For those who have followed the news, there has been a big political snafu happening in Kentucky.

Rowan County Clerk Kim Davis decided she would refuse to issue any and all marriage licenses to same-sex couples due to the fact it goes against her moral beliefs. The problem is, not only has she refused to issue marriage licenses, but she has tried to prevent her employees from issuing licenses as well.

As a result of these actions, Davis was sent to jail for refusing to issue marriage licenses to people who now have a legal right to them.

There are many important factors in this case and none of them should be overlooked. We can, and should, learn a great deal from what is going on in Kentucky, and to ignore any part of the happenings down south would be a great disservice for anyone paying attention to what’s going on there.

First and foremost, Davis’s belief that she cannot participate in handling legal documentation for same-sex couples should be seen as valid for now.

We’re expected to believe Caitlin Jenner when she says she has always felt like a woman trapped in a man’s body.

We’re expected to believe that Emma Sulkowicz was raped while at Columbia University because she said so.

Why then do so many want to question Davis’s belief that God does not want her to participate at all in same-sex marriages?

If you believe that an all-powerful God wants you to do X, it’s only logical to assume that you’ll do X.

We can’t blame Davis for doing what she believes is the right thing anymore than we can blame a Mormon for not working on Sundays or a Muslim for abstaining from pork.

In this case, she seems to be saying she doesn’t think God wants her to participate in LGBT marriages, yet we all want to assume this has nothing to do with her religious beliefs and everything to do with her bigotry towards same-sex couples.

Time will tell if this is truly because of an honest and sincere belief in her idea of God or if it’s just the excuse she’s using to act the way she is.

Although a healthy level of skepticism is never a bad thing, we shouldn’t discard the idea she could indeed be sincere in her religious beliefs by condemning her as a bigot. If we’re going to assume that Jenner and Sulkowicz were being honest, it’s only fair to assume that Davis is being honest as well, until additional evidence comes out indicating otherwise.

Secondly, supporters are painting Davis as the first, of possibly many, Christian martyrs who will need to suffer legal consequences for their belief that marriage is between one man and one woman. These supporters need to use a different brush.

The fact is, many people think marriage should be between a man and a woman. Mitt Romney thinks that. Many in Utah and across the U.S. think that. I think that.

None of us have been imprisoned for that belief. In fact, I don’t think we’ve imprisoned people for simply believing something since the McCarthy Era, when we seeked out American communists. We arrest people for things they do, not for things they believe.

Davis had a job to issue marriage licenses. And she refused to do that for a portion of the American population who now have a legal right to marry. She is being held in contempt by the court for obstructing the legal system. In other words, she is in jail for what she did, not for what she believes.

Thirdly, we have to understand the difference between rights, duties and privileges.

Rights are freedoms the government is supposed to protect both in the public square as well as the privacy of your own property. Duties are responsibilities you are expected to carry out. Privileges are benefits you are allowed to have in the public square as well as on the property of others.

We have a right to free speech in public. We don’t have the right to say whatever we want at work. I can only imagine what employees at Walmart would say if they were free to say whatever they wanted while on the clock.

We have the right to belong to a religion. We don’t have a right to make employers bend to our every religious whim in order to hire us. Employers do have a duty to accommodate religious worship as much as they reasonably can. If they can give someone his or her holy holidays off that is a privilege for the employee.

Rights, duties and privileges aren’t the same thing.

Davis has the right to believe same-sex marriages aren’t valid in the eyes of God. She has taken an oath, however, that makes it her duty to uphold the law. Since she abandoned her duty she has lost the privilege of doing her job and is now in contempt of court.

Davis can either choose to perform her duty and keep the privilege of working as a county clerk or she can quit her job and find a new one where her duties don’t conflict with her beliefs.

Fourthly, the ideal solution to this Kentucky-fried problem would be finding a middle ground where Davis, and others like her, could follow their religious conscience while keeping their oaths as clerks. This is where Kentucky can learn from Utah.

Utah has created a system where those clerks who don’t feel comfortable performing same-sex marriages can opt out of performing them altogether. Under Utah’s current system, a clerk’s office only requires one clerk who is willing to perform all marriages. It allows clerks who may not feel comfortable with same-sex marriage to stay true to their religious beliefs without neglecting their duties as clerks.

I feel Utah’s current system is an ideal role model for other states to follow. We have done a great job as a state reasonably balancing the rights of the individual with the rights of the whole.