Church and State

So I'm LDS which most of you already know. I have been sitting on the sidelines for a while now watching everyone go on and on about prop 8. I haven't wanted to get involved because honestly I already have my views about it and I am a firm believer in the saying "A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still." So on that note I am not going to write in such a way that I am trying to convince anyone to change their views on anything. I am only going to pose a couple questions that have been really bothering me lately. Mostly regarding the LDS church and their overwhelming support of "yes on prop 8".

First off I'm having a hard time understanding why the church is getting involved at all in a political issue. Does the whole separation of church and state not apply for some reason here? Some might say "well this is a moral issue so we need to get involved". If that's true then why didn't we get involved when we jumped head first in to this war? I find that war often leads to death and destruction of whole cities. I'm pretty sure that ought to be considered a moral issue! Why was there not a peep out of church leaders about that?

Why is our church raising and spending $21 million on the fight against gay marriage? 2 1 M I L L I O N D O L L A R S?!!! How many starving children could we have fed with that money? How many lives could we have saved in Darfur? How many homeless people could we have reached out to? And all because we are afraid. This is a civil rights issue. And last time I checked out church history we didn't have the best reputation for upholding civil rights. The LDS church took a stand against the civil rights of women, and black people. Of course your not gonna get that info at church, but check out some church history and it's all there. And as far as I could tell it all worked out all right. I mean, I can own property and vote, so thats good... right? Could it be that we are in the same situation now?

I recently read a book called SWAY. It talks about why people do irrational things. It says that two major reasons why people make irrational choices is because of #1 Fear of loss and #2 Commitment. I was thinking about how that applies to this prop 8 situation. The rationale I am hearing from people in the church is that they are afraid of losing their own rights if gay people are allowed to get married. That is what the average white man was afraid of in the 19th century with blacks gaining their own civil rights. I also see how the church has sent out the calvary on this issue and all these people are doing it out of a strong commitment to their faith. Key word there is commitment. Case in point, 70% of the funds raised in the christian coalition are from the LDS church members. So what I am asking you all now is, does all of this seem rational to you?

God asked us to use our faculties and choose for ourselves. Yes the LDS church has a prophet and for some it is enough to follow him without taking the time to pray for ourselves. But I don't think that is what his purpose here is. You don't have to read much of the scriptures, ancient or modern, to see that prophets are quite capable of making bad choices here and there, just like the rest of us. (I'm tempted to put a slanderous racial quote in here from Brigham Young, but I'll spare you.) So this is my conundrum. I am seriously disappointed in how members are handling this situation. But, who knows. Maybe i'm just the voice of corruption, the spawn of the devil. Or that poor Megan who fell by the wayside. Judge if you must, but as my good friend Amanda says, "I choose to ere on the side of compassion."