First, let me say I support marriage between consenting adults (to me the term gay marriage is somewhat prejudice, just as the term bi-racial marriage is).

My point is that the freedom to exercise religion, which is a first amendment right, comes from a greater freedom: freedom of conscience. Now, of course, the first amendment also contains the (non) establishment clause as well. My point was not that religion should be part of government, which you seem to imply (I could be wrong). I support and advocate that all people should follow the dictates of their respective consciences, even if they are misguided, and in some cases simply wrong, because it is necessary for the freedom of all. To me, this is how it seems: Religious people are "bad" for trying to express their conscience and using their voice in government to deny marriage rights. The caption above asserts that "you are not free to use your religion to take away the freedom of others." However, these people have the right not only to think (perhaps incorrectly) for themselves, they also have a right to be represented and partake in their own government. To assert that these people "are not free to use [their] religion (and thus, use their conscience) [when partaking in the political process]" is to try to deny them an even greater freedom (in my opinion)--i.e., the freedom to be represented in their government, or rather, more simply, the freedom to vote and hold their government accountable. I am not saying that denying the freedom to marry to consenting adults is not a grave injustice. That was my point of quoting the first few paragraphs of Federalist 10, especially the last paragraph quoted above.

If you look up the rest and read, the main point of Federalist 10 is that the people will (hopefully) elect representatives to the Federal Government that will protect the greater public good when it is attacked by the State governments, which is accomplished mainly by protecting the minority from the "moral majority". This is already happening in real life, as a number of Federal District Courts have held bans on gay marriage, and even DOMA, to be unconstitutional.

Again, I support marriage between consenting adults, but I also support every individual's right to exercise their freedom of conscience and their right to suffrage. It is true that in the present case, the majority is tyrannizing the minority (fortunately, the federal courts are in the process of remedying this), but to deny freedom of conscience and freedom to suffrage to a certain group based on their beliefs would be the minority tyrannizing the majority.

As for the Middle East, you just picked a huge tangent. There is much strife, but to place the blame squarely on religion is naive at best. Look at Iran, for instance, and then look up "Operation AJAX" where the American and British governments (secular governments I might add) overthrew another secular government in the early 50s. I am not trying to justify the present theocracy in Iran or the Iranian revolution in 79. I am asserting, however, that the present theocracy in Iran would not exist had not the British and US secular governments overthrown a legitimate government and replaced it with another that used Nazi torture techniques on its own citizens.

And that is only a small factor in the history of it all. For the past 200 years, foreign powers have been using religions within the Middle East to keep the region weak in order to take advantage of their natural resources. Here's a question and answer: How long have the Shiites and Sunnis been killing each other? For over a thousand years. That still didn't stop the Western Empires in the 18th and 19th centuries (mainly Great Britain and France) from strategically organizing countries so that they included both sects in order to keep the governments and nations nearly always at the brink of civil war to the nation's disadvantage and the West's advantage.

On an even larger time scale (think for 4000 years), the geographical area of Palestine and Israel is so valuable mostly because it is one of the best land routes between the East and the West. Before international shipping, if one controlled that land route, one controlled the majority of the trade between East and West. Being able to tax that trade is a huge source of government income. I am not saying religion wasn't used as an excuse to continually invade the area, which it was (e.g., the Crusades). I am saying that the excuse was to cover up many other economic short comings of Western "Civilization" at the time.

The point of the above Middle East spiel is that religion is often used as an excuse for many other things. It is true that it can cause hate, but so can any other misguided philosophy (Nietzsche's avocation of sexism) or science (e.g, look up Eugenics, or better yet, Hitler's Aryan race). To place the blame solely on religion is naive at best, and at its worse, it is to blatantly ignore history in order to promote one's own prejudice.

On a side note, I distrust "religious government" not because of the word "religious" but because of the word "government".

TL;DR Don't hate! Commiserate. :D