Same sex marriage

[thesummerqueen]

You are missing the point: the church is NOT being forced, as far as I can tell, to perform the ceremonies.

YET, at the moment there is no way of legally challenging the Church, once "marriage" is legalised between same sex couples, the Church is open to the legal challenge through the European court of human rights (which has a history of overturning UK courts, it has recently overturned UK law that prevented murderers, rapists and paedophiles from being allowed to vote, saying it was their human right to vote!) What happens then, if the court rules it unlawful to refuse to perform same sex marriages?

Am I missing something in churches and marriages being somewhat private functions and gov't elections being public ones?

[Zen Badger]

If the church is fine with performing the ceremony, I don't see why not.

That is precisely the point, what takes precedence in a situation where the Church is not happy to perform the ceremony? The "right" of the gay couple to have an equal opportunity to be married in a Catholic Church or the right of the Church to refuse on grounds of belief about same sex marriage?

But fucking altarboys is ok?

Just checking.

[Tiberius]

I doubt you'd find a country where 100% of people think marriage should be statist and commercial. The point is, marriage shouldn't be up to one group of people. Government shouldn't be discriminating in the laws it creates.

@StatCrux: I share your concerns over gay marriage, but for slightly different reasons.

[KichigaiNeko]

You are missing the point: the church is NOT being forced, as far as I can tell, to perform the ceremonies.

YET, at the moment there is no way of legally challenging the Church, once "marriage" is legalised between same sex couples, the Church is open to the legal challenge through the European court of human rights (which has a history of overturning UK courts, it has recently overturned UK law that prevented murderers, rapists and paedophiles from being allowed to vote, saying it was their human right to vote!) What happens then, if the court rules it unlawful to refuse to perform same sex marriages?

Am I missing something in churches and marriages being somewhat private functions and gov't elections being public ones?

So it seems to me Summer.... just follow the money

[Creed of Heresy]

Not only that but how many little ones need a stable environment to grow up in...why not a homosexual household??

Homosexual households have been shown to at least be AS stable as straight couple households have been. It doesn't seem to affect the sexuality of the child, either [lending more proof that an individual is not "turned" gay or bisexual by environment or choice], from what studies there are out there [that are NOT sponsored by christian or islamic groups; there are abrahamic-religion-backed studies and naturally they can claim to point out dozens of areas where homo-households cause gayness. Sources rarely, if ever cited, of course...].

---

I doubt you'd find a country where 100% of people think marriage should be statist and commercial. The point is, marriage shouldn't be up to one group of people. Government shouldn't be discriminating in the laws it creates.

Yeah, I agree with ya there, on both accounts. It's a bit inextricable from US tax law but that's no excuse for the government to say "NO!" just because someone wants to marry someone of the same sex.

[thesummerqueen]

Nothing to do with money. He's pissed at human rights groups - but churches as far as I can tell are perfectly allowed to decide what they want to do because they're running on private money, yes? Am I misunderstanding?

The minute they enter the public sphere then I should think the human rights groups can get pissy at them with legal standing.


Edit: I realize what I said didn't make sense considering the first sentence - I have a sinus headache. You get what I mean, I hope.

[StatCrux]

But fucking altarboys is ok?

Just checking.

I always find it quite interesting that if someone commits a crime and happen to be atheist, atheists jump and shout and point out that the crime had nothing to do with the person being an atheist. BUT...when a person commits a crime and happens to be religious they are happy to make the correlation. It always strikes me as inconsistant thinking. Does an atheist paedophile give me the right to accuse all atheists or even imply a correlation? Anyone doing such a thing would be reprehensible wouldn't they? To try and imply something about a group of people beacuse of the actions of others?

---

Nothing to do with money. He's pissed at human rights groups - but churches as far as I can tell are perfectly allowed to decide what they want to do because they're running on private money, yes? Am I misunderstanding?

The minute they enter the public sphere then I should think the human rights groups can get pissy at them with legal standing.


Edit: I realize what I said didn't make sense considering the first sentence - I have a sinus headache. You get what I mean, I hope.

