worship as I please, but I don’t have the right to impose my beliefs on another person, nor does any American citizen.
ERIC DAVIS
Lehi
