Refusing to honor a Supreme Court decision and not give marriage licenses because your version of Christianity doesn't like them isn't really a religious freedom issue.
Hold on, I'm not insulting her or her views. Here's why it's not really about religious freedom: I would assume that the same-sex couples looking for marriage licenses don't follow Ms. Davis's version of Christianity, as they clearly aren't forbidden to marry.
By refusing to grant them a (by the way, secular, NOT religious) marriage license, she is forcing those people to follow her religion instead of their own.
The clerk in question is on her third marriage; her actions don't look all that different than if another town clerk had refused her 3rd license because the clerk's religion forbids divorce. Clearly Ms. Davis's own version of Christianity is OK with it, so she'd have been forced to follow the other religion's rules rather than her own. Being refused a marriage license for a marriage your religion permits because someone else's religion doesn't permit it, is the exact OPPOSITE of religious freedom.
Also, religious freedom, separation of church and state, call it whatever you want, is established in the United States for ALL religions and religious people, not just Christians, and certainly not just those Christians who don't like same-sex marriage. Just because you don't like it, and your religion forbids it, is NOT enough of a reason to deny people who aren't followers of your religion.
If your religion disapproves of same-sex marriage, then your church doesn't have to have them. You may get pushback from others, but if you're being true to your faith, let them rail at you. But, (and here's my main theme) just because your religion doesn't approve, that doesn't mean you get to force others, of other religions, to follow your guidelines.
If you personally disapprove of same-sex marriage so much that you don't want to be in any way associated with one, but your job duties require it, there are several ways to really handle a religious objection to your job duties.
If you personally disapprove of same-sex marriage so much that you don't want to be in any way associated with one, but your job duties require it, there are several ways to really handle a religious objection to your job duties.
The easiest is the great American response to a horrible job: "Take this job and shove it!" If a job is trying to force you to do things that are objectionable to you, the simplest thing to do is quit and find a better job. I'm certain there are many places that would hire her in a hot second, lots of them because of her business clerk experience, or her experience in government (companies often need to deal with government departments), or even because of her, let's call it fame. She wouldn't be unemployed for long.
Another way is to go part-time, and let the county office hire another clerk, also part-time, to handle those duties she finds objectionable. Then she can stay faithful and still do as much of her job as she can, and the county is in compliance with federal rulings, even up to the Supreme Court (which, in a wonderful ironic twist, she is willing to petition for her own case, when she is defying it and its ruling about her own job).
The fact that neither of these options seems to have occurred to her makes this seem, again, like something other than a religious freedom issue. To most casual observers (I am here avoiding both her avid supporters and the real avid opposers of her statements and actions), it seems like she isn't interested in her own religious freedom so much as forcing her own religion on others who are not already followers of it.
And that, still, is not religious freedom. It's an attempt at religious oppression.
Another way is to go part-time, and let the county office hire another clerk, also part-time, to handle those duties she finds objectionable. Then she can stay faithful and still do as much of her job as she can, and the county is in compliance with federal rulings, even up to the Supreme Court (which, in a wonderful ironic twist, she is willing to petition for her own case, when she is defying it and its ruling about her own job).
The fact that neither of these options seems to have occurred to her makes this seem, again, like something other than a religious freedom issue. To most casual observers (I am here avoiding both her avid supporters and the real avid opposers of her statements and actions), it seems like she isn't interested in her own religious freedom so much as forcing her own religion on others who are not already followers of it.
And that, still, is not religious freedom. It's an attempt at religious oppression.
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