The saga of Kim Davis, the Kentucky county clerk who refused to issue same-sex marriage licenses, shines the spotlight on an increasingly different attitude of the political Christian right. Long dismissive of whiny, victim-obsessed secular liberals, right-wing Christians appear to believe they’ll prosper as whiny, victim-obsessed religious conservatives. Not that they see themselves as whiny, of course. Heavens no, they simply are standing up for their God-given rights – rights they had until other people were granted “special rights.”
Interestingly, the origin of the term “special rights” isn’t attributed to right-wing Christianity. According to good old Wikipedia, libertarians first used it to describe “laws granting rights to one or more groups which are not extended to other groups.” Instead of viewing those laws as correcting historical wrongs of inequality and discrimination adversely affecting a specific group of citizens, libertarians saw them as conflicting “with the principle of equality before the law.” To libertarians, such laws are a burden of unnecessary regulatory intrusion in the lives of individuals.
Political Christian fundamentalists latched onto that idea and took it a step further. Those involved in turning right-wing Christianity into a political juggernaut railed against “special rights” for people who would undermine God’s will on earth. In their worldview, things, such as affirmative action, hate-crime legislation, gay rights, reproductive rights, gender-neutral language and policies, really, any assertions of entitlement outside traditional societal norms – along with any questioning of institutional power – were anti-Christian and designed to weaken the moral fiber of the nation. (It’s only in the past few years that “special rights” became political Christian code-talk for civil rights sought by gays, lesbians, and more broadly, the LGBT community.)
Stretching back to Jerry Falwell’s “Moral Majority” and the rise of right-wing political Christianity, leaders in the movement insisted they spoke for most Americans and most Americans wanted them in control. Mainstream Christianity had become an anachronism, plain old pablum compared to their muscular brand of Christian fundamentalism. Their religious, political and social movements would return America to greatness by engineering the true Christian nation our Founders intended.
Contrast that to their new narrative of persecution. Christianity is under siege, and Christians are victims, maligned and belittled for their beliefs. Christian butchers, bakers, candlestick makers, and county clerks are forced by godless government to abandon their faith or go to jail. The language and the tone used tend more and more toward hysterical. Indeed, the popular conservative talk-show host Erick Erickson said in an op-ed about the Kim Davis story, “How much longer until we have another civil war?”
What the political right-wing Christian movement could not see coming was the swift shift across America in support for gay rights, including gay marriage. Previously, when the argument about religious conscience and the workplace arose, it often was about pharmacists refusing to fill prescriptions for birth control or morning-after pills. When push came to shove, as it did in North Dakota with the “Religious Liberty Amendment” a few years ago, voters made clear that religious beliefs of one person can’t trump the legal rights of another. But gay rights weren’t central concerns.
Now they are, and the religious right doesn’t know what to do.
Trying to reinvigorate his campaign with the Kim Davis episode, perennial presidential candidate Mike Huckabee was asked by talk-show host Mika Brzezinski whether he would support a clerk religiously opposed to divorce from granting four-times-married Kim Davis a marriage license. He didn’t answer, saying only that the question wasn’t relevant.
Pointing up hypocrisy in the Kim Davis saga isn’t tough. But it is a powerful reminder why separation of church and state is so important.
Ahlin, Fargo, writes a Sunday column for The Forum. Email janeahlin@yahoo.com
