Faith drives Idaho legislator to reverse same-sex marriage. These faith leaders push back.

Yahoo

17-02-2025

The Rev. Josh Lee talks to a reporter at Boise's First Congregational United Church of Christ on February 3, 2025. (Otto Kitsinger for Idaho Capital Sun)
A decade ago, the Rev. Josh Lee finally came to terms with his sexuality.
From a young age, Lee knew he wanted to be a pastor, but his attraction to men conflicted with his evangelical Christian upbringing. Raised in Illinois, Lee tried 'conversion therapy' three times in high school, and as a young pastor he believed he would live single and celibate for the rest of his life.
Within one month of moving to Idaho, the now married and openly gay pastor at Boise First United Church of Christ spoke up against legislation impacting the state's LGBTQ+ community. House Joint Memorial 1 — which passed 46-24 in the Idaho House of Representatives on Jan. 27 — is now headed to the Idaho Senate. The memorial asks the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn its decision on same-sex marriage. While the North Idaho lawmaker who sponsored the memorial said it pushes to restore states rights and 'the natural definition of marriage,' Lee and other faith leaders say the memorial misrepresents their faith.
Lee's journey to advocating for LGBTQ+ rights in Idaho has been difficult. For many years, he was miserable, filled with self hatred, and had even contemplated taking his own life.
'I thought … maybe God would welcome me into heaven if I could die having been faithful to his cause,' he told the Idaho Capital Sun.
That was until he met other Christians from gay-affirming churches in 2015. After coming out and leaving the church where he had been pastoring, Lee began studying queer theology and deconstructing his faith. For the first time, he allowed himself to date men.
'I was taught that racism didn't exist, that women should submit to men, and that men have ultimate veto power over women,' he said, reflecting on his former beliefs.
Now, as Idaho lawmakers push to take away same-sex marriage, Lee said he can see his former self in the lawmakers who, like he once did, believe their faith defines marriage as solely between a man and woman.
House Joint Memorial 1 is not a bill, and its passage in both chambers would not adjust Idaho law. Its passage, however, would send the memorial to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Idaho already defines marriage between a man and woman in its state Constitution, but the U.S. Supreme Court's 2015 decision in Obergefell v. Hodges declared that definition unconstitutional. If those federal protections were ever reversed, a ban on same-sex marriage would immediately take effect in Idaho.
The memorial's sponsor, Rep. Heather Scott, R-Blanchard, told the House floor the bill is meant to restore states' rights to define marriage. Scott could not be reached for comment. However, in an interview with The Ranch Podcast, Scott compared the issue to Roe v. Wade, saying that court precedent can be overturned.
'This is a Judeo-Christian based country, and our constitution was designed for a moral people,' Scott said in the podcast. 'So that morality was built on God's word … That's what our country was built on.'
Scott said the Bible is clear that marriage is between a man and a woman. Some Christian faiths, such as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, share this perspective. The LDS faith, which has 476,000 of its nearly 7 million nationwide members located in Idaho, does not permit church officers to perform same-sex marriages, according to its website.
'Just don't force me to say that that's a marriage, because in my eyes, that's an abomination to God,' Scott said in the podcast. 'Do I respect those people? Absolutely. Do I hate them because they believe in something different? No. I have no ill will towards them. I don't want their lives to be harder or anything like that. I want them to know the truth, but at the same time I don't want to keep things from them.'
Her bill received support from the Idaho Family Policy Center, a conservative organization focused on implementing Christian-based policies. Morgan MaGill, spokesperson for the organization, said the Idaho Family Policy Center affirms 'the biblical design for marriage is one man and one woman, joined together in a union blessed by God.'
'The Bible is clear that deviation from this design is a perversion of the sacred institution of marriage,' MaGill told the Sun. 'Because marriage was created by God for the organization of family life and child rearing, government has no legitimate authority to restructure this pre-political institution.'
The House Joint Memorial 1 has raised concerns among LGBTQ+ Idahoans about its potential impact on adoption, visitation rights and taxes. However, one legal expert says she doesn't believe people should panic.
