If Christian proprietors who embrace traditional marriage should be required to promote weddings that violate their convictions, then it logically follows that sign makers who are pro-choice be required to produce, against their interests, graphic posters advocating the protection of life both within the womb and at birth. Everyone knows that proposition won’t fly. Neither, according to the First Amendment, nor under the common standards of good-will, should it. Conservatism doesn’t even suggest such an expectation. Even a moment’s reflection exposes the absurdity of the double-standard one party in this dilemma wishes to impose on others with whom they disagree in the name of free speech.
What are the actual facts behind the present debate that expose the falsity of that leading objection? The straw-man fallacy identifies the common misconception that traditionalists deny their services because of what others believe, when in fact they, like all of us, are resisting the demand to tacitly encourage a ceremony they don’t believe their authority, the Bible, permits. It is being expected of traditionalists that they violate their consciences in order to avoid facing bankruptcy, so that same-sex couples not be inconvenienced (our common experience) into searching for other businesses that are more amenable to their wishes. If the integrity of conscience is as trivial a matter as so many seem to suggest, should that consequently mean that conscientious objectors, while free to hold their inner beliefs, must go to battle after all? If the conscience is denigrated, a deeper battle is lost.
Gary Jensen, pastor
Lake Stevens
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