Marriage Spat: Calif. Supreme Court Decision Sparks Church-State Discussion

The California Supreme Court decision in favor of same-sex marriage has opened an important discussion about the relationship between religion and government. The justices in the court majority made it clear that they were ruling in favor of civil-marriage equality and not religion. Religious communities will remain free to perform same-sex marriages or not, as their theology dictates.

A lot of people rightly see that as an important expression of judicial respect for the separation of church and state.

The Rev. Clyde Grubbs, pastor of the Pasadena’s Throop Unitarian Universalist Church, told the Pasadena Star-News that his congregation has performed weddings for gay and lesbian couples for years, but has not been able to register the unions with the county.

“But now,” said Grubbs, “we will attempt to do so.”

Any law establishing a religious litmus test for marriage, he argues, is a violation of the First Amendment’s guarantees about the separation of church and state.

“Our religion is in favor of (gay) people getting married, and they are saying that under someone else’s religion, that is wrong,” said Grubbs. “There is no secular reason for that position, so it must be a religious test and a violation of the First Amendment.”

Religious Right activists are predictably up in arms. They want to see their religious perspective on marriage imposed on everyone.

According to Baptist Press, the Rev. Barrett Duke, vice president for governmental affairs for the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, said he was “saddened for the people of California.”

“The California Supreme Court ruling not only overruled the very clear will of the people, it also proposes to overrule God’s design,” Duke said. “These judges may think they know more about marriage than the rest of us, but I am confident they don’t know more about marriage than God. Marriage is the union of one man and one woman….That’s not only my opinion and the opinion of most of the people in this country, it’s God’s opinion, and His opinion overrules the opinion of any judges.”

Sorry, Rev. Duke. You’ve got the American approach to freedom of conscience exactly wrong.

You’re perfectly free to determine “God’s design” and “God’s opinion” for yourself and for others in your denomination. But please realize that many other religious communities have come to a different understanding of God’s will. Why should your doctrinal take on marriage be imposed on them in a country that separates religion and government? Furthermore, why should it be imposed on the millions of Americans who follow no spiritual path at all?

To the government, marriage is a civil institution, and the California Supreme Court has simply determined that the benefits of that institution cannot be denied to same-sex couples. Southern Baptists and other like-minded faith groups don’t have to marry same-sex couples, but religious liberty means they can’t stop congregations that do.

The battle over this issue, of course, isn’t over. There’s likely to be a referendum on it on the California ballot in November. Rev. Duke and folks like him are gearing up for a fight.

“May God help the citizens of California to win this battle for the family,” he said.

Many Californians, religious and non-religious, have an opposite understanding. They see the referendum as a battle for church-state separation. They have families too, and they don’t want them to live in a theocracy.

By Joseph L. Conn