What effect, if any, will same-sex marriages have on religious liberty?

At first blush, your answer is probably "none".  After all, if the gay couple down the street gets married, whose religious freedom does it impugn?

But, as Maggie Gallagher points out, there is an argument here:

Catholic Charities of Boston, one of the nation’s oldest adoption agencies, had long specialized in finding good homes for hard to place kids. "Catholic Charities was always at the top of the list," Paula Wisnewski, director of adoption for the Home for Little Wanderers, told the Boston Globe.

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[But it] made the announcement on March 10: It was getting out of the adoption business. "We have encountered a dilemma we cannot resolve. . . . The issue is adoption to same-sex couples."

Under Massachusetts law, it would be illegal for an adoption agency such as Catholic Charities, to discriminate against couples based on "sexual orientation":

To operate in Massachusetts, an adoption agency must be licensed by the state. And to get a license, an agency must pledge to obey state laws barring discrimination–including the decade-old ban on orientation discrimination. With the legalization of gay marriage in the state, discrimination against same-sex couples would be outlawed, too.

Over at The Corner, Stanley Kurtz gets all hysterical about this:

Same-sex marriage will be used as a tool, not only to silence opposition, but to unstring religion itself as a force in American life.

Kurtz is engaging in one of those "Christianity is being attacked" hyperbolic arguments, just like the infamous "War on Christianity" that supposedly occurs simply because the checkout lady at Target says "Happy Holidays" instead of genuflecting and praying with customers.

This is a red herring, and quite fear-mongering.  It’s also disingenuous. For example, Kurtz fails to point out that, prior to throwing in the towel, Catholic Charities did handle adoptions for same-sex couples.  But following a change in heirarchy, it simply chose not to continue that practice. 

Well, isn’t that religious liberty — having a choice?  It wasn’t Massachusetts that prevented Catholic Charities from operating; it was a unilateral decision by Catholic Charities itself.

It’s like the school prayer debate.  Religious conservatives disingenuously argue that banning "prayer in school" violates religious liberty.  What they fail to understand (and constantly mislead the public about) is that prayer is legal in all public schools.  Even the ACLU fights for that.  It is school-led prayer that it unconsitutional.  When student are allowed to pray (or not pray) of their own free will, and in their own individual manner, then you have a net-plus of religious liberty, not a net minus.

Still, it is unsettling that a religious-based charities will be caught between a rock and a hard place: they must either obey anti-discrimination laws, or go against their religious tenets. 

But why is this problematic?  Suppose a religion opposed interracial marriages (marriages between, say, a white person and a black person).  Should that religion’s charitable organization be forced to provide adoptive children to interracial couples, even if it is against the tenets of their religion?

Like many people, my response is simply this: "Yes, they should".  We are a nation of laws, and equality.  If those notions clash with a particular religion’s (racist) beliefs, well, tough.  Then they should get out of the game, or resign themselves to losing their license, tax exempt status, etc..  Other organizations will pick up the slack.

Kurtz tries to dismiss my race-related analogy by writing:

The source of the problem is the flawed analogy between the battle for same-sex marriage and the sixties movement for civil rights. Gay marriage proponents argue that sexual orientation is like race, and that opponents of same-sex marriage are therefore like bigots who oppose interracial marriage. Once same-sex marriage becomes law, that understanding will be controlling.

Tellingly, Kurtz does not offer a reason why the analogy is "flawed", nor can I think of one.   Perhaps he believes that sexual orientation is a "choice", whereas race is not.  Of course, that is a huge lie.  The only "choice" made by people within the LGBT community is whether to admit to having a particular orientation, which is vastly different from choosing an orientation.  Besides, given the prejudices of society, who would choose to be gay?

Orientation choice is a fallacy.  Even Falwell, when pressed, had to admit that:

Matthews: How old were you when you chose to be heterosexual?

Falwell: Oh, I don’t remember that.

Matthews: Well you must, because you say it’s a big decision.

Falwell: Well, I – I started dating when I was about thirteen.

Matthews: And you had to decide between boys and girls. And you chose girls.

Falwell: Well, I never had to decide, I never thought … (laughter)

But I am confident that in thirty years from now, we will look back on the same-sex marriage debate the way we look back now on the civil rights issues of the 1960’s.  Throughout history, conservatives have always tried to impede social progress (hence, the name "conservative"). 

And regrettably, they mis-use religion as a weapon in their arsenal, totally bastarding the Gospel for intolerant and divisive ends.   

But I despair not.  Eventually, they will come around — in no small part due to mainstream (or, as conservative call them, "liberal") Christians like Rev. Martin Luther King — who preach love, understanding, and tolerance, and other Jesus-like things.

After all, Catholic Charities has been in the adoption business since 1947, and back then, they didn’t allow adoptions to interracial couples.  But they came around.  On gay marriage, they’ll come around again.