Progress...

[Doubting Thomas]

I have never understood why atheism is so closely tied to political liberalism.

I've never understood why Christians are so tied to conservatism since Jesus himself was so liberal. He wanted people to pay their taxes and give money to the poor, yet modern conservatives are against these principles.

I don't support gay marriage because the legal benefits given to married couples are not designed for a gay marriage.

This is a pretty stupid statement. Not sure which benefits you're talking about, but what gay people are fighting for is to have equal benefits with married heterosexual couples. But what you're basically saying is that, "I'm against gay couples having the same rights as heterosexual couples, because then they'll have equal rights."

Couples are given those benefits as a way of rewarding them for creating a more solid platform to raise new upcoming citizens within. Kind of a "you are helping us all my being married and raising your children in a marriage so here is some financial help." Since gay couples do not raise children the perks should not apply to them.

Ahh, the old, "marriage is for raising children" argument. What about heterosexual couples who can't have kids? What about allowing gay couples to adopt kids? What about lesbian couples who get artificially inseminated? You seem to be reverting to the "them filthy queers and dykes shouldn't be allowed to raise kids" idea.

I think forcing churches to do it crosses the line between church and state).

At last we agree on something, but I'll take it one step further: Churches shouldn't be allowed to fund ballot proposals to ban gay marriage. And are you actually admitting there should be a wall of separation between church & state?

Though I would rather the government just get out of the marriage business as well rather than open it up to homosexual and multiple partner marriages.

To have legal marriages, the government can't just get out of the marriage business, but if they could guarantee that gay couples have the same rights as heterosexual couples, then I'm all for it. But I think the only real way to guarantee it is to allow legal gay marriage.