ratboy's anvil

The Solution to the Gay Marriage Debate

The problem is a semantic one; a problem of meanings; a problem of language.

The transitive verb:

mar-ry v. -ried, -ry-·ing, -ries.

1. To join as spouses by exchanging vows.
   
2. To take as a spouse.
   
3. To give in marriage.
   
4. To perform a marriage ceremony for: The rabbi married the couple.
   
5. To obtain by marriage: marry money.
   
6. Nautical: To join (two ropes) end to end by interweaving their strands.
   
7. To unite in a close, usually permanent way: “His material marries the domestic and the exotic”.

Note that none of the above definitions speak to either gender nor religion

But the term ceremony itself can be used without religious context; a "graduation ceremony" for example. Therefore a marriage ceremony can be based on either a religious (sacred) or a non-religious (secular) premise.

This distinction is at the heart of the argument...along with the constitutional clause demanding separation of church and state.

Simple enough.

However, there is third concept involved which causes confusion and tends to make the distinctions less clear.

Two people cannot be considered married just because they exchange vows or sign a piece of paper which gives them licence or allows them to marry getting a marriage licence does NOT make you married). Nor can they be considered married even if those vows are witnessed by kith and kin. The marriage contract occurs legally only when a person who has been invested with the authority by the state declares the couple married.

For a majority of Americans who get married, this person invested with the state authority to make their marriage legal will be a member of the clergy of some recognized religion. This means that the two otherwise distinct forms of marriage are blended into one ceremony; both the sacred and the bureaucratic are combined.

This investment of state authority is in itself is a breach of the separation of church and state clause, but because it has gone on for so long, it seems completely normal and is almost never questioned.

If the religious aspect of marriage is removed from the equation and we are speaking only of civil marriages, all of the arguments used by the religious right or by those proposing a constitutional amendment barring same-sex marriage, as when Dubya referenced "cultural, religious and natural" traditions, are meaningless. And without those arguments, there is simply no rational reason not to allow same-sex couples to marry in a civil ceremony to make their relationship contractually legal in order, if for no other reason, that they be eligible to fulfill their legal responsibilities and pursue whatever advantages marriages bestows on married heterosexual couples, as citizens equal under the law.

Let all those who desire to be married legally to do so through a state appointed bureaucratic agent.

Those who desire to add a layer of sacredness according to the lights of their religion may do so freely.

Nothing will change or threaten the institution of marriage at all if this were done.
As it is heterosexual people who get married in civil ceremonies, such as the Las Vegas weddings, are not seen as threatening to the institution of marriage, so why should the civil marriage ceremony of same-sex partners be considered any more of a threat?

Related update comment from NY Times article:

March 19th, 2007 9:11 am

Here in Maine, we’ve recently added fuel to the Establishment Clause fire. A state legislator proposed a bill that would strip clergy of their status as agents of the state in the matter of performance of wedding ceremonies which are then recognized as legal.

There’s no question that this has been the historic practice in America for nearly all, if not our whole, history. “Just get me to the church on time. . .”

The bill was killed in committee before it ever made it to the legislature floor for a vote. The reasons appear to be as manifold and muddled as the practice itself. The Religious Right immediately opposed it on the grounds that it would be a stalking horse for those favoring gay marriage, though how this was supposed to happen was never made clear. Just saying it was enough to tar the proposal for a sizeable segment of the population, and to “put the fear of God,” into legislators with conservative constituencies. The “Portland Press Herald” contributed to the demise with an ignorant and silly editorial that said, essentially, that the bill would be an inconvenience to couples who wanted a religious ceremony by forcing them to get married twice–once by the civil authorities and once by their clergy person. Apparently the editors were unaware that in most countries of the world, this is precisely the case; legal marriages are those registered with the civil authorities. Religious ceremonies are just that– religious ceremonies which have religious, but no legal, status.

Interestingly, major support for the bill came from among the clergy themselves, myself included. Many of us do not wish to serve as agents of the state in any respect, believing that to do so does, in fact, violate whatever shreds of reality left in the Establishment Clause. I’m happy to conduct a religious ceremony for those couples that wish to make a spiritual covenant with one another that goes beyond the legal, contractual aspects of marriage. But I have no wish to be the legalizing authority.

— Posted by Larry R. Kalajainen