01 May 2013 Project 21’s Nedd: Sharpton No Longer Seems Wedded to Religion Beliefs

Earlier this week, Jason Collins — a mediocre player in the NBA — likely garnered himself at least one more year of play and a spot in the NBA’s Hall of Fame by announcing that he is homosexual.

Reverend Al Sharpton, never one miss an opportunity to toe the extremely liberal line, took to the pages of the Huffington Post web site to declare Collins a “role model” as well as salute “the courage and candor of Mr. Collins” and his “incredible contribution to this country both on and off the basketball court.”

All that because Collins told Sports Illustrated he likes guys.

But Sharpton didn’t stop with platitudes for Collins.  He used the announcement to go completely off the rails and against his religious background by using the Collins coming out party as a means of criticizing the institution of marriage.

In his commentary, Sharpton wrote:

Many of my fellow members of the Church think that marriage is sacred between a man and a woman according to the Bible, but if that’s the basis, then why do we allow secular judges to conduct marriage when we don’t know what the judge’s personal beliefs are, if any?…  The answer is, we really don’t believe that ourselves and we live in a nation where we do have separation of Church and state.  Therefore, why should anyone get to decide which partners are afforded legal rights and which partners are not?

Council Nedd II, the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Missionary Church and a member of the Project 21 black leadership network, faults Sharpton’s understanding of the religious underpinnings of marriage:

For Al Sharpton to say that marriage isn’t sacred tells me that he has completed his transition from ordained minister in the church of God to become a full-blown media personality.

Any first-year student at a local Bible college will not dispute the sanctity of holy matrimony.  Even a religious novice should have enough acumen to make a distinction between a civil joining of two people and two people making vows to God before their friends and relatives.

Sharpton asks why churches don’t conduct divorces?  The church did conduct divorces for about the first 1,700 years of Christian history.  In England, one still cannot remarry in a church without a proper decree of nulity from the church.  This is why they have so many civil partnerships in England.  In the Philippines, one cannot divorce without the specific permission of the Roman Catholic Church.

There is this book Al Sharpton might have heard about called the Bible.  In this book, Christ says render unto Caesar that which is Caesars.  The state, for its own reason, has usurped and placed its authority above that of the church.

How can Al Sharpton side with Caesar over scripture regarding the sacrament of marriage?