This is an attack on personal freedom

I am at a loss to understand what it is about the legitimization of the nearly 20-year relationship with my partner that Pastor Joe Fuiten is so obsessed with [“Nationwide forces likely to have role in challenge at the polls,” page one, Feb. 3].

We have never met Fuiten. We have no intention of ever stepping foot in his church. We love each other, we are loved by all of our friends and family. We have good jobs in which we are respected. We pay taxes.

Hmm, come to think of it, I’m not sure Fuiten pays taxes — his Cedar Park Assembly of God Church certainly doesn’t pay taxes in an exemption due to its status as a “church.” A status conditioned on its mission of spreading the doctrine of Jesus (hence the word, “Christian”), the Jesus who uttered not one word about sexual orientation — whose greatest commandment was to “love one another.”

Fuiten said attorneys are working to determine wording of his planned referendum to prevent my partner and I from realizing a legal validation of our long-term commitment. This doesn’t sound at all like what you’d expect of a Christian church when there are so many in need of the basics of life: food, water, shelter. Yet apparently it is perfectly legal for Fuiten and people who are providing the financial means to ignore these things and go after me — hiring lawyers and amassing money using their tax-exempt status on something entirely unrelated.

There will be a lot of attention paid as the anti-rights groups mount their attacks on personal freedom — I would hope that one group keeping an eye on things will be the IRS, as so-called reverends such as Fuiten use their sanctuaries in way that are reminiscent of another frightening group masquerading as a religious entity, the Taliban.

— David R. Noe, Seattle