If You Want to Play the Game

Kevin Drum gets it exactly right here in commenting on the Mormon Church's involvement in the Prop 8 battle in California and the subsequent protests against them:

QUOTE OF THE DAY....From the Mormon church, reacting to protests against their campaign to pass Proposition 8 in California:

"People of faith have been intimidated for simply exercising their democratic rights. These are not actions that are worthy of the democratic ideals of our nation. The end of a free and fair election should not be the beginning of a hostile response in America."

I'm afraid the church elders have it exactly backward here. Churches have every right to involve themselves in political issues, but if they do then they're going to be treated as political actors. Protests, boycotts, op-eds, blog posts, and marches are exactly the democratic ideals of our nation, and being on the receiving end of them is what happens to anyone who enters the political fray. It's a little late to pretend you didn't know this.

While I am not a big fan of protesting in front of churches and definitely do not agree with disrupting services as a political tactic, when a church gives in the political arena it can expect to take as well. You can't have one without the other.