People are
all worked up about some woman going to jail for refusing to do her job. Not
all that long ago a judge put a mother in jail and said she would stay there
until she signed consent for her four-year-old son to have elective, cosmetic
surgery on his penis. A surgery he doesn't want. She tearfully signed under
threat of continued jail and loss of custody. She signed because the judge was
going to arrange that she never see her son again. [It's been months and she
still hasn't seen him.]
I’m not the only one who posted about this on Facebook many
times and posted pictures of her crying her eyes out—clearly horrified at what
she had to do--as she signed. Few people commented and few shared it. Where was
the outrage then?
Major news outlets wrote about but not many people cared about it. Evidently,
the violation of this boy’s right to make his own cosmetic surgery decision
when he’s grown and this woman’s right to not sign consent under duress isn't near as important as this woman claiming she doesn’t have to
do a vital part of her job because it conflicts with her beliefs.
Leaving
Heather and Chase’s story aside for now, let’s examine this County Clerk case rationally.
First, important
comments from U.S. District Court Judge David Bunning, the judge who ruled on
her case:
"Her
good faith belief is simply not a viable defense. I myself have genuinely held
religious beliefs ... but I took an oath."
"Mrs.
Davis took an oath. Oaths mean things."
Here are the
facts of the case.
1. Issuing
marriage licenses to people who are legally qualified to marry is a part of the
County Clerk’s job.
2. Ms. Davis,
in her capacity as a government official, swore an oath to uphold the laws of
the United States.
3. By United
States law, two consenting adults who are not already married (and in some states, not closely
related) are eligible to marry.
4. Rewriting
laws is not a part of the County Clerk’s job.
Ms. Davis
evidently claims the right to make judgments and decide which marriages she’ll
allow based, not on US law or state law, but on her own beliefs.
Based on the
facts, Ms. Davis is refusing to do her job and is violating her oath.*
I respect a
person who holds to her principles; however, if her principles make her not be
able to do her job and cause her to break her oath**, she needs to resign***
instead of disrupting the business of the County Clerk’s office. I think that's
pretty cut-and-dried. I would respect her for that whether I agreed with her
beliefs or not.
Do you or I
get to continue employment if we refuse to do our job? I once had a government
job. I knew that at some point I'd be expected to do something that went
against my principles. When that time came, I resigned the job. A job that paid
quite well and wasn't especially difficult. However, it was a violation of the United
States Constitution as I understand it so I couldn't continue in good conscience.
As I understand it. That's important in
this case. Ms. Davis
interprets the Bible the way many people do; however, numerous others have their
own understanding. Nevertheless, Ms. Davis has the right to hold to her
understanding of the Bible that gay people are forbidden to marry.
Now let’s
talk about the fact that she’s a government official. That is an important fact
in this case. By my understanding of freedom, if she had her own business, it
should be up to her if she provided services to gay people. Example: In order
to respect everyone’s rights, a person cannot be forced to bake a cake for a
gay couple’s wedding UNLESS baking wedding cakes is a part of his or her
government job. Of course, that’s not the way we do it in this
country where we confuse what the government cannot do with the doings of
private individuals.
Okay. So Kim
Davis, County Clerk of Rowan County, Kentucky claims she cannot issue marriage
licenses to couples if the Bible says they cannot marry. You’d think this issue
would have come up long ago, what, with the way she refuses to issue marriage
licenses to divorced people. Oh, wait...she doesn’t have a problem with that?
Interesting.
What does
the Bible say about divorce and remarriage?
Matthew 19
19 And
it came to pass, that when Jesus had finished these sayings, he departed from
Galilee, and came into the coasts of Judaea beyond Jordan;
2 And great multitudes followed him; and
he healed them there.
3 The Pharisees also came unto him,
tempting him, and saying unto him, Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife
for every cause?
4 And he answered and said unto them,
Have ye not read, that he which made them at the beginning made them male and
female,
5 And said, For this cause shall a man
leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be
one flesh?
6 Wherefore they are no more twain, but
one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.
7 They say unto him, Why did Moses then
command to give a writing of divorcement, and to put her away?
8 He saith unto them, Moses because of
the hardness of your hearts suffered you to put away your wives: but from the
beginning it was not so.
9 And I say unto you, Whosoever shall
put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another,
committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit
adultery.
1 Corinthians 7
10 To the married I give this command (not I, but the Lord):
A wife must not separate from her husband. 11 But if she does,
she must remain unmarried or else be reconciled to her husband. And a husband
must not divorce his wife.
12 To the rest I say this (I, not the Lord): If any
brother has a wife who is not a believer and she is willing to live with him,
he must not divorce her. 13 And if a woman has a husband who is
not a believer and he is willing to live with her, she must not divorce him. 14 For
the unbelieving husband has been sanctified through his wife, and the
unbelieving wife has been sanctified through her believing husband. Otherwise
your children would be unclean, but as it is, they are holy.
15 But if the unbeliever leaves, let it be so. The
brother or the sister is not bound in such circumstances; God has called us to
live in peace. 16 How do you know, wife, whether you will save
your husband? Or, how do you know, husband, whether you will save your wife?
A couple of prominent Christians weigh in.
For example, in Deuteronomy
24 God seems to condone divorce, yet in Luke 16:18
Christ associates divorce with adultery. Reading “Matthew 19:3–12
gives the explanation: divorce was not God’s intent from the beginning, and
divorce and remarriage for any reason other than sexual immorality is adultery.”
Don Landis,
---
"When
people get too focused on redefining marriage, you’re distracted from the
bigger problem – fornicators and adulterers."
"If the
people sitting in the pews are fornicators and adulterers, the church will
destroy marriages much more quickly than those outside the church. When God’s
people mock marriage, God doesn’t take that lightly."
"I think
the greatest threat to marriage is not other people’s definition of marriage…
The church isn’t taking God’s definition of marriage seriously. It’s not other
people sabotaging marriage that’s the problem."
Therefore,
if Ms. Davis issues marriage licenses to people who have been divorced,****
she’s a hypocrite and all the talk about her so-called principles should be
lying out in the cattle yard.
---
*If after
reading this blog post, you have reached a different conclusion, please explain
this to me in the comments. If I’ve overlooked any facts, please add them.
**An oath
most likely given before God and with her hand on a Bible.
***Or, is
this a test case that was set up?
****Not to
mention the fact that she’s on her fourth marriage. Her supporters are excusing
these as mistakes that we shouldn’t
bring up. But this is no ad hominem. No, this is relevant to her claims of
adhering to the Bible. Unless her divorces met the rules from the Bible, these
were all blatant violations of what she claims to be her beliefs. I’m not
judging her for three divorces and remarriages—as far as I care, she can marry
and divorce all she likes—but, given the details of the case, she shouldn’t be
expecting others to live up to a standard that she, herself, cannot meet.
Earthchild has spoken. Now it's your turn.
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