Church as “public accommodation”?

I knew the logic, so I figured it was coming. I even started writing this blog some months ago.

But I was surprised to see it arrive so soon.

On Wednesday, two Christian churches filed a lawsuit in Hawaii federal district court claiming that individuals who are planning civil union ceremonies have already filed complaints with the Hawaii Civil Rights Commission against churches that refuse to rent their facilities for same-sex civil union and marriage ceremonies. The complaint (full text) in Emmanuel Temple, The House of Praise v. Abercrombie, (D HI, filed 12/28/2011) claims that investigations launched by the Civil Rights Commission have a chilling effect on plaintiffs’ free exercise of religion. HRS Sec. 489-3 prohibits discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in places of public accommodation.

(Religion Clause, emphasis added.)

The premise of the investigation by Human Relations Commissions apparently is (as I think it must be) that Churches are (or at least in some cases  may be) “places of public accommodation.”

That premise is not as ridiculous as it may sound, especially in its “in some cases may be” version.

I know essentially nothing of “Emmanuel Temple, The House of Praise” or of “Lighthouse Outreach Center Assembly of God,” its co-plaintiff. They may be nothing like any of the following hypotheticals.

Case A

The State of Confusion, historic home of quicky divorces, has finally begun issuing licenses for same-sex marriages, having over the decades earlier legalized casino gambling and giving county option on prostitution.

The Never Give a Sucker An Even Break Resort, Casino and Wedding Chapel, inexplicably turned away a same-sex couple (instead of inviting the news media to make it an occasion of “earned media”). The loving couple complains to the Human Relations Commission that Never Give a Sucker An Even Break, including the Wedding Chapel (which has hosted spontaneous, drunken celebrity weddings) is a place of public accommodation and that it has violated anti-discrimination law.

Never Give a Sucker An Even Break loses hands down, it seems to me.

Case B

Haile Liturgical Church is a hierarchical Parish in a state that just began recognizing SSM. Its Priest knows what Bishop ordained him, and what Bishop ordained that Bishop, and when his memory fails him, he can look up the chain all the way back to the Apostles. Haile Liturgical has a definite sense that it is the one holy, catholic and apostolic church of the Nicene Creed.

Haile Liturgical Church recognizes seven or more Christian sacraments, whereby physical means communicate grace, of which Holy Matrimony is one. Holy Matrimony is celebrated according to an ancient order of Bethrothal followed by Crowning. The order prays for the couple’s fertility, invoking the fertility of Old Testament patriarchs. The couple presents itself voluntarily, but does not exchange vows; the Church “marries” them.

Like all sacraments, Holy Matrimony is available in its strict sense only to members of the Church. If a member marries a non-member (who in all events must be some manner of Christian), the service is modified and no longer fully sacramental, but the prayers for fertility remain. Divorced persons are not categorically forbidden to remarry, but the order for second marriages is markedly penitential as compared to first marriages.

Haile Liturgical Church allows other clergy to officiate or participate only if their churches are in communion, and Haile Liturgical Church is only in communion with Churches that observe substantially the same order for Holy Matrimony.

Haile Liturgical Church has never officially approved contraception or sterilization, though it is not vocally opposed. It is thought that a number of members practice contraception to space their children, or to delay first pregnancy during school studies. But nobody can remember when a couple had been married ten years without either having children or seeking prayers for their grievous infertility. “Childless” is part of their vocabulary, but the neologism “child-free” is utterly alien.

The Church officially disapproves of homoerotic conduct, as contrary to God’s will and as conducing more of condemnation than salvation. In other words, homoerotic conduct is amartia, a missing of the mark, as are all other sins. It is known in some cases, suspected in others, that devout (and not-so-devout, for that matter) members experience same-sex attraction. They’re expected to struggle against acting on it. They’re presumably given grace when they stumble, as are all sinners, but the seal of Confession doesn’t allow anyone but Priest and Penitent to know he details of that. Unmarried parishioners, gay, straight, or ambiguous, not irregularly experience the awkwardness of an older member asking “when are you going to find a nice mate and settle down?” as the Church tends to think you’re to be either married or monastic.

