The city saw progress;
It’s moving, at last,
But the church remains stubbornly
Stuck in the past

When Kat married Krista
They first had to fight
Till the city agreed
To their benefits right

So health care was covered
Which only seems just
And the city agreed
That they certainly must

And Kat’s parents supported
Her fight all along
They were quite in the right—
Now their church says they’re wrong

The church has the parents
In hot (holy) water
Demanding the couple
Abandon their daughter!

Or at least, they must publicly
Fully repent
(“What? Supporting our daughter?
That’s not what we meant!”

“She’s sinful and evil,
Her marriage a fraud!
I denounce here right now
In the name of my God!”)

But the parents are better
Than God up above
Their daughter (now, daughters)
Get nothing but love.

For good, loving parents,
There’s but one way to choose:
If it’s church or your daughter
Then the church has to lose

From CNN’s belief blog, a couple on a bit of a nightmarish roller coaster ride. Kat and Krista are married (yay!); Krista’s parents have essentially disowned her (boo!). Kat’s parents love them both (yay!) and have supported them while they fought, successfully (yay!), for health benefits from the city where Kat is a police detective. Not all parents are so supportive (boo!)

So the family supported their daughters through the court battle (yay!) and their church wants to recognize that display of familial love… by kicking them out of the church (I’m gonna go with “boo!” here, even though I think being kicked out of church is cause for celebration).

Elders at Ridgedale Church of Christ told Linda Cooper and two relatives that their public support for Kat Cooper, Linda Cooper’s gay daughter, went against the church’s teachings, local media reported. In a private meeting, reports say, Linda Cooper was given a choice: publicly atone for their transgressions or leave the church.

Linda left the church.

More proof that morality is innate–clearly, in this case, the moral thing to do was to go against the wishes of the church.

When the Ridgedale congregation next updates its membership rolls, it will be crossing out the Coopers. The family told the local newspaper they were devastated to leave a church where they had been active for 60 years.

For now, both the Coopers and their former church are standing by their own convictions, and after six decades of traveling together, they are heading in different directions.

Those different directions are not equally valid; they are right and wrong. The Coopers have done right. The church is doubling down on wrong.