"RELIGIOUS FREEDOM MEANS 'FREEDOM from RELIGIOUS OPPRESSION,' NOT 'FREEDOM to OPPRESS." Kim Davis is an oppressor of other people's freedom and a violator of her elected office.
No place for faith
Paso Robles
September 14, 2015
I am sure that Kim Davis, the clerk in Rowan County, Ky.,
believes herself to be praiseworthy in following her Christian
conscience by denying marriage licenses to same-sex couples. I beg to
disagree.
There is nothing praiseworthy about a public official discriminating against an entire class of people on the ground that “I had no other option but to deny the licenses” or “God is my authority.”
First, she had and still has another option. She can resign from her public office at any time. Second, religious freedom means “freedom FROM religious oppression,” not “freedom TO oppress.” Third, if Davis was a practicing Muslim, not a Christian, and did exactly the same thing, she would have been condemned as a traitor and hounded out of office long before this. And for good reason. Our Constitution is there to protect us from the arbitrary discrimination of religious zealots of any faith, not to allow them to use a public office to practice it.
There is nothing praiseworthy about a public official discriminating against an entire class of people on the ground that “I had no other option but to deny the licenses” or “God is my authority.”
First, she had and still has another option. She can resign from her public office at any time. Second, religious freedom means “freedom FROM religious oppression,” not “freedom TO oppress.” Third, if Davis was a practicing Muslim, not a Christian, and did exactly the same thing, she would have been condemned as a traitor and hounded out of office long before this. And for good reason. Our Constitution is there to protect us from the arbitrary discrimination of religious zealots of any faith, not to allow them to use a public office to practice it.
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