Conservative churches could reach an agreement that only they determine marriage. But the emphasis of that agreement would be those marriages they reject.
Each faith would have to go back to the very old way of doing things, but share a common registry. Then if a couple showed up at the door of any of them, claiming to be husband and wife, unless they were checked out, they would not be considered as married.
Marriage of one man and one woman is fundamental to Natural Law Theory and the “Duty” that all human beings have to raise and care for all their biological offspring. The Natural Family is the basis of all governments/civilizations.
It is fundamental to the philosophy of our Constitution, which is based on Lockean philosophy. Montesquieu stated that all Republics have to promote “Public Virtue” for them to succeed.
Our government is unique— set up to promote “Justice” (Rule of Law (Higher Laws/God’s))-—which is Virtue (our Justice System is based on Christian Ethics which began with Common Law and blossomed into the Magna Carta—no other ethical system, but the Christian one, where Individual Rights originated).
The US government always has to promote “Public Virtue” (otherwise the laws are not “Just”-—and are Null and Void), which is the ethics of Christianity only, since ALL humans have dignity and worth in Christian Ethics—no matter how old or weak. No other ethics system enshrines Individual Natural Rights from God which precedes all governments.
(Without Virtue, there can be no Freedom (Socrates).)
All the Founders KNEW that Virtue is essential for Free Republics, and the only purpose of governments is to enforce contracts-—Natural and agreed upon ones and protect our private property Rights (ALL NATURAL RIGHTS).
So Marriage is definitely a Natural Right which is connected to Duties——a natural contract that is essential to flourishing teleological ends, which should be encouraged and promoted by State Laws——as all Laws have to promote Public Virtue (and Natural Duties) to be “Just Law”.
Any Laws that prohibit or discourage “Natural Duties” are unconstitutional. They would be anathema to the Supreme Law of the Land: “Null and Void”. For Individual Natural Rights are God-given and unalienable and permission from the government is never needed-—but should be promoted-—to create Virtue in the people which is the only purpose of government: “Justice”—the Queen of all Virtue.
Marriage of one man and one woman is the only system designed to make sure human beings do their duty to their own biological offspring.
Any other system denies babies their biological mother and/or father (unnatural)-—and destroys their Natural Rights and reduces babies to an object (Means) to be bought and sold like in slavery. Dehumanizing laws are unconstitutional. Homosexual marriage is an abomination and unnatural and unconstitutional. Judges need to be impeached for allowing such denial of Natural Rights to human beings in our “Justice” system based on Natural Rights from God. It also sets up a system which promotes vice-—not fulfilling one’s Natural Duty of raising your own biological offspring.
I’ve been arguing for years now that the govt no longer belongs in the marriage business. This positioned managed to upset a few.
riteIf you want to cite marriage in America as having Judeo-Christian roots and assert [implicitly or explicitly] the import of the ceremony then you have to explain the marriage of Isaac & Rebekah:
- a formal or ceremonial act or procedure prescribed or customary in religious or other solemn use: rites of baptism; sacrificial rites.
- a particular form or system of religious or other ceremonial practice: the Roman rite.
- (often initial capital letter) one of the historical versions of the Eucharistic service: the Anglican Rite.
- (often initial capital letter) liturgy.
- (sometimes initial capital letter) Eastern Church, Western Church. a division or differentiation of churches according to liturgy.
right
- a just claim or title, whether legal, prescriptive, or moral: You have a right to say what you please.
- Sometimes, rights. that which is due to anyone by just claim, legal guarantees, moral principles, etc.: women's rights; Freedom of speech is a right of all Americans.
- adherence or obedience to moral and legal principles and authority.
- that which is morally, legally, or ethically proper: to know right from wrong.
- a moral, ethical, or legal principle considered as an underlying cause of truth, justice, morality, or ethics.
(Gen 24:61-67)Pretty light on ceremony there… plus the portions immediately prior indicate much more that it was more a social arrangement than any sort of religious rite.
Then Rebekah and her maids rose up, mounted the camels, and followed the man; thus the servant took Rebekah, and went his way.
Now Isaac had come from Beer-lahai-roi, and was settled in the Negeb. Isaac went out in the evening to walk in the field; and looking up, he saw camels coming.
And Rebekah looked up, and when she saw Isaac, she slipped quickly from the camel, and said to the servant, “Who is the man over there, walking in the field to meet us?”
The servant said, “It is my master.”
