Yeesh! This mess is certainly anything but the proverbial piece of cake.

In the next few days, Masterpiece Cakeshop vs. Colorado Civil Rights Commission goes before the U.S. Supreme Court. The outcome of this five-year legal battle will be significant, helping determine where we as a nation stand on important concepts like discrimination, freedoms of expression and religion, and tolerance for those with whom we fundamentally disagree.

At the heart of the issue is a dispute between a Christian baker and a same-sex couple. Back in 2012, Charlie Craig and David Mullins asked Jack Phillips, owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood, Colorado, to make them a wedding cake.

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If Phillips just goes ahead and bakes a cake for the two men, everybody lives happily-ever-after and this column turns out to be about how many Cheetos a certain writer can stuff into his mouth at one time. (Survey says: 12.)

Unfortunately, Phillips felt he had to take some sort of moral stand. The baker refused to create a cake, saying it would violate his religious beliefs. In other words: God don’t cotton to men lying down with men, and the last thing Phillips wanted was his Lord thinking one of his disciples was soft on sin.

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Now, at this point, if the couple simply says, “Good to know. Because frankly, we don’t want a narrow-minded homophobe anywhere near our special day,” this column is then about how many pounds of bacon a certain writer consumes each week. (Let’s just say it’s more than three and less than five.)

But alas, Craig and Mullins also felt the need to take a moral stand. So they reported Phillips to the state’s civil rights commission, everybody lawyered up, and here we are five years later — in the highest court in the land.

I’ve been trying this case in my tiny little brain for quite some time now, and I find compelling arguments on both sides. On the one hand, it’s not right that a customer should be denied service based solely on sexual orientation. But on the other hand, it feels just as wrong that a business owner would be forced to participate — however peripherally — in something he finds morally objectionable.

If the primary goal is to be proven right, either by God or by history, then a legal fight is very much the way to go. Because frankly, you’re pretty much guaranteed a sore winner and an even sorer loser, every time. But if the goal is to increase tolerance, understanding and love between people? That kind of justice rarely comes through the court system.

I get that Phillips thinks the Craig-Mullins union breaks a fundamental commandment of God. I even get the twisted logic that Phillips may think he’d be breaking a commandment simply by being a nice guy and making the cake. But do such lesser commandments trump the really big ones?

In the New Testament, a lawyer (of all people) asks Jesus which is the most important of all God’s commandments. And Jesus tells him that loving God is the “first and great commandment.”

But Jesus then offers a twofer, throwing in a second commandment of equal importance: “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”

Notice he didn’t say, “Love your neighbor unless he’s gay,” or “Love your neighbor unless he’s a homophobe.” He simply said, “Love your neighbor.”

Ah, but wait, there more! Because the Man from Galilee takes it one step further elsewhere in the Good Book when he says: “Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.”

So if those are the two most important commandments professed Christians should be keeping — loving God, and loving others no matter what terrible things they do — I wonder where that puts a perceived commandment against baking a “gay cake”?

WWJD? I’m fairly confident from the above verses that if Jesus had been a baker rather than a carpenter, he would have made Craig and Mullins a wedding cake — even if they were sinners.

Especially if they were sinners.

Of course, I find it equally ironic that two allegedly tolerant individuals could be so unforgiving toward a baker’s religious beliefs.

What I’d really love to see is the two parties arrive at the Supreme Court on Tuesday and say, “Your honors, we’re sorry we wasted your time. We’ve talked about it and have decided we both acted rashly. And now, if you’ll excuse us, we’re all going out to breakfast together.”

But that won’t happen. Because this never was about building understanding. This was only about proving that I’m right and you’re wrong.

And all that crap about loving your enemies and doing good to those who hate you? Meh, let them eat cake.

Or not.

Contact Mark Saal at 801-625-4272, or msaal@standard.net. Follow him on Twitter at @Saalman. Friend him on Facebook at facebook.com/MarkSaal.