Is marriage a holy sacrament?

Great Debates
1

In this thread, Triskadecamus said

Tris is not alone in this thought. I have seen it bandied about by many people on both sides of the gay debate. Because of SOCAS, the government has no business saying who can or cannot get married. Alternately, since the Bible clearly(?) states that homosexuality is abomination, no church should sanction gay marriage. Strangely, people on both sides of the debate seem to agree on this one point, that marriage = religion. To the best of my knowledge, no one has thought to challenge this notion.

I’m here to challenge this notion.

For one thing, the mere fact that one can get married by a justice of the peace in a civil ceremony is proof enough that secular marriage is possible. People who get married by a JOP have just as much legal standing in the eyes of the IRS as do people who married in a church.

Secondly, an engaged couple does not have to prove to a JOP that they are, in fact, religious. There are no religion police (at least in theory) going around trying to disprove the validity of secular marriages.

Third, if you want to assert that the notion of marriage was thought up by an organized religion, you’ll have to provide a cite. Then once you do, you’ll need to convince me that marriage must remain within the province of religion. “That’s the way we’ve always done it” is not a valid reason.

Lastly, I’d like to mention two friends of mine. Yes, they were married in a church, but that was for the sole intent of pandering to their families’ wishes. They are still about as atheist as you can get. If you tried to tell them that their marriage is a holy sacrament, they’d laugh in your face.

Well?

2

Secular marriage is a civil union. Religious marriage is a holy sacrament.

You seem to be thinking that because they have a common name, they’re the same thing. It’s a frequent misunderstanding, but it’s still wrong.

3

A couple of examples, to elaborate.

There are a number of Christian churches (Roman Catholics are the largest example, but not the only one) that refuse to marry divorced persons, although there’s no law against it.

Conversely, you could probably find a clergyperson somewhere who would be willing to marry a couple of 17 year-olds, even if the law in that state required that a person be at least 18. That marriage might be considered a “holy sacrament” but it wouldn’t be recognized as valid by the state.

I understand there are several European countires that deal with this conflict by not recognizing religious ceremonies. A couple must be married by a civil authority. If they also want a religious wedding ceremony, that’s up to them and their religion.

Frankly, I’m beginning to come to the conclusion that wouldn’t be a bad idea here in the U.S.

4

Fair enough.

Question, then: When my atheist friends got married in a church, which of the two types of marriage did that become? And how does it differ from that marriage of my aunt and uncle, who got married in a fundie church and who thank The Good Lord every twenty minutes* for their holiest of marriages?

*(I can’t help but think that my uncle occasionally curses God for this union. Hell, I’m not part of that marriage and I’m an atheist, and even I curse God for that wretched sham of a trainwreck.)

5

Slight hijack, but… really? My mother married at 17. Her grandmother married at 16. Were (are) those marriages considered invalid? If not, when did they get official state sanction?

(OK, I realize that laws back then may have been different. For the time being, let’s suppose that those weddings took place today.)

6

Not all marriages are holy sacraments, according to the definition: a sacrament is a formal religious act conferring a specific grace on those who receive it.
So, not all holy sacraments are marriages, either.
So your friends were conferred a grace they didn’t wish to receive…I think that happens a lot.

7

Only if the parties involved believe it is.

8

Such a pseudo-“marriage” is no marriage at all. The status of something under the “laws” of humans is irrelevent to the doctrine of the Church.

Yes, the Eastern Orthodox Church does teach that purely “civil” marraiges do not count and that people who indulge in them are not actually married. Of course, that’s pretty much the doctrine for any marriage outside the Eastern Orthodox Church.

Please do not jump to the conclusion that this means that the Church automatically condemns such people to Hell–that’s not how we do things.

9

Ages of consent vary from state to state. In some places a couple can (I think) get married at 17 on their own. In some states they can do it with parental consent.

I believe (IANAL) that state reciprocity guarantees that a marriage that’s legal in one state will be recognized in any other, even if the consent ages are different.

10

The argument is moot.

