Jersey Culture Wars
Not too long ago, the State of New Jersey legalized same-sex civil unions. Marriage and civil union are the legal domain of the state legislatures in the United States. And so, they had a right to do so, whatever the feelings of people on both sides of this issue. If you want your state to have same sex unions - call your state legislator. If you want your state to say that marriage is between one man and one woman - call your state legislator.
Ocean Grove, for those who do not know, was founded by the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association in 1869 as a Methodist summer seashore community. It is the longest-active camp meeting site in the United States.
When the State of New Jersey approved of civil unions, the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association ruled that no such unions were to be permitted on Camp Meeting property. The reason for this is that the position of the united Methodist Church states that no same-sex ceremonies are to performed by the clergy of the denomination and no such unions are to take place on church property.
Accordingly, the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association ruled that no ceremonies were to take place at the beach pavilion on the boardwalk at the end of Ocean Pathway, which the Camp Meeting Association considers a church that is exempt from the New Jersey’s anti-discrimination law.
The decision to ban such ceremonies is the responsibility of Scott Rasmussen, President of the Camp Meeting Association. The board officially ratified his decision, so that the OGCMA could establish that the board had an unambiguous position and for future consultation.
A same-sex couple filed a civil rights complaint against the Ocean Grove Camp Meeting Association in 2007, claiming it discriminated against them by denying their request to hold a civil union ceremony in the Boardwalk Pavilion. The complaint is the first in New Jersey since same-sex civil unions were recognized there in 2007, said a spokesman for the state Division of Civil Rights.
An official of the Camp Meeting Association was quoted as saying that the association considers the pavilion to be as much of a religious building as the Tabernacle or the Youth Temple and that it would not permit same-sex civil union ceremonies to be conducted in the Pavilion, which it owns.
A local advocacy group, Ocean Grove United, disputed this, contending that the issue involves public, not religious, property. However, even their website acknowledges that the OGCMA “owns all of the property in Ocean Grove”. So, how they can claim that property owned by OGCMA is owned publicly (i.e., by the town of Neptune, the county, state, or federal government) is beyond me.
There is more at stake here than just one marriage. This is the first test to see if some claims made by certain people are in good faith or not.
Let me explain. Many church leaders have advocated for cultural pluralism and liberalization on the assumption that “I do it my way, you do it your way”. Personally, I have no problem with this. I support it. I do not want to the Church to run America - politically, culturally, or otherwise.
We have had allies in this measure by secular and left leaning friends for some time. But now comes the rub. What happens when the church says that Trenton can have same-sex unions, but we still won’t perform them or allow them performed on our property. Like it or not (and I don’t - for the record) the church has collectively agreed that the leaning of God in the dimensions is that gay marriage (or anything that looks like it with a different name) shall not be permitted by us in our communions and on our property.
So, now what? Will our former friends let us be or will they turn on us? The question is this: had the pluralism so many church leader supported never been the agenda of our allies? Have they all along not wanted pluralism, but secularism, even from us?
The possible end game here matters: Is it possible that the church being the church is illegal? This is one small case, but it could have big repercussions. It is already not allowed for chaplains in the military to say that their religion (whatever it is) is better than another’s. So, is it conceivable that there will come a day when the churches in the US are shut down by the government because preaching that Jesus Christ is the way, the truth, and the life is offensive to people who are Jewish, Muslim, etc.?
I think this is the crux of the issue here. Same-sex unions is only the window dressing. This is an issue about what rights, obligations, and privileges the Church has in the face of an ideology of equality by most Americans which can no longer see that their pluralistic-secularism has in some places become a dogmatism just as rigid as the religious people they make fun of.
Think on this . . . .
