Paris Peace Accords 23 Oct. 1991

Wednesday, July 8, 2015

Freedom of Religion under threat by new decision of US Supreme Court in Obergefell v. Hodges

Seen and heard on Ms. Theary C. Seng's Facebook accounts: 
www.facebook.com/theary.c.seng


5-4 Majority Decision



RELIGION AND PLURALISM (the best exposition I've heard / read anywhere on the need for to keep WORLD SAFE FOR DIVERSITY)

Read the OBERGEFELL 5-4 majority DECISION and its DISSENT led by Chief Justice Roberts, with my highlights here:

Chief Justice Roberts dissenting:

Today’s decision, for example, creates serious questions about religious liberty. Many good and decent people oppose same-sex marriage as a tenet of faith, and their freedom to exercise religion is—unlike the right imagined by the majority— actually spelled out in the Constitution. …

The majority graciously suggests that religious believers may continue to “advocate” and “teach” their views of marriage. The First Amendment guarantees, however, the freedom to “exercise” religion. Ominously, that is not a word the majority uses. …

Perhaps the most discouraging aspect of today’s decision is the extent to which the majority feels compelled to sully those on the other side of the debate. … By the majority’s account, Americans who did nothing more than follow the understanding of marriage that has existed for our entire history—in particular, the tens of millions of people who voted to reaffirm their States’ enduring definition of marriage—have acted to “lock . . . out,” “disparage,” “disrespect and subordinate,” and inflict “[d]ignitary wounds” upon their gay and lesbian neighbors. These apparent assaults on the character of fairminded people will have an effect, in society and in court. Moreover, they are entirely gratuitous. It is one thing for the majority to conclude that the Constitution protects a right to same-sex marriage; it is something else to portray everyone who does not share the majority’s “better informed understanding” as bigoted.




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