So she took her veil and covered herself. And the servant told Isaac all the things that he had done. Then Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah’s tent. He took Rebekah, and she became his wife; and he loved her. So Isaac was comforted after his mother’s death.
The state has an interest in hetero marriage as being by far the best institution for procreation, insofar as a pool of healthy well-adjusted citizens and taxpayers is maintained and grown. Homo marriage does not facilitate this, the only contribution thereto being sporadic adoption (which is an attempt to make better a broken situation). Hence the carrot-and-stick legislation encouraging hetero marriage, denying those benefits (and related penalties!) to couples utterly incapable of procreation.
(BTW: there’s a difference between “the plumbing is there but damaged/unused” vs “non-sequitur”.)
They would never give it up at this point. The state needs a way to manipulate the culture, conditioning people to rely on the state to define marriage for them allows that. The homosexualists need a way to punish those faiths who are never going to buy into it, so they need the state involved. What’s probably going to happen is that those faiths that don’t take their marching orders from the state will stop acting on the state’s behalf civilly, and just take the punishment for not going along.
Pope Leo XIII warned about the dangers of state involvement 130 years ago, in the context of divorce and remarriage. He was obviously a well known raging libertarian atheist who only wanted to advance the homosexual agenda. It’s the only thing that makes sense.
Freegards
If marriage is exclusively a religious feature, how would non-religious people that aren’t a member of a church get married, considering the government-sanctioned course wouldn’t exist.
I've been asking that for years.
Marriage is a religious institution. There is no role for the Federal Government.
Defend the 10th amendment.
Absent such a role by the state, in many instances, the stronger person in the marriage will tend to exploit and harm the weaker, especially when the marriage breaks down. In addition, the weakest of all -- children -- are especially vulnerable to mistreatment, abuse, and neglect.
For example, children are especially vulnerable to abuse when they live with their mother and an adult male sexual partner who is not her husband. In most instances, the best outside advocate for that child is a vigilant father and ex-husband who is alert to and ready to intervene if there are indications of harm to his child.
The better route is to preserve traditional marriage as exclusively and uniquely between one man and one woman, while also providing for the courts to determine disputes that arise out of other personal relationships by adults living together. In such cases, the courts should look to what the parties have agreed to and to traditional principles of equity.
Thus gay marriage and other relationships can be defined by the participants with the assurance that the courts will enforce such agreements and resolve disputes. A general domestic partners registry also makes some sense as a way to put such relationships on the public record without the full effect of marriage.
This is childish and silly, we have a real political battle on our hands and these closet end of marriage people want to pretend that we can just convince the voters to end marriage as we know it since our creation as a nation.
In other words suddenly marriage and divorce law and benefits ends, and polygamy and gay marriage become normal anyway.
Marriage has always been legal or illegal, whether it was Roman law, or Greek law, English law or law imposed by the Catholic church, or Islam, or the tribe.
IF YOU DON’T CARE IF YOUR MARRIAGE IS LEGAL, THEN REMEMBER, NO ONE ELSE DOES EITHER, AND NEVER DID, SO JUST DO WHAT YOU WANT IF YOU DON’T CARE IF THE REST OF US RECOGNIZE IT.
If you had a private gay marriage 30 years ago, or a 100 years ago, so you did, it just wasn’t recognized by law.
I agree, my parents agreed, and everyone I know agrees that government being in the “marriage” business is not a good thing-it is too open to coercion-after all, look how well big brother manages everything else-not-they’ve done such a fine job so far, right?
Government shouldn’t even be licensing cars or bars, never mind anything like a partnership, business or otherwise-I can hire a lawyer for that and get a better deal anyway-and probably from a lawyer right here on FR...
MrT5 and I bought a civil license-and that is all it was, a document for a partnership-because it was required by the military for benefits. But we were married a week later, when the PRIEST performed the ceremony, and we participated in the SACRAMENT of marriage before GOD and witnesses. Marriage is before God, one man, one woman, and not anything else, I don’t care how much someone says every new circus act is “marriage”, it is not.
That is my opinion, but I will respect anyone else’s, we don’t have to agree, and I don’t call those whose opinions differ nasty names-that is what liberty means to me-liberty for everyone-not just those who agree with me.
I was surprised to see this from a poster, though-”we keep order and protect the population by mandating that people...” and you can fill in the rest of that sentence with pretty much anything, it still sounds like something from the old soviet bloc to me.
And I mean no offense, Waggle, I agree with you more often than not...
Better yet, don’t marry perverts, monitor them, especially queers with access to children.
bye bye
If government did not exist, marriage would still exist.
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