Kim Davis--No Rosa Parks

courtesy of Mike Licht who entitled his picture:
Our Lady of Intolerance / flickr

Ever wake up thinking you have landed in a crazy house? This sad saga of Kim Davis is a mite weird. Two gay guys applied for a marriage license in Rowan County, Kentucky. County Court Clerk Kim Davis turned them away. She said her religious principles about gays would not permit her to grant that license. Well, she wound up in jail for not following the law she promised to uphold when she took the job.

I thought the jailing of this woman was overreach on the Judge's part. Why not just censure her and let her know that she had to follow the rules of her job or be shuffled around in another department. Jail seemed cruel to me. I'm glad she is free.

The media who always loves hoop-la rushed to the scene. A group of  citizens surrounded the court house waving American and Christian flags, some holding huge crosses, others carrying signs saying this woman was a martyr for a Christian cause. Some people intoned that Ms. Davis was the Rosa Parks for religious freedom.  If that were not worse enough Presidential candidates Mike Huckabee and Ted Cruz
 rushed to the scene. They couldn't comment enough. I don't think I saw either candidate in Charleston after the blood bath in the Ebenezer Church. But that's beside the point.

What we now know is that Kim Davis has been married four times. Yes, four times. I have a sneaky feeling that Mr. Huckabee and Mr. Cruse would not have rushed down to Kentucky had they known this fact. Of course--Huckabee who claims to be a Baptist minister and smoothed the event over by saying: "I know she has been married four times but she accepted the Lord Jesus as her Savior several months ago and it has changed her life. She is not the same person she was." This reminds me of another story which has nothing to do with the issue. But some little boy asked his Sunday School teacher if she thought Hitler was a Christian. She said,  "Well, we hope he accepted the Lord Jesus and was baptized when he was a little boy."Hmm.

Ms. Davis is no Hitler. But her recent conversion does not sweep away the years or her history so easily. I am glad she has turned her life around. But not far enough. Jesus welcomes all. The Supreme Court has said, at least at this point, all citizens in this country have the same right when they request a marriage license. If your job is to grant licenses to all tax-paying citizens--Ms. Davis has made a serious mistake.  She can believe whatever she wishes about gays--that is her right as a citizen of a free land. But to work for the state her job is to follow the law of the land. When religious freedom means discrimination in any form something is wrong with this picture. Ms. Davis is no Rosa Parks.
But sadly she has been used by a narrow segment of the church and a much larger media blitz--not to speak of political candidates-- for their own shabby purposes.

                                           --Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com