What your religion calls marriage – a holy ordinance, a sacrament, a sacred institution – is relevant only to the ceremony which is conducted within the structure ordained by that religion. Legal marriage – the kind at the heart of the current “who should marry” discussions – is a secular institution.

It doesn’t matter if you only had one wedding, after which your officiant, empowered by the state, signed off on your affirmative decision as given in your vows. It doesn’t matter if you had two, one at the Justice of the Peace and one at your synagogue two months later. Did you stand under a huppah? Did you jump a broom? Have a handfasting? Irrelevant.

The name and/or content of the ceremony has nothing to do with the rights conferred upon you by the state; call it whatever you want.

11

As far as the church is concerned, it’s probably a holy sacrament. As far as your friends are concerned, it’s probably a civil marriage. So it’s both. Which applies depends on who you’re talking to.

Different people can have different views of the same thing. It doesn’t necessarily mean that one is wrong and one is right.

12

Fine and dandy for the Eastern Orthodox Church. There are a large number of people who are not subject to the dictates and rules of the EOC, however.

13

The name and content of the government-recognized civil union has nothing to do with the state of ones soul. It works both ways. The government has no business, whatsoever, in dictating what is and is not a marriage. Likewise, a specific religion has no business, whatsoever, in dictating what is and is not a civil union. The two ought to be utterly separate. ONLY the civil union should matter for legal purposes.

14

In my opinion, religious marriage can only happen in your head or heart. It has never had anything to do with the world we actually live in. Catholics and Jews are both recognized as a civil union by the rest of the world; only their churches and themselves see the religious union.

15

Christians may have a sacrament recognizing marriage, but this no more makes marriage an exclusively Christian institution than the sacrament of baptism makes being born an exclusively Christian act. Marriage is found in non-Christian cultures, and in non-Judeo-Christian cultures, and in non-Abrahamic-monotheist cultures. There are Shinto marriages and Hindu marriages; the works of Homer talk about marriages; the Code of Hammuribi sets out laws governing marriages; Genghis Khan got married–more than once, in fact. Of course not all cultures limited marriage to only two people; the Encyclopedia Britannica starts off by defining marriage as “a legally and socially sanctioned union between one or more husbands and one or more wives that accords status to their offspring and is regulated by laws, rules, customs, beliefs, and attitudes that prescribe the rights and duties of the partners” and goes on to note the universality of the notion.

We have done much to re-define this universal institution in 21st Century America, just as we have re-defined many other institutions to suit our own needs. In mainstream America marriages are monogamous, egalitarian, based on mutual love, and are not only entered into by free consent but are initiated solely by the parties involved–none of which things are necessarily part of the universal idea of marriage found in all human cultures.

None of this means that Christians can’t imbue their marriages with spiritual significance, just as they may imbue all other parts of their lives with spiritual significance, and certainly no church should be coerced or even pressured by the state to extend any of its sacraments to any person, whether marriage or baptism or any other sacrament. But neither can Christians claim any exclusive right to govern marriage for non-Christians. Marriage licenses should have no more to do with the Christian sacrament of marriage than birth certifications have to do with the Christian sacrament of baptism.

16

What’s wrong with the government using the word ‘marriage’ to describe what is after all a marriage? Marriage is not exclusively a religious term. And even if the government starts using ‘civil union’ it won’t change the fact that people will still refer to them as married, because that’s what they are.

17

After this bit of unmitigated barn excrement from an Orthodox Christian and approximately 150 threads of bigotry perpetrated by “good Bible-believing Christians” on another board, and a request to a learned Catholic that she not use the to-us-insulting term “priestess” to refer to a woman Episcopal priest being thrown back in my face with an argument about unisex terminology that had nothing to do with the issue, I’ve gotten to the point where I’m seriously wondering if there’s any point to trying to defend the idea of Christianity. :frowning:

I still love and try to emulate Jesus, though. (wan smile)

18

To me, marriage is a Sacrament, and the vows one swears when one marries, like any other major vow, should not be broken. I also believe God is present at all weddings, regardless of how secular they are, even though I suspect He’s screaming “No! Don’t do it!” That latter, I admit is due to a willful naivete on my part which approaches willful ignorance, but there it is. It’s also easy for me to talk – I’ve never been married. I am, in my own way, just as conservative about marriage as any person thumping on a Bible and proclaiming that marriage is between a man and a woman. What makes me look liberal is my firm belief that, if two people honor, respect, and love each other enough to be willing to swear those vows, it shouldn’t matter what sex they are.

