New York governor: opponents of same-sex ‘marriage’ just ‘want to discriminate,’ are ‘anti-American’
NEW YORK, – An employee with the New York Archdiocese warned of an “impending persecution” after New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo called same-sex “marriage” opponents discriminatory and “anti-American” last week.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo
The governor, who was instrumental in the state’s passage of same-sex “marriage” in June, was asked at a New York Times forum which arguments against same-sex “marriage” he found compelling.
“None,” he said. “There is no answer from the opposition. There really isn’t. Ultimately, it’s, ‘I want to discriminate.’ And that’s anti-New York. It’s anti-American.”
Ed Mechmann of the Archdiocese of New York’s Family Life Office said it is “chilling” that the state’s top official would declare such a large segment of the population as “political pariahs.” He warned Catholics of an “impending persecution,” saying that Cuomo has effectively “declared us to be enemies of the state and nation.”
“In reality, Mr. Cuomo doesn’t just disagree with our arguments, he denies their existence,” said Mechmann on the archdiocese’s blog. “He clearly believes that they are pernicious, beyond the pale of proper discourse, and motivated only by hatred.”
“That is why he has now declared that we are ‘anti-American’ — that is to say, enemies of our nation,” he continued.
“This is legitimately frightening. We all know what the power of the state can do to its enemies,” he added.
This week, Rev. Jason J. McGuire of New Yorkers for Constitutional Freedoms issued an open letter calling the comments by Cuomo an “attack” on half of America’s population and demanding an apology.
In July, New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan warned that, if experience in other jurisdictions was any indication, believers in the traditional family “will soon be harassed, threatened, and hauled into court for their conviction.”
Christians in the UK, Canada, and elsewhere have lost their jobs, been dragged through lengthy “human rights” proceedings, and faced steep fines for questioning the dangerous homosexual lifestyle, declining to facilitate gay “marriages,” or even failing to acknowledge “gay pride” events.
“Like St. Thomas More, we’re willing to take the heat and even lose our head from following a conscience properly formed by God’s revelation and the teaching of His Church, even if it is politically incorrect, and clashes with the King’s demands to re-define marriage,” said Dolan.
Immediately following the passage of same-sex “marriage”, New York state officials moved to force marriage commissioners to sign marriage licenses for same-sex couples.
Reacting in July to the news that the first commissioner had resigned as a result, Cuomo insisted that commissioners must put the law above their religious beliefs. “When you enforce the laws of the state, you don’t get to pick and choose which laws,” he said. “You don’t get to say, ‘I like this law and I’ll enforce this law, or I don’t like this law and I won’t enforce this law’ - you can’t do that.”
“The laws would have to be paramount, and would have to be paramount to your religious beliefs,” he added.
New York was the sixth U.S. state to recognize homosexual “marriage,” in addition to the District of Columbia.
See Edward Mechmann’s blog at the Archdiocese of New York’s website here.
See Rev. Jason J. McGuire’s open letter here.
