Where did it all go..... wrong? Or atleast where did it all change.

I don't want to imply that anything is "wrong" or that I'm unhappy with anything but as I was listening to NPR today I had to wonder... where did I get my centrist/slightly-left beliefs?  My parents are staunchly republican, most of the influences in my life have been very Conservative, and yet I find my self at odds with the very beliefs that I grew up with.  Not all of them, there's a lot of things I like about the Conservative values but I do find myself more and more disagreeing with some of their core values.

The "Right" says to protect the sanctity of marriage by keeping it man-woman.  I find myself saying "Okay, then separate government from it and make marriage a religion ceremony and the government will view everything as a civil union".  Who cares who you marry/love, it's not the role of the government to dictate your lifestyle.

The "Right" says we're a nation founded on judeo-christian values but that's not the case either.  Religious freedom was a law put in place to stop the federal government from coming in a persecuting religions.  No one talks about local governments and all the horrible persecutions they did.  The founding fathers knew that religion should play no role in government because it would lead to the same things that happened in England, at lest on a federal level.  I'm sure they were wise enough to recognize that they couldn't pin down persecution in local colonies.  

I'm not saying either side has it right but whatever happened to our separation of church and state?  Where did we get the audacious idea that it was fine for us impose our beliefs through a federal government.  I get that, for example, Utah will always be a Mormon state and will be influenced that way... and I'm fine with that.  I'm fine with state rights being what they are and the federal government having to take a far more neutral stance.  But where the state and the federal government have to play together, local religion should play no part and we should be mature enough to keep the two separate.