July 14^th

Civil disobedience is on the menu today thanks to Pat Buchanan’s column. Pat mentions the long history of civil disobedience in this country. He talks about the civil disobedience that came out of the civil rights movement. He even mentions Rosa Parks favorably. That Pat Buchanan who was opposed to much of civil rights legislation, and particularly the idea that he might have to share his favorite D.C watering holes with non-whites, now promotes Rosa Parks favorably is shocking, I tell you shocking!  

Pat believes that civil disobedience is the weapon that will negate SCOTUS legalization of gay marriage; civil disobedience will protect those who prefer not to help gays planning a wedding ceremony. Then he presents us with this: “And if cities, states or Congress enact laws that make it a crime not to rent to homosexuals, or to refuse service at celebrations of their union, would not dissenting Christians stand on the same ground as Dr. King if they disobeyed those laws?” In a word, no.

Refusing service on the basis of race was entirely legal in the Jim Crow south and that is exactly what Dr. King was rebelling against. Now Buchanan apparently believes that to refuse service because of sexual orientation is very different. There were professed Christians in the south who believed quite passionately that there were Biblical precedents for “the separation of the races” and that their religious beliefs would be violated if they were required to serve blacks and whites in the same establishment or accommodate them in the same hotel. Why Buchanan believes sexual orientation is different he does not say, probably because he can’t!

I understand the dilemma that a county clerk faces who is required to issue a marriage license to a gay couple and believes that she would be committing a sin if she did. She believes that she is within her rights to refuse to accommodate the couple and she is right; if she believes it is a sin she shouldn’t do it. Her responsibility under these circumstances is to resign from her position. If she doesn’t then her supervisor should fire her. To make this more obvious, suppose someone is working in a factory which produces condoms; they have an epiphany and become a Roman Catholic and decide the work they have been doing is sinful.   They report to the work site but refuse to do the work assigned as a matter of conscience. They would be fired of course. How is this different from the county clerk’s situation? It isn’t; except that the clerk might have her position as a political favor.

Buchanan says, “Christian colleges and universities will deny married-couple facilities to homosexuals.” Of course they will; some already deny entrance to any student not properly screened for his or her “relationship to Christ” which must be described on the student’s application. In their view no practicing homosexual could possibly have a “satisfactory relationship” with Christ. No matter; there are lots of other colleges with much better academic reputations that really don’t care about their student’s sexual orientation.