I confess I'm ignorant. I assumed that the Church modified the practice. I'll look into it.
Sandy Sent from my iPhone On May 1, 2015, at 11:21 AM, Doug Laycock <dlayc...@virginia.edu<mailto:dlayc...@virginia.edu>> wrote: Offlist: Has it done away with selling them? If so, you might want to clarify. Douglas Laycock Robert E. Scott Distinguished Professor of Law University of Virginia Law School 580 Massie Road Charlottesville, VA 22903 434-243-8546 From: religionlaw-boun...@lists.ucla.edu<mailto:religionlaw-boun...@lists.ucla.edu> [mailto:religionlaw-boun...@lists.ucla.edu] On Behalf Of Rick Garnett Sent: Friday, May 01, 2015 12:14 PM To: Law & Religion issues for Law Academics Subject: Re: Religious organizations, tax-exempt status and same-sex marriage Dear Michael, This does not contradict your point but, as it happens, and for what it's worth, the Catholic Church has not done away with indulgences. See, e.g.: http://www.news.va/en/news/pope-francis-grants-indulgences-for-world-youth-da That said, there was recently some confusion over the question whether Pope Francis had *really* told people that following him on Twitter was a way to obtain them: http://www.forbes.com/sites/alexknapp/2013/07/18/no-the-pope-isnt-tweeting-indulgences-to-his-followers/ =-) All the best, Rick Richard W. Garnett Professor of Law and Concurrent Professor of Political Science Director, Program on Church, State & Society Notre Dame Law School P.O. Box 780 Notre Dame, Indiana 46556-0780 574-631-6981 (w) 574-276-2252 (cell) rgarn...@nd.edu<mailto:rgarn...@nd.edu> To download my scholarly papers, please visit my SSRN page<http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=342235> Blogs: Prawfsblawg<http://prawfsblawg.blogs.com/> Mirror of Justice<http://mirrorofjustice.blogs.com/> Twitter: @RickGarnett<https://twitter.com/RickGarnett> On Fri, May 1, 2015 at 11:44 AM, Michael Worley <mwor...@byulaw.net<mailto:mwor...@byulaw.net>> wrote: To emphasize two policy changes in the LDS faith is legitimate; however the centrality of traditional sexual norms to the LDS faith is extremely more central than those changes. It is like saying to a Catholic "because you did away with indulgences, you'll eventually deny that Christ's blood is literally in the sacrament." I think that would be offensive to all Catholics. LDS teachings on marriage in this regard are just as central to our faith as the doctrine of Transubstantiation is to Catholics. On Fri, May 1, 2015 at 9:06 AM, Levinson, Sanford V <slevin...@law.utexas.edu<mailto:slevin...@law.utexas.edu>> wrote: Isn't it foolish in the extreme to assert that "time and culture" are not part and parcel of the history of all religious movements, even if one concedes, perhaps for reasons of tact, that they are not "simply" such products. (I frankly have no idea what secularists actually mean by that concession. Some may be agnostics, genuinely open to the unproven possibility of revealed religion.). For starters, though, look at the LDS renunciation of polygamy in 1890 (not to mention the later renunciation of an all-white priesthood), the Protestant critique of selling indulgences (and the response of the Catholic Church), or the 11th century decision of Ashkenazik Jews to ban polygamy even as Sephardi Jews living in Islamic cultures stuck with it, some until the 20th century. I could obviously go on and on. I have no doubt whatsoever that some adamantly opposed to same sex marriage religious groups will change their collective minds in the next decades. Can anyone seriously doubt that? This is much like debates between committed legal "internalists" who take everything the Supreme Court says with full seriousness (including Roberts's assertion on Tuesday that judges aren't "politicians") and committed legal realists who see ONLY politicians in robes. The truth may be somewhere in between, both for law and religion as systems of practices always striving to maintain their legitimacy within the wider culture. Sandy Sent from my iPhone On May 1, 2015, at 9:14 AM, Marty Lederman <lederman.ma...@gmail.com<mailto:lederman.ma...@gmail.com>> wrote: Alan: Thank you for that very thoughtful and candid reply. I apologize if my wording in response to Eugene's post was infelicitous, or insensitive, in any way. I was trying to be very careful not to suggest that all religious objectors would "change their minds." I agree with you that some will not. And I certainly did not write, and did not mean to suggest in the slightest, any of the following: -- that religious beliefs are "simply" a "product of time and culture" -- "that religious beliefs opposing same-sex sexual relationships are purely an irrational bias" -- that religious beliefs on this question are dependent upon, or necessarily reflect, "bigotry" (or "animus," for that matter) -- that anyone "misunderstands" their own religion or -- that conservative Christian teachings about sex have the same place in the church that former teachings about race did. Indeed, I don't believe any of those things to be true, and so I surely would not argue for them or intend to suggest them in this thread. Of course, as your response acknowledges, religious beliefs of many individuals (not all)--and of many religious institutions--do change as a result of shifts in social practices, which tend to be followed by shifts in understandings of human nature. These shifts sometimes occur even with respect to theological commitments that have long been viewed as based in transcendent truth. The examples are legion--within my faith, the Catholic Church, the LDS, etc.; I know I don't need to belabor the point. The Notre Dame video, making great efforts to attract LGBT students, is merely the latest example. But it's of a piece with many, many other, similar trends. Even so, I agree with you that after a rapid change in the views of most people, some portion of the population is likely to maintain its religiously grounded views about homosexuality. (Your 20% seems like a reasonable guess about that number.) The point