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If a man should force you to walk a mile for him....

DougS

DougS

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May 29, 2001
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Walk a second mile as well.

I saw this on Facebook today, and I must admit it has made me think. The post was in regards to someone being required to bake a cake for a gay wedding.... We all know the scenario.

Adapting this teaching of Jesus the poster then said "if you should be forced to bake a cake for a gay wedding, bake for them two"

To that I would add "..... And give them the cakes at no charge".

Such an action would be, IMO, fully in keeping with Jesus teachings about being forced to do things against your will. The persons providing the service does not harm the couple, and also does not gain from the transaction. In that way, they can also keep their own conscience clear.

In a world where personal liberties sometimes operate at cross purposes I think this option is a winner.

Thoughts?
 
That's a very elegant solution.

Theologically, I think it's a solution to the wrong problem, however. I understand that some Christians see a same-sex marriage as inherently sinful, but I really don't think the proper concern should be, "What level participation should I have?" Instead, it should be, "How does my action witness for Christ?" Refusing payment may actually send a negative signal. Why not instead collect the money and quietly give it to a charity of the baker's choice? That avoids the same problems but adds another level of benefit. The baker's conscious is clear, his performance was exemplary in the eyes of others, and a charity reaps the financial benefits.

goat

This post was edited on 4/6 9:30 PM by TheOriginalHappyGoat
 
That is what I admire about Christians.

The works are better that the mystical which is the foundation of faith. I once heard a Clergy say that if we didn't find a way to scrap the 1st century unnatural the religion was doomed. I fit with Jefferson and dismiss any act unnatural. Turn the other cheek, give them your coat, bake two cakes.
This post was edited on 4/6 9:34 PM by Rockport Zebra
 
i can see that solution as well

Mine has a bit of an edge to it, but if the baker is looking for a way to take a stand, that's how I would do it. Hard to get prosecuted over providing a free service (although, I suppose, it could cause the straight couples to feel discriminated against!)
 
It's a pretty soft edge

but I wonder if it's one that the baker wouldn't regret upon further reflection later.

I would ask any baker confronted with this situation who feels conflicted about it to read and meditate on two Bible stories: Jesus and the adulterous woman and the conversion of the Ethiopian eunuch, and then trust them to make the decision that best fits their own conscience. But I hope they'd remember that the duty to spread the gospel to others with love is absolutely paramount for Christians, while the desire to express disapproval of others is itself a personal vice and sin.

FWIW, I would apply this same thinking to a situation in which a Christian baker is merely asked to bake a cake, not only a situation in which he is required to.

goat

This post was edited on 4/6 10:04 PM by TheOriginalHappyGoat
 
And....

I have a few people in mind I would like to hear from.
 
Not sure I see the tie-in to the Ethiopian

The story of the woman at the well, or the adulteress are both good tie-ins. There is much to be learned there.
 
Well...

The first non-Jewish (Gentile?*) Christian was a man who was not only a foreigner, but also a member of an outcast group. As a eunuch**, he was banned from the Temple. He was the ultimate outsider. But the Holy Spirit called upon Phillip - literally - to baptize him. It would be one thing if he were just some random convert near the end of Acts. But he wasn't. God directed that the church expand to the wider world, and selected as the symbolic beginning of that expansion the baptism of a man who was, by God's own rules, unclean.

goat

* Interpretations differ.

** And I mean legit "eunuch." I don't believe it's a metaphor for homosexuality, as some pro-LGBT theologians would argue.

This post was edited on 4/6 10:42 PM by TheOriginalHappyGoat
 
I'm not impressed

I've often wondered what I would do in Martin Luther's place when he refused to recant at the Diet of Worms. That refusal changed the world. While the stakes are much lower with a wedding, I think the principle of faith is the same.

I AM impressed with the florist in Washington who told a gay couple "My relationship with Jesus Christ does not permit me to do your wedding". At least one of the couple to be married and the florist were long-time friends and her refusal to do the wedding was heart wrenching. She was found guilty. A crowd source website paid her fine plus much more.

Getting back to your example, if the baker wanted to make statement with two cakes, that needs to be entirely voluntary and unforced. To do so after being "forced," as your example suggests, is not an impressive statement of faith or principle for me.

On a related note. Remember when the bus full of Obama immigrant kids was met with protests and blockades in that California town last summer? I thought then how neat it would have been for the town to have met the bus with chants of "welcome to the USA" and lots of flag waiving of the Red, White and Blue. I would have given each kid a flag and a copy of the constitution--in Spanish if need be. I'd file that in the "scenes I'd like to see" cabinet.











