Our Gang (or important representatives thereof)
The First Amendment does not actually mandate a separation of Church and State except to the extent that it forbids Congress to establish a religion and further forbids it to prohibit the free exercise of religious belief. It guarantees freedom OF religion, but it does not now nor was it ever intended to guarantee a freedom FROM religion. It has always been perfectly alright for organized religions to urge their people to vote for or against given causes or to donate funds for supporting or resisting such causes. And for a couple of centuries it has been considered perfectly appropriate for The Ten Commandments or other quotations from the Mosaic Code or from the law that replaced it in the Meridian of Times to be engraved in stone on public buildings. It is not necessary to strip the majority of its rights in order to protect those of minorities.
I am saddened to see some Latter-day Saints becoming uncomfortable with the position which the Prophet took in favor of Proposition 8 in the recent election in California. Two similar propositions were passed in other states. Some Saints seem to be embarrassed to stand with the Church in this thing. They seem to wish that they could be politically correct in the eyes of the world and simultaneously be considered faithful to the principles of the Gospel.
This can never be. Inevitably, the principles (or lack of same) by which the world lives and judges will come into conflict with the doctrines of the Church and expected behaviors of its membership. This does not prevent the members from disagreeing with each other on political issues. Even in the leadership of the Church there have been examples over the years of political division among the brethren. But this division is purely political. It does not become a schism (to employ a much-used and oft-needed word from European Catholic history) in the establishment of doctrine and policy in the Lord's Church.
After all, it is His Church. We are members of it, because we believe that He called Joseph Smith to be His prophet of the Restoration. We believe that the current president of the Church is also a prophet just as literally and just as authoritatively as Moses, Joshua, Jeremiah, Isaiah, or any other such person. He speaks for the Lord. He speaks with authority. If he didn't, I wouldn't bother to be a member of this Church. It would be pointless to join or become active in a Church which is without Godly authority. Its doctrines would be powerless to comfort me regarding life, death, or the purposes of each of them. It would only be a sort of club for humans who think the same way about existential questions. Such a Church could not authoritatively seal me to my wife and children and to my siblings and parents. And in the difficult end times which seem to be approaching so quickly, such a Church would be powerless to give me saving counsel or comforting assurances.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the Lord's Church. It is not a democracy of any kind. It is a perfect theocracy. Its organization is perfect and its God is perfect. Its membership of imperfect people would be badly served by anything less than a Church which gets its organization, doctrines, and direction from the living God.