I was trying to make, however, was not about the cause, or the rate, of changes in individuals' religious beliefs. What I wrote was that, if and when antidiscrimination laws are extended more broadly to sexual orientation, "very few" of today's religious organizations will be "legally and socially marginalized" because "they will have voluntarily ended their discriminatory practices." Indeed, as I emphasized in later posts, even today there are very few such organizations that openly engage in such discriminatory practices (other than as to ministerial positions). And that number will only diminish--probably to a small handful--by the time Congress gets around to amending Title VII and Title IX to cover sexual orientation. I hope that better explains what I was getting at. I certainly did not mean to disparage or trivialize anyone's sincerely held religious beliefs. Best, Marty On Thu, Apr 30, 2015 at 9:53 PM, Alan Hurst <alan.hu...@aya.yale.edu<mailto:alan.hu...@aya.yale.edu>> wrote: Thanks to Marty and everyone else for the discussion here. I'm finding it very informative. I wanted to respond briefly, however, to Marty's wager below: And Eugene, I'd be willing to wager that very few of today's conservative Christians' organizations will be "legally and socially marginalized" at that point, because by then they, too, will have voluntarily ended their discriminatory practices. I have two quick thoughts about this. First, I think you should consider a bit more carefully how that argument sounds to someone whose religious beliefs include the rejection of same-sex sexual relationships as immoral. "You shouldn't worry about the long run because your religions will just change their minds on this issue anyway" suggests at least one of the following two ideas: --that religious beliefs are simply a product of time and culture, with no basis in any transcendent truth and no capacity to resist broader cultural movements. --that religious beliefs opposing same-sex sexual relationships are purely an irrational bias and, like religious opposition to interracial marriage, will gradually vanish as gay marriage becomes commonplace and believers' aversion to gay relationships is worn down by familiarity. You may in fact believe these two ideas, and although I don't, I'm certainly not going to change your mind here. But I do hope you'll consider for a moment how they sound to believers who disagree with you. In essence, when you say, "Your religion will change on this issue," you're saying either, "The beliefs you've built your life on have no basis in reality" or "Your bigotry has led you to misunderstand your own religion." True or false, these two thoughts are quite the opposite of comforting to a believer who worries about this issue. They do as much as anything to persuade believers that people like you really don't understand religion and really are out to get them. Second, if I were a betting man, I'd take your wager. Partially I'd take it because, well, the analogy between religious racism and religious heteronormativity is at most superficially accurate. Conservative Christian teachings about sex just have a much different place in the church than American Christians' teachings about race ever did--theologically, functionally, socially, historically, etc. These things are simply not the same. Douthat wrote briefly (but I think accurately) about this here: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/05/opinion/sunday/rosss-douthat-interview-with-a-christian.html?_r=0 And partially I'd take your wager because religion has always been an international phenomenon, and like everything else it's getting to be more so. The heart of Christianity is moving from Europe and North America to Latin America, Africa, and Asia. Within a few decades, China may be home to more Christians than any other country. American Catholicism has never been centrally important to the Catholic church, and even we Mormons now have more members outside the U.S. than inside. Unless the gay marriage movement catches on in a lot of places where it's not yet had much traction, I think these Christians abroad are going to give some ballast to American Christian opposition to gay marriage. To some extent it's already happened--see, for example, the ties springing up between conservative American Episcopalians and African Anglicans. My prediction? I think religious opposition to gay marriage is going to be like religious opposition to premarital sex. The polls will move more rapidly than anyone once thought possible, and in a decade or two only 20% of Americans will think gay marriage is immoral. And then the graph will bottom out, and you're going to have about 20% of Americans still thinking that for a long time. So, no, I don't think these issues are going away. Best, Alan (My apologies, but I took an hour that I didn't really have to write this, and I don't know when I'll be able to post again. But Marty, if you respond, I promise I'll get back to you eventually.) _______________________________________________ To post, send message to Religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu<mailto:Religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu> To subscribe, unsubscribe, change options, or get password, see http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/religionlaw Please note that messages sent to this large list cannot be viewed as private. Anyone can subscribe to the list and read messages that are posted; people can read the Web archives; and list members can (rightly or wrongly) forward the messages to others. _______________________________________________ To post, send message to Religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu<mailto:Religionlaw@lists.ucla.edu> To subscribe, unsubscribe, change options, or get password, see http://lists.ucla.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/religionlaw Please note that messages sent to this large list cannot be viewed as private. 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