(November 21, 2017 at 1:23 pm)Neo-Scholastic Wrote: I crimped the following text from another thread HERE because, this seems like the more relevant thread and I put quite a bit of effort into it.
There can be a civil institution equivalent to marriage without being considered equal to it. For example tea is functionally equivalent to coffee but they are essentially different substances. Civil marriages have an essential character that makes them different from other types of social institutions recognized by the state. They have an objective definition: an on-going legal bond between one man and one woman involving physical intimacy with the potential to produce off-spring. That is what differentiates a marriage from roommates (of any sex), live-in caregivers with power of attorney, business partnerships, casual lovers, kissing cousins, free-love communes, and yes, homosexual unions. It should be noted that many states in the USA have so-called common law marriages, automatically conferring marital status to long-time cohabiting heterosexuals who have been physically intimate. Apart from the traditional definition we get absurd results like Felix and Oscar becoming common law. This is not a "slippery slope" argument; but rather, an illustration of the unique character of civil marriage as an objectively definable and secular social institution.
As a practical matter, the state generally does not impose fertility tests or automatic dissolution of marriages when a couple is beyond child bearing years. If someone wanted to debate the merits of such policies I would be willing to listen but personally I would consider someone a spoiler for advocating those kinds of tests and measures. Also as a practical matter, the state allows religious leaders to officiate weddings, so that a civil marriage and sacramental marriage occur simultaneously as part of the ceremony. If someone wants to propose that religious leaders not be allowed to officiate civil ceremonies I am open to listening to that as well. Again however, that seems like the stance of someone willing to inconvenience millions just to be a spoiler.
So-called "marriage equality" erases the vital line between civil and sacramental marriages. For example, Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Baptist or even Swedenborgian weddings are sacraments tacitly accepted, for practical reasons, by the state as civil ceremonies. It is not a civil ceremony in-and-of-itself. That is why there are now cases before the US courts attempting to force religious businesses to recognize a civil marriage as identical to sacramental ones. There are even activists, in both the US and Australia, who want to force religious leaders and institutions to perform heretical sacraments within their sacred spaces. Again, I am open to the idea that the state has a legitimate state interest in legally recognizing homosexual unions as functionally equivalent to marriages, however, the state has no business making people perform religious sacraments against their will or to recognize nontraditional unions as equal, meaning identical, to sacramental ones.
This is very relevant so thanks for brining it here. The No campaign in Australia also argued that marriage is a union between a man and a woman for the purpose of having a family, however the majority of the country disagreed so that argument has been put to bed. But there are civil and religious ceremonies and I'm pretty sure in Australia they are essentially legally equivalent. I do find it difficult to understand why some same sex couples want to marry in a religious institution but they do. So the question remains, why should religious institutions be allowed to discriminate?
Let's use an equivalent example to show what I mean. If a black African man and a white Australian woman wanted to marry and they turn up to a church in Australia, is the priest allowed by law to say to them "Sorry but the church does not believe in mixed marriages - marriage is between a white man and a white woman only". Would they get away with it? No, because it is racial discrimination and there are laws that protect against that happening by any organisation or person in the country. Yet it is being argued that the church should be allowed to discriminate against a section of community based on their sexual orientation.
The more interesting question is why religious leaders want to be unethical. This is something that I don't understand. I say stop all discrimination and if we have to legislate to stop it, then so be it.
