I understand that people of some faiths have problems with issues like marriage equality and abortion. I understand that those people may have the strongest belief that their faith is the one true faith, and that people who are gay are going against God’s law, that people who have abortions are killing a human being.

I don’t have those beliefs.

There are people whose faith requires them to treat women as less than a man, where women are subservient to men, where they can’t act without the say-so of a man. They have the strongest belief that their faith is the one true faith, and those who touch a woman or let a woman handle her own business are going against God’s word.

I don’t have those beliefs.

There are people who truly believe with all their heart that people with dark skin are inferior. There are religions that touted that tenet for decades — even centuries. They believe that God made people with dark skin are heathens meant to serve white men.

I think those people are full of shit.

There are people who think the first paragraph is perfectly reasonable, but the third and fifth are the beliefs of people who should be ignored.

What I want to know is why the people who believe with all their heart that marriage  between to men or two women is a great sin get to have their way? We live in a society that protects the beliefs of all people. If you want to live in a theocracy, where your beliefs are the basis of the laws of the land, try Vatican City, Iran, or one of many African countries that render homosexual acts illegal.

I want to believe that this is a country where religion doesn’t determine how anyone behaves except the adherents of that religion, and where people of no religion have the same rights as everyone else.

That’s a faith I can get behind.