When the topic of gay marriage comes up, it makes me wonder who is really in charge.  There always seems to be a special interest group on one side or the other vying for our attention so they can “get the word out” about the inconvenience that the folks on the other side of the debate are causing them.  Then the call goes out for all of us who agree to put the pressure on our elected officials to vote the way we see it and thus resolve the issue in each of our respective states to our satisfaction.

            But, to put it bluntly, I really don’t give a rat’s patooty what any legislature, any court, or any arm of government says that marriage is or is not.  It does not matter to me in the least what the state’s opinion is on the topic.  It is not the government’s place to define marriage; the responsibility must rightfully be placed elsewhere, and the civic powers need to acquiesce to the true authority on the subject, which is religion.

Did he just say “patooty?”

            Most philosophers and pundits typically say that marriage is a civil institution, a societal institution, and a religious institution, and then proceed to argue about exactly what blend of those three sources would apply.  But a look at the historical sources of this thing we now call marriage would properly rule out the first two of those three.  In just about all ancient societies, to marry meant to participate in some sort of religious ceremony performed by a priest, witch doctor, tribal elder, or whomever to invoke the blessing of God (or whatever gods they held as deities) upon the formation of the new family unit at the center of the ritual.  The validity of any such rite was almost never questioned, and if it was it usually had something to do with the religious credentials of the officiant.  Even kings were married to their queens by a bishop or his parallel.  Any couple who cohabited without the accepted validation of some sort of religious blessing was considered to be in a “common law” marriage, which was generally held to be at least suspect if not evil by the surrounding society, and the children of such a union were labeled as illegitimate.

            If we then define marriage as a religious institution, then it must follow that we must allow our religion to define for us not only how it is initiated, but what it is.  The role of government in the process is merely to recognize the community property rights, tax allowances, and other items that their involvement necessitates.  Such rights are generally conferred on whomever a minister of a recognized religion presents to the civil authorities as the participants in the new family unit which the ceremony created.

“Patooty” isn’t in the spell checker

            At this point, some would rightly contend that this arrangement opens a virtual Pandora’s box of potential problems.  What about homosexual marriage?  What about those religions which endorse polygamy?  Or about those that say that puberty is an acceptable age of consent, or even younger?  So on one hand, if I adhere to a religion that teaches that marriage is acceptable only for a heterosexual, monogamous couple, then that is what marriage is to me, and no government body, no other faith, and no person or group within society has the right to tell me that I must accept any view that says otherwise.  On the other hand, many groups who exist in the United States as recognized religious groups do permit marriages that are defined outside normal Biblical parameters.  Metropolitan Churches, who present themselves as a gay Christian denomination, greatly desire the opportunity to perform marriages for their lesbian and homosexual members.  Even though the Mormon Church has officially reversed their position on polygamy, it is still recognized by some Muslim nations, certain African societies, and was practiced in the early years of the nation of ancient Israel.  Many societies and religions also accept persons as prospective marriage partners who are younger than U. S. laws allow.  We would also have the obvious problem of persons of no religion at all who desire to marry; what rules or guidelines would they follow?

            This seemingly daunting slate of problems should not deter us from pursuing the goal of keeping government out of the defining of marriage.  The courtrooms and state capitols are not the proper battleground for this fight.  By shifting the theater to the sphere of religion, we keep our civic leadership on their side of Jefferson’s “wall of separation between church and state” and allow the battle for the family to remain where it rightfully belongs.

            It may be that the state would have a compelling interest in the area of setting a lower age limit for those who could be recognized as eligible for the application of the civil laws that are afforded to the wedded couple, as well as certain other necessary protections for those who may not be aware of the responsibilities they are invoking for themselves as participants.  But it makes no sense for the municipal powers to be able to say “no” to the rights of those consenting adults who enter into a marriage covenant under the auspices of a legitimate, or even an illegitimate but recognized religion.

Keeping their patooty out of it

            If there is to be an ensuing free-for-all concerning the various religions’ conflicting definitions of marriage and the family unit, at least in this situation it would be happening in the correct arena.  I have written elsewhere about the wording of the Constitution where it addresses freedom of religion (see the article The Religious Marketplace linked below), so it is only consistent that in this matter, which is religious in nature, the sole interest of the government would be merely to recognize that which has already taken place in the religious ceremony (if, in fact, there is any need for them to do anything at all).  Thus we leave the state without the option to refuse to grant the appropriate civil rights to any consenting adults who participate in the free exercise of their religion.

            Finally, as for those of no religious affiliation at all, how could they marry?  My answer is simply: why would they want to?  The same end could be reached by means of a civil union/domestic partnership pact which could bind the participants legally, and therefore give the government a contractual basis to work from.  Since religion implies that there is a deity watching over the union, and the deity would exert power to enforce the bonding between the persons involved, then the contract would replace this god as the means of ensuring the bond, and a “divorce” would simply involve a dissolution agreement recognized by both parties as superseding the original contract.  The ultimate responsibility for any moral obligations between the parties would be their own business, since they recognize no god to whom they must give account for this breakdown.

            If this sounds a bit cold and less-than-personal, that is understandable.  Marriage is more than a mere contract—it is a covenant.  And although these two terms are often compared by theologians attempting to explain what a covenant is, they represent two different levels of agreement.  A covenant is meant to be a lifetime commitment, but a contract most often ends when a time limit expires or a particular goal is achieved.  A covenant involves all that a person is and has, where a contract most often involves only a single aspect of life—a job to be done or a financial arrangement (for this insight I am indebted to Huston Smith and his excellent book The World’s Religions—San Francisco, HarperCollins, 1991—see the chapter on Judaism.  It is also listed in my citations page linked below and mentioned in the article Evaluation).

So the real ulterior motive is …

            I believe that marriage can only be legitimate when it involves two and only two heterosexual, monogamous persons, one female and one male, with the primary purpose of creating a stable environment for the possible procreation and upbringing of children; and any other reasons being secondary.  This is what I believe the Bible teaches about marriage, and my own local fellowship as well as the historic Christian Church agrees with this definition.  If the First Amendment of the U. S. Constitution is held to be valid, then neither any arm of the state nor any branch of any government has the right to try to make me believe differently.  I must reject the notion that marriage is anything other than a religious institution, therefore my religion informs me as to what I should believe on the subject; no other system may interfere with that belief.  Other faiths may believe and practice what they please—I will not interfere with them, despite the fact that I may personally find their theories and explanations of marriage to be defective, ludicrous and frivolous.

            I recognize that my view of this may seem much too libertarian for the comfort of my conservative friends.  They may ask why I would not want our government to define what sort of marital unions may receive apposite civil rights.  The answer is simply that this issue is best left up to the churches, and the government needs to stay out of it altogether.  Religious rights in America have been gradually and subtly eroded in many other ways lately, and it does not require a stretching of the imagination to see that if we allow the state to define what marriage is, then it will quickly follow that Christian pastors and ministers may someday be required to perform wedding ceremonies in situations with which they disagree.  Sillier things have happened and are happening—we are already seeing a parallel in the case of the Christian, pro-life gynecologists who are being threatened with the revocation of their license to practice medicine because they will not themselves perform abortions, even though they will refer patients to a practice which does.  We also see this in the tendency of local zoning regulations being allowed to trump individual religious rights when they are used to prohibit people from holding prayer meetings in their own homes.