Marilyn Chinitz, a matrimonial attorney and partner at Blank Rome LLP, told the Sun that although people may worry the U.S. Supreme Court could reverse Obergefell v. Hodges as it did Roe v. Wade, she said the constitutional arguments behind the two cases are different. In Obergefell, the court ruled that states cannot deny same-sex couples the right to marry, basing its decision on both the due process and equal protection clauses of the 14th Amendment.
Additionally, in 2022, President Joe Biden signed the Respect for Marriage Act, which adds protections for interracial marriage and same-sex marriages. If the Supreme Court were to overturn Obergefell, the legality of same-sex marriage would revert to state law. While states like Idaho and Texas, which have pre-existing bans, would likely stop performing same-sex marriages, they would still be required to recognize marriages that were already legally performed under protections from the Respect for Marriage Act.
'If you do get married in one state, even though you live in a state that doesn't recognize that marriage under federal law, it will be protected,' Chinitz said.
Lee was the first faith leader to speak out against the memorial before the House State Affairs Committee, but he was joined by faith leaders from the Jewish, Evangelical Lutheran and Unitarian Universalist traditions — some of whom protested by walking out of the committee or testifying against the memorial.
Rabbi Dan Fink, who recently retired from the Congregation Ahavath Beth Israel in Boise, has long supported same-sex marriage. When his congregation moved to its Boise Bench campus in 2003, the first wedding he conducted in the synagogue was a same-sex couple, he told the Sun. Though it was not legally acknowledged before 2015, he said it was a way of joining people religiously in the Jewish faith.
Fink acknowledged there are differences of opinion within the American Jewish community, but he said a strong majority are supportive of same-sex marriage.
'We should be supporting love and human dignity, and more people being able to commit to a sacred partnership is a good thing,' Fink said. 'Marriage is not an easy thing. Marriage takes work, whether you're same sex or heterosexual partners. What makes it sacred is love and respect, and that's not a function of gender.'
As someone who has spent his lifetime studying the Hebrew Bible, Fink said marriages in the Bible are 'very complicated,' and he doesn't believe they offer a good guide to marriage, noting that some marriages involve handmaids or more than one wife.
Pastor Connie Winter-Eulberg is also an LGBTQ+ affirming faith leader. She testified in opposition to the memorial when it was in committee, representing the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America which has nearly 2.8 million members in the U.S.
In 2009, the church began welcoming and performing marriages on same-sex couples, she said, emphasizing the church's deep commitment to the principle of 'loving thy neighbor.'
'I think it's more about control versus, 'this is what God says,'' Winter-Eulberg told the Sun about the memorial. 'I think they want the male and the family to have control.'
Like Winter-Eulberg, the Rev. Sara LaWall felt compelled to speak up against the memorial during the committee hearing. LaWall is a minister at Boise Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, and her faith is deeply rooted in justice, equity and compassion, she told the Sun. Unitarian Universalism draws wisdom from a variety of sources, she said, rather than a single text like the Bible in the Christian tradition.
'The Bible is rife with contradictions,' she told the Sun. 'The Bible says a lot of things that we no longer practice or believe… We no longer stone people to death. The Bible also says that women are property. So this whole notion of marriage between a man and a woman — well, that used to mean that a man could own a woman as his wife, and perhaps even more than one.'
LaWall said she doesn't believe Obergefell v. Hodges marginalizes anyone's faith because religious institutions still have the right to define marriage as they choose.
'In their private spheres, in their churches, they're allowed to make rules and policies that suggest that marriage is only between a man and a woman, and they can uphold those,' LaWall said. 'I may not agree with them, but that is what religious freedom actually means.'
For now, House Joint Memorial 1 is headed to the Idaho Senate side, where the chairman of the Senate State Affairs Committee may choose to hold a hearing on it in the coming days or weeks. If approved by the committee, it would advance to the Senate floor. Approval from the Idaho Senate would send the memorial to the U.S. Supreme Court.
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