This post was edited on 4/7 12:44 AM by CO. Hoosier
 
That would be a nice response, but

it would also be nice if the gay couple, when refused service, would simply say that they respect those beliefs and move on.
 
The second cake would be voluntary

The whole idea loses its point if everything is forced. The point is to do more than what one is being forced to do.
 
First, I think

the first thing you should try to determine is if what you are going to do is against God's laws. If it is, then don't do it because I don't recall anywhere in the Bible where it says it's okay to commit sin (which we all do every day). I believe the Bible says when God's laws and man's laws conflict you are suppose to obey God's laws. In your scenario if a doctor is asked to do an abortion should he volunteer to do two? I don't believe he should do one because the I think it's killing a human being.

To me it's hard to determine what you're suppose to do in a lot of situations. All of us probably support things we don't agree with every day. For example, I've read where Apple uses also slave labor in some places to make their products yet we continue to buy their products. I'm sure that applies to a lot of situations. Of course what we think as slave labor may actually be good wages in the area where the people are (I haven't researched that so I don't know).
 
This isn't about what people should or shouldn't do.

It's about what they can or can't do.

FTR, I do agree with you -- and Doug, too.

The religious baker should bake the cake, if asked. The gay couple should move along to somebody else, if refused. But, again, the debate is actually about what is and isn't allowed by law. And that's a very different question.

This post was edited on 4/7 7:58 AM by crazed_hoosier2
 
I understan that

I was focusing on the idea that an element of force could or should change an individual's faith-based principles. If that is the operating norm, then the critics of IRFRA might have a point. The refusal to render a service to a same sex wedding might be discrimination and not faith.

This is why I brought up Martin Luther's refusal to recant and the willingness of the florist to be found guilty of a crime instead of violating her personal beliefs.

Another example is blood transfusions for Jehovah Witnesses. They put up a facade of objection but willingly accept the authorities compelling the transfusion. That might be a little different with the life and death consideration thrown in the mix.

This is all very complicated. Much of the problem arises from those secularists and even some who profess religious beliefs, who cannot hold any unyielding core faith based principle. For them EVERYTHING is relative.
 
What is the difference between relativity and exceptions?

Here is an example, it is wrong to kill. But it is OK to kill in a war. What is that exception but relativity? I would imagine that is the way a Quaker would see it. Same for the death penalty.

It is wrong to torture someone for B&E, but it is OK to torture a terrorist leader. Is that not relativity? Torture is a moral wrong unless your crime is sufficient enough seems pretty relative to me.

Aren't exceptions just moral relativism? What moral laws do we have that contain no exceptions? Even the Amish have rumspringa, where Amish youth are encouraged to enter the real world and sow their wild oats. So driving a car is immoral, unless you are 18 years old? Drinking is wrong, again, unless you are 21?

I'm having a hard time here, I'm not being intentionally obtuse. Aren't exceptions just relativism put into law? I have this problem with some of my gaming. I used to be quite good at Diplomacy, a game that requires a certain amount of lying to other players about your true intentions. As an adult, I am finding it very hard to play the game. I am having a hard accepting that lying in a game is somehow not lying. But I have friends, friends of faith, who are very good at it and they justify it as just a game.
 
Not sure what you're saying there . . .

and I think it might be some good stuff. Can you unpack that for me a bit?
 
There's an easy solution to this.

Don't worry about it -- except, of course, in your own case.

Hypocrisy abounds in this world. Moral relativism does too, including among people who purport to decry it. My attitude is: suit yourself...your morality is your business, not mine. But I would ask that you return the favor -- not only to me, but to all of your fellow citizens.

Now, this approach obviously has its limitations -- such as your example of torture. That's not something that only involves somebody else and their choices, lifestyles, etc.

But, so far as the rules by which others live their lives, rather than trying to make any sense of them....why not just say "Whatever floats your boat?"
 
The path to subjugation....


The humility before God I understand. He is all things.

I don't agree that 'we all know the scenario'.

And if we did understand this particular scenario, a thousand differing scenarios could present.

In a Republic, there is no subjugation of the minorities by a majority, and the minorities are free to participate
or not participate. Key word here is FREE.

Christians in a Republic cannot be compelled to act in defiance of scripture.

Christians in the perverted Democracies of the West, such as what the US is quickly becoming, have lost that freedom
apparently, as the recent blackmailing of the State of Indiana by the Gay lobby illustrates.

