There are two things that will never change in this world: 1) people will always have reasons to hate others, and 2) religions will always provide a way to make this exceedingly easy.
Take the Mormon Church for example: they’ve been diligently working to ensure that gays and lesbians aren’t allowed to marry out of the ridiculous notion that doing so “violates” the sanctity of marriage. Because of a few passages in the Bible (next to the ones that condone slavery and selling your daughter for money), Mormons have fought tooth and nail to deny the rights of their fellow human beings.
And because they are convinced of the superiority of their ideas, they now feel as though their OWN rights are being violated when society tells them politely to go fuck themselves. They recognize the way the tide is shifting, and it’s not something that’s a pleasant prospect. Tolerance, it seems, is not that Christian a virtue.
One of their elders recently said that as gays get the rights they deserve, the Church’s religious freedoms are being threatened:
Elder Dallin H. Oaks, one of 12 leaders, known as apostles, who help govern the Mormon Church, delivered his message Friday in a speech at Chapman University in Orange: The 1st Amendment right to freedom of religion is under siege, he said, threatened by a growing secularization of society and constrained by the inroads made by a vigorous gay rights movement.
“For some time,” he said, “we have been experiencing laws and official actions that impinge on religious freedom.”
Oaks, a former law professor and Utah Supreme Court justice, has been making speeches along these lines for more than 25 years, and says the climate has been getting worse for religious rights. “It was apparent 25 years ago, and it is undeniable today,” he said.
It’s funny he didn’t say 35 years ago, when the Mormon church didn’t allow black men to be ordained into the priesthood (and they weren’t allowed to be included in their “celestial marriages” either). You might recall that their racism was a direct result of their own religious conviction. Sound familiar?
Hey, it would be fucking effortless for Mormons to abandon their own bigotry and get with the program. In 1978, elders said they had received a “revelation” decreeing that African Americans were suddenly granted the same rights as everyone else in their church; this after strong public pressure to change their policies. It’s easy to change your stupid dogma when you’re just making shit up, isn’t it?