Marriage Commissioners's Choice: Your Conscience Or Your Job

Once again, the court has denied Christian marriage commissioners their freedom of conscience, forcing them to choose between their values or their job. For Larry Bjerland, a marriage commissioner from Saskatchewan, it would rather be his job:

REGINA, Saskatchewan, January 12, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A Saskatchewan marriage commissioner says the government will have to fire him if it expects him to perform same-sex “marriages.”
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Bjerland told CBC the decision might result in his losing his appointment. “I do not intend to marry any gay couples and so, therefore, I’m not going to resign,” said Bjerland, who has been a marriage commissioner for 10 years. “They’ll have to fire me.”
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Dr. Maurice Vellacott, MP for Saskatoon-Wanuskewin, agreed with Bjerland. In a letter to Saskatchewan Justice Minister Don Morgan on Monday, Vellacott expressed his concern with the court’s ruling.

“Some have suggested that marriage commissioners should resign if they won’t perform same-sex marriages. However, that approach violates the spirit and letter of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms,” said Vellacott.

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Except that for the judicial activists that took over our courts, the spirit and letter of the Charter means advancing special interest groups in the name of equality, forcing their social engineering on the rest of the society (especially Christians) in the name of tolerance.

But here's another thing: do we even need the institution of civil marriage the way it has become? One of the options studied by the House committee back in 2001-02 was to get the government out of the marriage business. Maybe we should consider this as an interim solution? After all, those of us who still believe in the Sacrament of Marriage, could easily do without the government clerk and the piece of paper called "marriage license", in which the bride and the groom are referred to as mere "partner A" and "partner B".

Sure, there are many who reject religious marriage; but most of them don't even bother to have their relationships registered with the government. "Common law" status gives them all the rights and obligations that are available to married couples. And, as for the rest - they could be easily accommodated by lawyers and notary public. I doubt that drafting a typical contract and having the partners' signature witnessed would cost more than what the government charges for its license.

So if the government is to fire Christian marriage commissioners for refusing to issue phony "civil marriage" licenses and perform mock wedding ceremonies for perverse couples, then they might as well scrap what's left of the institution altogether and make the remaining marriage commissioners join their Christian colleagues on the job market. After all, it's their indifference and their unwillingness to defend the historic values upon which the marriage rests, that eventually led to the situation when the institution of civil marriage has become a shadow of its former self and Christian marriage commissioners are being forced to choose between their conscience and their job.