I don't think Jesus established that humility entailed allowing a boot across your throat.

Funny thought....how would this work?

Bakers do exactly what you proposed....Bake two cakes....one free...

All of the gay customers wanting wedding cakes go to this baker....he becomes known in the community as a supporter
of gay weddings..and 'gay marriage'..after all, he gives free cakes to them....but not to the straight couples...

How do other Christians view the baker in this scenario?
 
Moral dilemmas are fascinating

and I agree that individuals must engage in a version of relativism to resolve those dilemmas.

The point I tried to make, but not very well, is to emphasize the individual nature of some of these issues. Like the Martin Luther and Washington florist examples. However, many have an urge to see all major societal questions as an issue of moral relativism and then impose a one size fits all solution of that dilemma on the rest of us. That tendency is growing, not diminishing. I don't disagree that this approach is necessary and suitable for some issues like criminal law. But we must also preserve the right of the individual to stand on their individual faith-inspired principles. The secular relativists have difficulty with individual choice and seem to inherently believe their resolution of certain dilemmas must be imposed on others.

Of course figuring out the line between those issues where individual principles ought to be allowed to guide our behavior and those issues where society must come up with a common solution is a different story. RFRA laws, including IRFRA, at least provides a means to address this difference. It seems to me that the Tim Cooks and Dan Malloys of the world, including some on the Cooler, do not even want to allow for that means.














This post was edited on 4/7 12:55 PM by CO. Hoosier
 
Of course they don't want to allow for it.

The gay rights movement, somewhere along the way, has ceased being defined by the liberation of sexual minorities (largely because they succeeded in achieving that) and moved on to become a vindictive enforcer of coerced acceptance. And it's both amazing and disheartening how many people don't grasp the difference.

The Evansville Courier & Press editorialized over the weekend to repeal RFRA. I think they're a little late to the game. I'd say the chances of the GA revisiting the law a third time are about zero. But here's a puzzling snippet:



Of course, in Indiana, gay couples can be denied access to marriage, which is discrimination as well. And the proposed fix, as was being discussed Thursday, does not make gays and lesbians as protected class.



On the other hand, if a business owner, say the baker, is told he must provide a gay couple with a wedding cake, and he says that it is a violation of his religion, then the so-called religious freedom law does not provide him protections either. That begs the question, why have the law in the first place? It does the baker no good either.


Our point is that the law does neither group any good.

Speaking of questions begged, how exactly does the C&P suggest we do this proverbial cake-baker "any good?" Because it sounds to me like they're at least interested in trying to strike a balance. They advocate for gays and lesbians to become a protected class. OK. And this cake-baker?

Screw him. He just needs to get over it and start baking.

No, the proper balance is actually very simple:

1) Hey religious people with a moral qualm with gay marriage: gays can marry each other and them doing so doesn't impact you in the least. Go about your business, let them go about theirs.

2) Hey gay people: you can marry each other and live in marital misery like the rest of us, but some of your fellow citizens are going to have problems with it. If I can get them to leave you be, can you promise to leave them be as well?


We really, really need to get out of the business of seeking to impose morality on others. I don't care if it's the religious right doing the imposing or the gay rights movement.
 
You are suggesting the gay agenda practice tolerance?

Ummmm..

"We're here,

We're queer ,

And we're in your face."

Juxtapose.
 
Re: The path to subjugation....

Originally posted by Mas-sa-suta:


How do other Christians view the baker in this scenario?
Click to expand...
They would stone the baker to death.
 
Yes ... And No

there is no question that many - but not all - interpretations of the Gospel would suggest that the baker should provide his/her services without regard to the purported "sins" of the customer. All fall short. Love the sinner. Judge not. Turn the other cheek. Mammon worship. Splinters and logs in eyes.

And as an individual, I cannot see any way that it is NOT a sin for ME to discriminate against a gay person. But I also know it depends on who is asked and which Scripture you focus on. Fred Phelps would give you a different answer than Billy Graham, who would give you a different answer than Rick Warren, and I'm CERTAIN they would be CERTAIN they were right. But that bastard Fred Phelps (oops) has not lived my life. He has not had the "benefit" of my experiences. I cannot hold to him to my standard, any more than I will allow him to hold me to his.

"In matters of salvation, unity. In matters of opinion, liberty. In all things, love."
That's from a local mega-church pastor (or someone he quotes).

