The Texas legislature has a slew of bills before it to try and circumvent a favorable SCOTUS ruling on marriage equality. One of them is to protect clergy, and a state Senate commitee held a hearing on that one today. And, it brought out some paranoid pastors. I honestly do not understand this because no member of the clergy has ever been forced to marry anyone against their sincerely held religious beliefs. It just makes no sense. Nevertheless, far right evangelical pastors, ministers, and bishops are certain that they will be FORCED by law to marry same-sex couples if the SCOTUS rules in favor of marriage equality. And, then what is next?!
From that hearing, here is Pastor Bruce Engleman. He is terrified that he will be forced to marry persons into bestiality if something is not done to protect the clergy. I mean, did you not hear of the woman in Florida who wants to marry her dog? No? I didn't hear about it either. Here he is:
And, then here is Pastor David Joiner. He would like for you to know that he is not a "homophobia". And, does he ever have all the talking points down. He is quite fearful that he will be forced to marry pedophiles if not protected from this evil marriage equality.
And, then we have Beverly Roberts. She is quite upset that people might think that she is a homophobe and a hater just because she is against marriage equality. She would like to know just who are the REAL "bullies, bigots, and haters".
From Towleroad:
A Texas Senate committee hearing turned into an anti-gay hatefest on Monday.
As we told you last week, state legislators are considering a bill designed to protect clergy and churches from being forced to participate in same-sex weddings.
Pro-LGBT groups including Equality Texas and the ACLU of Texas have said that as long as the bill is crafted narrowly enough, they'd be wiling to support it. However, at the conclusion of Monday's hearing, the author of the Senate version of the bill rejected an amendment proposed by the two groups.
This was after dozens of pastors testified in support of the bill, with some comparing same-sex marriage to adultery, bestiality, domestic abuse, pedophilia and polygamy. Anti-LGBT witnesses also accused gay couples in other states of "bullying," "bigotry" and "hate crimes" for allegedly trying to force pastors to perform their weddings.
The Senate committee advanced the bill in a 5-1 vote. It now goes to the full Senate. An identical bill was approved by a House committee last week.