How could declining an invitation to sing at Trump's inauguration when they've sung at so many other inaugurations in the past possibly NOT be seen as a political statement.
Frankly, I'm uncomfortable with a religious organization endorsing the government (or being "patriotic", as you put it) even in a non-partisan way. The problem's more apparent when it's a religious minister giving an invocation or the like during a government ceremony, but there's still a problem when a religiously-affiliated group performs in a government ceremony, IMO.
So it's not that they're going to participate in Trump's inauguration. It's that the idea of them participating in
any government-related ceremony? Hypothetically speaking, had a candidate you thought was spectacular won, would you still be opposed to a religious group participating in the inauguration? Would it matter at all if they only songs performed were of a patriotic nature and not in any way religion?
I'm finding your take on this whole thing really interesting. The LDS Church strongly encourages its members to be actively involved in the political process and in the organizations governing them, from the local to the national levels. I don't think (maybe I'm wrong, though) that you'd have a problem with this, as long as they didn't come right out and tell its members how to vote, etc. You just don't like the idea of the organization itself setting an example. See, here's where this strikes me as odd... The Church tells its members to show love, compassion and nondiscrimination towards the LGBT community. But I suspect that you'd be critical of the fact that it doesn't seem to be leading by example in this case. So what's the difference? Should the Church as an organization say, "Do what I say and not what I do" or what?