Because there are so many different interpretations, The Church long ago was forced to allow folks to follow their own conscience. And I've been assured more than once that if I follow mine, I'll go to Hell. I disagree.

On the other hand, even if all religions agreed, you still have a question of what should "society" "compel."

When will/should society as a whole "force" a religious person to "go against their conscience" ?
When will society as a whole "force" a gay person to "accept" less from a religious baker because of their sexuality?

(I'm gonna ask a dumb question - does the law force a Jewish deli to serve ham - or other non-kosher items? I know some DO - but are they FORCED to?)

Let's jump forward to the time to when science, etc. confirms that "homosexuality" is an "immutable characteristic" (to put it in the language of "discrimination law") - even to the satisfaction of the Moral Majority.

You still would probably have to "balance" a clash of "rights" - some deeply religious folks would still say "young earth and hetero - that's my story and I'm sticking to it."

To me, if a person (wrongly - according to me) truly believes they shouldn't "sin" or "condone sin" by working a gay wedding, I don't think I should force them to do it. Sadly, that apparently makes me a bigot to the folks advocating against the Indiana version of a RFRA.

I'd happily host a beer summit for the pizza parlor folks and their gay wedding adversaries.
 
I don't follow

This line of thinking: moral relativists want to impose a one-size-fits-all solution.

Isn't that the opposite of what a relativist would do? Aren't people who say "discrimination is wrong, and you shouldn't be allowed to do it, ever" actually moral absolutists?
 
Courtney Hoffman puts it well.

If you haven't heard of her, she's the lesbian small business owner who donated $20 to Memories Pizza in the wake of that kerfuffle.

She went onto a radio talk show and was asked why she did it. Here's her answer:

"My girlfriend and I are small business owners, and we think there is a difference between operating in a public market space and then attaching the name of your business to a private event," she said. "Like, if we were asked to set up at an anti-gay marriage rally, I mean, we would have to decline."

You mean....discriminate?!?! Sorry, Courtney. Discrimination is wrong, and you shouldn't be allowed to do it, ever.

I feel sorry for this lady. She's going to become a pariah for having the audacity not only to think this, not only to say it publicly, but to actually dig into her own pockets to defend the concept.

I can't imagine it would ever cross anybody's mind to seek legal action against a lesbian businessperson who declined to take part in an anti-gay marriage rally. I suspect the response from just about anybody would be "Well, naturally."

I don't know if this outlook is moral relativism or moral absolutism. But I do know that we'd all get along a helluva lot better if we'd just be cool with other people having worldviews, values, morals, etc. different from our own.
 
For me, this all comes down to policy.

We've already been over this, and you and I disagree on a fundamental level. I do not think we would be better off if we just let business owners discriminate however they saw fit and let the market take care of them.

The ground-floor default setting, of course, should be in favor of freedom of contract and association. By default, we should let businesses decide who to offer services to and what types of services. Any restriction on this freedom should be limited to those cases where we've decided that society has a vested interest in preventing a specific type of discrimination.

For example, I absolutely believe housing discrimination should be illegal in all its forms. To me, the obvious harms of housing discrimination far outweigh the harms of restricting landowners in this way. If someone has a genuine religious objection to renting a unit to a same-sex couple, I say, "Tough shit."

In most cases, I think employment discrimination should also clearly be illegal. I can see an argument to be made for employment that is at its heart religious in nature, where certain beliefs are critical to one's employment. I do not have a problem, for example, with the Creationist Museum refusing to hire an atheist in an managerial position simply because he is an atheist. I might have a problem with such a policy for, say, a janitor.

Public accommodations is where it gets tricky. I can certainly see that hotels and grocery stores need to be "forced" to sell to anyone. For cake decorators or photographers, however, the harms done to society by discrimination are probably far less than they would be in the context of a grocery or hotel.

I honestly don't know if the baker should be forced by law to make a cake for a same-sex wedding. I've been consistently noncommittal on this point for years, and I haven't come to a firm decision yet, which is probably why my posts on the subject over the years have drawn the ire of such varied posters as, say, Rock and COH. I simply don't think it's an easy answer. One or the other party is going to suffer harms regardless of where we fall on this issue, and the math on those harms doesn't resolve as easily for me as it does for other forms of discrimination.

goat
 
Or, U can not be a bigot and bake a wedding cake for people who love each..

...other. Isn't God the one who is supposed to judge people? Wasn't Mary Magdelene a prostitute? American Christians are showing themselves to be absolutely awful, awful people.

