There are four primary options here:
- Allow gay couples to marry and give them all of the rights and privileges of married couples.
- Allow gay couples to form civil unions and give them all of the rights and privileges of married couples.
- Deny gay couples the right to marry and deny them all of the rights and privileges of married couples.
- Deny gay couples the right to marry but give them some rights of married couples.
What I'm wondering about are the arguments against option 1. Obama says that he prefers not to call it marriage but that he is willing to allow them option 2. Is it just about the term "marriage," then? What is the argument against calling it "marriage?" Do people against using the term think that the institution of marriage will lose its meaning? Will my marriage not mean anything because a gay couple is allowed to marry?
James Dobson says, echoing a familiar slippery slope argument, "If marriage means everything, it means absolutely nothing. It will mean nothing to same-sex as well as opposite-sex couples. The current decline of the institution of marriage will be accelerated. Increasing numbers of couples will elect to simply 'live together'."
I'm not sure that I follow the logic there. Allowing gay couples to marry will mean that more heterosexual couples will "simply 'live together'"?
What about "civil unions" with all of the rights and privileges of married couples? Does that option work?
The primary argument I see against allowing gays to have the same rights as married couples is that it legitimizes homosexuality in the eyes of the government. It says that the "perversion," to use the passage from Romans 1 is actually okay.
Is that a useful way to test whether something is lawful?
Please let me know what the arguments are, for I can't find too much intelligent stuff out there. For me, it's an issue that I don't really care about (for I am not gay), and I have often wondered why so many people are against it. I know I have made an implied argument here, but I really am wondering what the reasoned arguments are.
6 comments:
Nice photo, Chad. Was that taken on the mean streets of Columbia, South Carolina back in '93? A personal photo from your archives, perhaps??
;-)
A serious response incoming...
WD
First off, as a Catholic I believe that marriage is a sacrament given by Christ to the Church. Therefore the state cannot really define what marriage is and is not.
Therefore, the Church defines what marriage is...not the federal government. The Church defined marriage a long, long time ago...like 1st century. Once the Church defines dogma it cannot change it.
The federal government calls my union with my wife a marriage but it has no bearing on the status of our sacramental union. If the federal government tomorrow told me that I wasn't married it wouldn't phase me because I know that I am in a covenantal/sacramental bond with my wife which was made before God in the Church.
There is nothing sacrosanct about the word "marriage." Many hetero-sexual marriages aren't validly marriages according to canon law...such as people who marry over and over again.
I really don't care if the federal government decides that a homosexual marriage is valid...as it doesn't really make it valid. It would just mean that the state approves of it.
Having said that, in a perfect world, the civil government would harmonize with God's law as given in His Word and through His Church. Therefore, I would prefer for marriage to be defined as between 1 man and 1 woman.
I think if the catholic church put as much effort and money into supporting marriages within their church, as they do fighting homosexuals and protecting pedophile priests (more than 2 billion dollars since 1950), the national divorce rate would probably drop about 10 percent.
I think the church, both catholic and protestant, should harmonize itself with God's law first, then it can start worrying about the state.
As horrible as homosexual/predator priests are, it has nothing to do with the definition of marriage.
The Church is still allowed to have doctrines and sacraments.
The Church is dogmatically, harmonized with God's law. For this reason the Church upholds the sanctity of marriage as a sacrament.
Unfortunately, as was the case in Paul's (and before) time, there are wolves among the sheep.
I was asked how I would define marriage...I don't see how throwing out a red-herring about clergy abuse is related to marriage.
My point, by which I stand, is that the civil government does not have the power to define marriage.
Weak red herring, Mark. Cheap shot. While I am certainly no papist I can defend the RC church. A vast majority of their clergy have remained steadfast and pure in their vocations.
Furthermore, there has been rank heresy within much of the Protestant denominations over the past century or so.
The fact that we are debating whether or not marriage is between a man and a woman in 2008 is a mark of how unmoored our culture has become...
This is great info to know.
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