Nearly, at the moment, in law, same sex couples cannot marry. They can have civil partnerships. In the UK if you provide a service to the public you cannot discriminate on grounds of gender, sexuality etc. For example a hotel owner recently turned away a gay couple because of her religious beliefs and was taken to court. If marriage is made legal, the Church provides a service to the public of performing marriages, therefore a case can be made that they must not discriminate on grounds of sexuality. Even if the UK courts dismiss it the European court of human rights is known for its insanely liberal views and could force Churches to perform the ceremony.

[kılıç_mehmet]

Well, I have my own opinion on the same sex marrige thing, but I think that it's not entirely fair to forbid gay couples who wish to share property and enjoy legal rights that result from a marriage. However, I must add that the "concept" of marriage has other undertones besides it's legality.
I think that some of these undertones only apply for straight couples, as they did throughout history, so I think that such unions should be given a seperate existence besides the one of marriage, while having the same legal rights.
But well, that's my opinion.

[Creed of Heresy]

But fucking altarboys is ok?

Just checking.

I always find it quite interesting that if someone commits a crime and happen to be atheist, atheists jump and shout and point out that the crime had nothing to do with the person being an atheist. BUT...when a person commits a crime and happens to be religious they are happy to make the correlation. It always strikes me as inconsistant thinking. Does an atheist paedophile give me the right to accuse all atheists or even imply a correlation? Anyone doing such a thing would be reprehensible wouldn't they? To try and imply something about a group of people beacuse of the actions of others?

Actually, you see, our greatest weakness is our greatest strength. Atheists have no 'moral standing' other than their own. Considering that so very, very, very many pedophiles, rapists, and murderers in jail in the US, for example, are christians [somewhere to the tune of like 88%], and less than 1% of the prison populations are atheists [compare with the population statistics of the country at large; also factor in most of those atheists are probably in for possessing marijuana], you're already standing on weak legs on this argument. Factor in that very, very rarely are two atheists ever alike in their personal beliefs on morals and ethics [and yet somehow commit the fewest crimes per average of populations of all groups in the world, buddhists included], plus factor in that all christians hold themselves up to be paragons of virtue and morality and that their religion makes them essentially good as long as they beg to an unprovable entity of their forgivance, while no atheist dares to hold him or herself up to be a paragon of much of anything beyond what they can empirically bring to the table and the kneecaps of your meager rebuttal have just given out. Atheists are not organized except for the ones who adhere to philosophies like humanism, such as myself. And I urge you to go seeking any stories of humanists murdering, raping, or molesting people. You'll be looking for one of them about as long as you'll be looking for definitive, undetractable proof of god:

Forever.

---

Nearly, at the moment, in law, same sex couples cannot marry. They can have civil partnerships. In the UK if you provide a service to the public you cannot discriminate on grounds of gender, sexuality etc. For example a hotel owner recently turned away a gay couple because of her religious beliefs and was taken to court. If marriage is made legal, the Church provides a service to the public of performing marriages, therefore a case can be made that they must not discriminate on grounds of sexuality. Even if the UK courts dismiss it the European court of human rights is known for its insanely liberal views and could force Churches to perform the ceremony.

I should point out: Wasn't the Anglican Church responsible for forcing creationism and bible-reading on young students for many many decades until the 90s or something? Yeah, you guys suddenly see what it's like to have shit forced on you. You don't like it, huh?

Your lesson has been learned, perhaps. But I doubt it...

[StatCrux]

Well, I have my own opinion on the same sex marrige thing, but I think that it's not entirely fair to forbid gay couples who wish to share property and enjoy legal rights that result from a marriage. However, I must add that the "concept" of marriage has other undertones besides it's legality.
I think that some of these undertones only apply for straight couples, as they did throughout history, so I think that such unions should be given a seperate existence besides the one of marriage, while having the same legal rights.
But well, that's my opinion.

That is precisely how it already is in the UK. Why push for more? To agitate the situation and create division and confrotation.