That said, I do not think I have the right to impose my morality on someone else unless that person is deliberately harming a third person, and I think who marries whom and how often is none of the government’s business! Definitions of sacredness vary. My best friend was married in a courthouse by a Justice of the Peace. I was her maid of honor and I’m pretty sure she’d say she counts her marriage sacred and what took place was a sacrament. Some Christians I’ve encountered appear to consider sex for anything but procreation sinful; on the other hand, to my Wiccan friends, sex is a Sacrament. My own leanings are more towards the latter than the former.

Is marriage a sacrament? Is sex? Is love? I’d say it depends on who’s asking and why they want to know. Me, I’d say “yes” to all three, but I’m a bit of a marshmallow down deep. Someone else might just as readily say “no” to all three. I’ll respect that, although I may not choose to marry them. :wink:

CJ

19

I’m Protestant, so no, if I were to get married, it wouldn’t be a sacrament.

But, as to this:

More than a few people have frequently disagreed with that notion. As far as the state is concerned and when dealing with the benefits that the state doles out to married couples, marriage should have nothing whatsoever to do with religion.

To me, there are two (for lack of a better word) sides to marriage - the one side is purely civil, it deals with property, visitation rights, money, benefits, the baser side of life, and that is the part that the state has a valid interest in. However, the other side is the part that’s above the mundane - some ethereal thing that makes marriage more than just a business partnership - and what that thing is depends on the people in question. While your friends may laugh if you called their marriage a “holy sacrament,” I’m willing to bet they see their marriage as more than just a business deal. The state can neither confer nor deny that second side.

20

Well, let’s see.

What I think should be the case is that the state (by which I mean all levels of Government) should decide, in law, exactly what the legitimate interests of society are with respect to marriage. In that matter, I feel that there is very little that needs to be sanctioned, although perhaps some things should be defined. The state can then issue licenses and have court affirmations of who can, and who cannot marry. Of course there can be no religious criteria in such a secular definition of marriage. There is also the matter of inheritance in the absence of wills, and guardianship in the event of incapacity. Those should be defined, and agreed matters for any persons wishing to be considered as conjoined interests before the law.

There are legitimate concerns for the state. Survivor benefits by insurance, or by statutory entities would have to follow consistent patterns, without respect to sex, which the state has no legitimate right to even know, much less control. I suppose there is a limited interest on behalf of the state to limit the number of members of such contracts. I am not convinced that two represents a presumptive value as a maximum, in terms of the interests of the state, but I suppose arguments could be made. I am not sure that privilege of communication between partners of such a union is necessarily a vital requirement, but if such a thing does exist, it must be allowed for all marriages.

So, you get your license, you are married. If you want religion to be a part of it, that is a separate matter, between you and God, and whomever you invite to the festivities. Polygamy and Polyandry must then be discussed as an entirely civil concern. The religious approval or disapproval of it is not a legally salient point. However the consequences to society are, and should be considered by the electorate, and the legislature. Homosexual marriage could not be denied without specifically demonstrating that the interests of society, aside from religious opinions, are in some way damaged by the existence of homosexual couples. I doubt that that could be shown, in either case.

And would polygamy or homosexuality increase in our society? Probably some. But the fact is that both are already a part of our culture. I have seen very little harm done to the society at large because a small segment of our population differ in their life choices. In most cases that harm was not perpetrated by the minority that differs, but rather upon them. The illegality of Polygamy has caused voluntary segregation of its proponents, and that isolation has abetted some harm to members of those groups. The isolation, and indoctrination are not specific to Polygamy, and would be (are) subject to existing law on the rights of minors.

Yes, it amounts to a sweeping de jure reform. But the actual de facto changes are probably minimal.
Just what I think, of course, and certainly not an authoritative prescription from legal, or religious standards.

Tris