A same-sex couple shows up to arrange Holy Matrimony. Or to rent the Sanctuary.

I could go through the possible combinations: both are members, one’s a member, neither are members; they want the Priest of the Parish to officiate, or they want to bring their own.

I don’t see how they will ever, under any alternative, make the case that Haile Liturgical Church is a place of public accommodation in which they should be allowed to  exchange vows (not in the Church’s tradition) or to have absurdly pronounced over them the Church’s prayers for fertility from acts that the Church disapproves and that are in no way teleologically reproductive.

Case C

Acme Community Church, founded by “Pastor Al”, is a member of a moderately conservative “fellowship” (not a “denomination,” they’ll insist). Acme and its fellowship are spiritual descendants of the Radical Reformation and the Second Great Awakening revivals of the Burnt-over District. They recognize two Christian “ordinances:” baptism and the Lord’s Supper, observing the latter 4 times per year. They believe that marriage must be between a man and a woman, but do not view it as a sacrament or ordinance.

Acme has accordingly allowed any couple that wanted a “Church Wedding” to use its attractive facility under certain conditions.

• There’s a preference for members, but days other than Sunday are available to non-members if no member has claimed use of the sanctuary (“Praise Assembly Room”) 6 months before the date the nonmember wants it.
• For non-members, there’s a rental agreement, a fee paid for the janitor to set up and clean up. Acme’s pastor may officiate after the same kind of pre-marriage counseling Acme’s members go through, but it’s understood that the couple can provide their own secular or religious officiant.

In pre-marriage counseling, “Pastor Al,” serving in his 5th decade, has required genetic counseling as standard operating procedure. Twice, after genetic counseling disclosed that both prospective partners carried a gene for a painful and lethal genetic disorder, he has told the couple that they may marry in his Church only after at least one of them is sterilized. He has told college-age couples that they may marry in his Church only if they agree to use contraception until both have graduated. He has written a discreet little service to bless the unmarried cohabitation of retirees — to allow them to collect (and tithe from) maximum Social Security.

Associate Pastor Absalom, Al’s firstborn son and heir apparent to his father, is on his third marriage, the prior two ending in divorce because, as he put it:

There’s no question at times in my life, partially driven by how passionately I felt about this Church, that I worked too hard and things happened in my life that were not appropriate.

Absalom’s three weddings were all festive occasions, each one topping the last.

Both Al and Absalom preach that “sodomy is an abomination,” which God most definitely will punish in hell.

SSM is newly recognized in Acme’s state. A same-sex couple shows up to rent the Praise Assembly Room for a wedding, officiated by their pastor from a nearby Metropolitan Community Church, on an available Saturday 5 months hence. Acme Community Church refuses, and the couple files a discrimination complaint with the Human Relations Commission.

Isn’t Acme Community Church a plausible candidate for treatment as a “public accommodation,” subject to all antidiscrimination laws, if they refuse their facility to the same-sex couple?

• They do not consider marriage a sacrament.
• They rent their space to non-members for weddings, including weddings without clergy.
• They have severed any plausible connection between marriage and procreation.
• They have treated marriage as optional if children aren’t expected and marriage would reduce the couple’s income.
• Their own Associate Pastor has not convincingly upheld the sanctity of marriage.

It will probably be apparent that I have some issues with Acme Community Church, and great affinity with Haile Liturgical Church.

But there’s a lot more Churches out there in the Acme mold than the Haile Liturgical mold. They’re going to find that they have painted themselves into a corner and that Haile Liturgical has its work cut out to distinguish itself from Acme’s ways.

I sympathize with the Acmes of the world as they try to find escape, but I also resent how they have so undermined the whole culture’s understanding of “marriage” that SSM is rapidly completing the astonishingly rapid transformation from “unthinkable” to “axiomatic” without ever having passed through close scrutiny in between.