re: #88 Dark_Falcon

No, and I recently had that argument with my father actually. He favored a “defining of religion” to exclude Islam, which I opposed firmly as incompatible with the 1st Amendment (multiple ‘toleration of religion’ definitions at the time of the passage of the bill of rights expressly mentioned Islam, to make its inclusion within the Amendment’s scope crystal -clear, though I’d not support exclusion even had such definitions not been present). The Constitution is very clear on this point, and the 14th Amendment made the Free Exercise Clause binding on the states.

Let’s say I create The Church of Gay Marriage. It’s a religion. I meet all legal requirement. Part of my religion requires that our adherents get married. Denial of this constitutes a violation of my freedom of religion. What about that?