Marriage is a legal act, not a religious one. Married is a legal status.
So all unions should be – in law – civil unions, no matter the genders.
If people want to, they can go ahead and add a religious ceremony.
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Yes but Moe, my bronze-age book o’ wisdom sez that a marriage is between a man and a woman. This secular egalitarian conception of marriage seems just a little too inclusive and justice orientated for me and my imaginary friends’ liking. I doth protest.
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Doesn’t it also say something about giving your daughter in marriage in exchange for some goats and other good stuff?
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And some air-tight rules about selling her into slavery too! Has the morality of my book *evar* been doubted? 🙂
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Nevah!
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That book o’ wisdom in Deuterectomy 22: 13-21 has an interesting take on marriage:
A marriage shall be considered valid only if the wife is a virgin, If the wife is not a virgin she shall be executed.
That is the abridged version. I read the full text and sure enough, that’s what it said. I mentioned those words of scripture to my bride who mentioned something about Lorena Bobbitt and her former husband. I think she said his name was Shorty.
I don’t bother with no more of that scripture stuff.
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JR – I always love the cry about ‘redefining marriage’. As if our species hasn’t done that a hundred times already.
Shoorty!! 😆
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Isn’t the problem the word married? The fight, as I see it, is for equal rights. Perhaps the descriptor “United” could be used for a couple committed to legally joining their lives. A “religious union” should also be possible.
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Yeah, you’re right. I always liked the words ‘civil union’. Because, let’s not kid ourselves, ‘marriage’ as it has almost ALWAYS existed, is an economic contract. The religion part got added on later!
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“Isn’t the problem the word married?”
You’re right.
We should give it back to the Greeks and Romans.
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Welcome NotAScientist! Just read your ‘about’ page and was reminded that my grandmother – one of the lucky ones of her generaation – was born into gaslight and got to see the moon landing. But, like I said, she was a lucky survivor of a time when her contemporaries regularly dropped at pretty youg ages.
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In its entirety, this post is 100% accurate!
Well said.
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I love it when you say that pino.
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‘We don’t do God in Britain’ as Tony Blair’s head of communications once said. So the issue isn’t really cared about a great deal over here (although it wasn’t always the case.) I’m not sure churches should be forced into doing ceremonies though, if that’s something that might happen, although I’m sure it’s not. You’re right, what right do people have to interfere in civil ceremonies.
Jon Stewart did a brilliant skit on the Chick-fil-a protest if you didn’t catch it. It took me ages to realise the word play with the name when I was reading about the initial story because we pronounce the t in fillet here I was reading the name thinking, ‘Chick Filler,’ that sounds rude.
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wickles – the odd thing about us is that at the same time that the country (by measurement of affiliation and attendance at services) appears to be becoming much less religious, our public discourse is much more so.
When I was growing up, the evangelical branches of Christianity were confined to the South and usually were traveling preachers in tents. That has been a huge change.
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Nice lookin’ cake!
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Looks tasty too, doens’t it Bruce?
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