Fire over California's Prop. 8

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is under external fire for heavily promotinng the campaign for California's Proposition 8, which is intended to overturn a state Supreme Court ruling that permits gay marriage.

There is also fire within as some Mormon families to leave. ABC affiliate News10 in Sacramento, California reports:

SALT LAKE CITY, UT - There's backlash against the LDS church over Proposition 8. LDS members in Utah, even some entire families are leaving the church because of its opposition to gay marriage.

Division within the church began well before the Nov. 4 vote in California, according to the Salt Lake Tribune and others.

Dissent has reached so high into the church's hierarchy of members that in at least one case, that of Nebraska's Andrew Callahan, steps toward excommunication are being taken.

Callahan, who describes himself as a "high priest in good standing" in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, has apologize for and explained his stand in a letter.

At the letter's conclusion he asks several questions:

When gay marriages began to be performed in Massachusetts and later California, did it cause you to want to leave your wife? Did it cause you to become gay or want to become gay? Did it cause your you or your wife to abandon or want to abandon your children? Did it cause you to fall into a life of debauchery and sin? Did it cause you to change your life in any way for the worse? If none of these things happened to you, was that because you are superior to others, or because there is no real harm to come from gay marriage? If you didn’t experience these terrible things and I didn’t, and President Monson didn’t, and I can find no one else who did, then what harm is there to the family? Please, tell me what catastrophes or terrible outcomes await us if gay marriages continue as opposed to if they are stopped? Would not the precedent of a religious minority able to codify its own morality offer a greater risk to Mormonism and to society than gay marriage? Is going down the slippery slope of taking rights away from minorities really a good idea?

If only it were merely an internal church argument now.

Intensity of the rhetoric appears to be escalating.

Anti-gay violence has been linked to the matter.

Catholic Church and Mormon involvement have built, largely because of questions about nonprofit church involvement in electoral affairs, a terrible fire.