Internet-ordained ministers

I don’t usually mention politics, but this article caught my attention, because John and I were married by an internet-ordained minister.

https://www.npr.org/2019/07/13/739043318/tennessee-lawmakers-aim-to-ban-weddings-by-internet-ordained-ministers

According to the article, Tennessee’s attempt to ban weddings officiated by internet-ordained ministers is a means to target LGBTQ marriages because those marriages often use internet-ordained ministers.

However, John and I used an internet-ordained minister because we decided we’d rather be married by a friend in our own backyard than by a church official we hardly knew.

In practicality, I don’t see how Tennessee could succeed in this. They might be able to require some additional form of licensing for those officiating weddings, but there’s no way they can require them to be religious. And who’s to say what constitutes a religion? Any one of us could start a religion, and probably make it sound less bizarre than most of the world religions we currently have.

Hmmm, that could be my new next calling…