I hope the contortions you're doing in your mind about baking another human a wedding cake is making your soul feel better. Frankly, I think it's sick.
 
No, Mary Magdalene was not a prostitute.

Although that's a common misconception.

I think you're out of line here. Doug is suggesting a possible Christian response for those who have genuine religious objections. I disagreed with his response below, but it's certainly not a bigoted response. Not every disagreement is tantamount to bigotry.
 
I don't think it's out of line to call a spade a spade.

Doug likes to portray himself as a kind, gentle, Christian...yet he complains when homeless people don't eat the food he made them, he supports unnecessary wars (would Jesus do that...seriously?), and now he's justifying not baking a freaking CAKE for two people that love one another and actually want it sanctioned by marriage (something he and the right are always claiming as their territory...marital sanctity).

There are clearly LOTS of things in the Bible for people to be up in arms about...but for some reason they're stuck on the whole "gay" thing. I think it really comes down to the fact that gay people are, to them, gross. That's it. That's what it comes down to. Is Doug not watching football on weekend because people are touching pig flesh? No. Is he stoning people to death for ridiculous things? No. He's trying to contort his grossed-outed-ness about butt sex between two guys into a religious reason to deny them things or in this case, provide them things, but humiliate them at the same time.

It's ugly, backwards, and bigoted. Plain and simple. Why must mainstream/modern/majority of American people who know and like actual gay people and find them to be just like anyone else: Kind, mean, fabulous, nasty, generous, cheap, etc., etc., etc.,.....again....just like everyone else except they happen to be programmed (I assume by God in Doug's viewpoint) to be attracted to the same sex.

I will say that much of my "education" and becoming a grown up was moving to a large city where there are a lot of gay people. I realized what a fool I was growing up in Bigot-land (as one of my German clients called Indiana when I told him I was going home for Easter). My wife's cousin is a lesbian. If you ever met her you'd know that her sexual orientation is NOT a choice (she looks like Matt Damon), but she is the coolest, nicest, sweetest, person in the entire world. She brews beer and owns the Bay Area's best liquor store/brew pub in Oakland. She loves to hang out with me and watch football when she comes to town...and you won't ever meet a nicer, sweeter person...and that's a fact. The thought that Doug, who is trying to justify his bigotry would actually....in his own way...humiliate her makes my stomach turn.

If this is Christianity and this is the Christian God, then I want no part of it. Your God and your religion sucks, Doug.

This post was edited on 4/7 10:35 PM by DrHoops
 
You don't see many Christians elsewhere in the world acting like children.

Am I right?
 
Bigotry is intolerance to those who hold different opinions from oneself.

I'm not sure how that definition can be any more clear than it is in this case. If they think being gay is a choice, and gay people disagree, then that's a difference of opinion. There are many churches in Chicago who will marry gay couples.

Doug is trying to justify not only his intolerance, but he is essentially humiliating gay people in the process by "baking them two cakes and giving them both for free." It's the "baking" equivalent of "I'll pray for you".

Maybe bakers should be bakers and let God sort them out at the end? That goes for pizza bakers too.
 
By that definition, you might be the biggest bigot on here.

There might be nobody on Peegs who shows more intolerance to people who hold a different opinion than you.

It's almost comical that you actually made this last post.
 
But a KOSHER restaurant is a KOSHER restaurant.

You know what your getting into. Yet, in my business, I have multiple Orthodox Jews with whom I work. I go to kosher restaurants with them all the time mostly in New York. They don't discriminate against me because I'm Christian. They don't ask me if I'm kosher away from the restaurant and refuse to serve me. They treat me with respect, even knowing I'm not an Orthodox Jew....or Jewish at all.

They don't put signs in the window of the restaurant that say "No shirt, no shoes, no Gentiles!"
 
Why, because I point out bigotry when I see it?

Pointing out bigotry makes me a bigot? Okay.......
rolleyes.r191677.gif
 
You said bigotry is

being intolerant of opinions of others that don't match yours. Go back and read through your posts and tell me if you think you're being tolerant of Doug's opinions....or of "American Christians" opinions for that matter. You're not. Not at all. That by definition makes you a bigot, doesn't it?

After all, tolerance is tolerance. You have to tolerate it all or else you're just like those you are bitching about.

This post was edited on 4/7 10:41 PM by dugger1973
 
Well, if I'm a bigot about being "kind to", instead of "terrible to"...

...then I guess I'm a bigot.

Sick people.
 
Why do the "Christians" essentially want their version of Sharia Law?

I'm being serious.
 
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