What? There was no such request made at my wedding.
I agree we should do away with marriage as a legal concept and instead only offer civil unions. And allow religions to handle their marriages however they want. Politically it would be more difficult to implement then simply offering marriage to everyone.
In theory its a fine idea, but that would require all people to think rationally about the issue. Gay marriage is an issue in this country because not all people think rationally.
My opinion is bigots want to discriminate against gays in any way they can. They do not want homosexuality to be an accepted norm. Preventing gays from being married is just a way to punish them and somehow convince them to change their ways. They are negotiating from a point of view that does not want gays to be equal, so it doesn’t matter how you define things if you try to give gays equal standing in anything they will object to it.
You mean I’ve been holding my peace all this time for nothing?!
How exactly is making marriage solely religious more rational? It’s exactly as arbitrary as what we have now, with the drawback of being extremely unpopular.
Okay, but they didn’t have to be. They could have been married by a JOP or a judge. I’m not sure what your point is. Surely you’re not going to force atheists to be married by ministers, mail order or not. And there is no such thing as a “licensed” minister, that I know of. Perhaps you meant “ordained”? Licenses are issued by the state for protected occupations, ordinations by the church saying this person meets our requirements for carrying out religious rites. These requirements can be quite complex and involve years of study, like for the Roman Catholic church, or simple and brief, like for the ULC or UM (Universal Ministries - where I have my ordination through.) Because of separation of church and state, the state may not constitutionally declare “mail order” ordinations invalid - although some cities/states can and do require that the church have a brick and mortar site and have actual meetings and congregations, which is where ULC is running into trouble. But that’s another topic for another thread.
Polycarp, the “hold your peace”, if it is a legal requirement, is not a legal requirement everywhere. I marry people in Illinois, and it’s not required here.
Well, you’re in luck, because this is almost exactly what we have now. The state doesn’t offer any religious rites. It does provide a civil recognition of a couple’s commitment, which provides all the legal advantages and disadvantages of what we currently call marriage. The sole difference between what we have now and your idea is that this recognition is known as “marriage”.
And religious institutions don’t have the civil authority to change a couple’s legal status. They perform religious ceremonies. The ceremony doesn’t change the couple’s legal status, filling out the form does.
It is true that there’s a requirement for an “officiant” in the marriage certificate. But this doesn’t entangle the the government in religion. The officiant is just a person who is required to figure out of the couple really does want to get married, that they really do agree, that the paperwork is properly filled out, that they signed their names on the line which is dotted, and so on. And the witnesses also do the same.
That isn’t government entanglement in religion and doesn’t make marriage a religious ceremony. The officiant can be a judge, or it can be a person who customarily has handled marriages, which yes, includes religious figures. But you can certainly go to a judge’s office and get married and have absolutely no religious trappings. My Mom got married this way–we went to city hall, waited a few minutes in an office, the judge came in, asked a few questions to which my Mom and her now-husband answered “I do”, we signed the papers, and then went home. No nasty religion involved.
I’m an atheist, and I don’t have a civil union, I have a marriage. My Mom didn’t have any religious figure involved in her marriage, and she doesn’t have a civil union, she has a marriage. Marriage existed long before Jesus was born, it not a religious concept. Religion didn’t invent marriage, it just invented rituals to recognize marriage–just like it didn’t invent dying, it just invented rituals to recognize deaths.
They couldn’t get a justice of the peace?
Not on this board, you haven’t. 
But yeah, come on, people - a legal marriage and a church marriage are two separate things, even if they commonly occur simultaneously and with the same officiant. Unfortunately, the entire debate has been badly confused in the US by the states’ traditional policy of routinely deputizing clergy to perform the legal function at the same time - it conflates religion into a discussion where it is irrelevant and severely counterproductive. What is under debate here is the legal institution only. The churches can hold whatever ceremonies they please for whomever they please, and nothing changes that.
You’re right. What the OP wants is what already exists.
You are right as to the technical requirements of getting a license one day and a ceremony a few days later (in Illinois, it is at least one day later). I had merged these two visits conceptually into one procedure (it exists to prevent, however minimally, marriages on whims). A few things to note about the process of solemnizing a marriage in Illinois: (1) any sitting judge can do it, (2) any minister (interpreted as broadly as possible) can, (3) if no one person alone has solemnized a marriage, the two parties to the marriage themselves can attest to its solemnization, and (4) if, somehow, the officiant cannot be shoehorned into one of the three classes above, if either party believed that the person who solemnized the marriage was legally empowered to do so, the marriage is solemnized. I suppose a fifth point could be added: (5) the State of Illinois does not have any interest in sending prosecutors out to determine the legality of the solemnization of anyone’s marriage; absent truly truly extraordinary circumstances, this just is not going to be a sticky wicket–ever.
As to the proposition “everyone should be required to have a civil solemnization followed by a religious ceremony if they like,” I don’t know why this is superior to the joint propositions “some people can have just a civil solemnization,” “some people can have a religious solemnization,” “some people, if they want to make a point, can have a civil solemnization followed by a religious ceremony,” and “the State of Illinois just can’t be bothered to give two damp shits about how you get the bottom of your marriage license signed” that currently prevails now.
It allows churches to define their marriages however they want, without a legal definition attached to it. Our current system requires the state ban gays from entering into marriages largely due to the fact to religious people who will not accept the fact civil marriage is defined differently then their church may define it.
If the law only covered civil unions it makes a clear distinction between the two and there would be less basis to argue legally what the definition of marriage is. Of course that could eventually end up at the same place we are now when religious people co-opt civil union as being a heavenly union between man and women…
Boy, I asked you how your argument is more rational. You haven’t demonstrated it.
What about those of us who want to define our own marriages without the input of any churches?
And why should “churches” be accorded this privilege? Our democratic system gives rights and privileges to individuals, not some arbitrarily designated class of entities.
No, it doesn’t require the state to do anything. The effect is essentially the same. In fact, it’s worse. Even more people will be interfered with under this plan. You’re denying the right of individuals to define their own marriages without interference from some arbitrarily designated class of entities.
You’ve just invalidated your entire argument. How does this constitute a rational position?
I think I’ve stated my opinion quite clearly and feel your are just trying to be argumentative for no apparent purpose. My opinion is it is more rational then our current system.
If marriage was not a legal institution individuals as well as churches could define marriages however they want. I only mention churches specifically because they seem to be the ones who want their religious definition to be the legal one.
If you believe me to be irrational on this subject I can accept that, I’m not going to my spend time trying to convince you I am.
No, I’m not just trying to be argumentative. You’ve used “rationality” as the basis for your argument. It’s not a matter of opinion. It’s either a rational argument or it isn’t.
It’s as if you had said, “I believe that tax lawyers should pay less in taxes than fast food workers, because fast food workers make more money.” But the basis for your argument is false. Fast food workers don’t make more money than tax lawyers. You can’t reply, “You’re just being argumentative. It’s my opinion that fast food workers make more money than tax lawyers.”
Your position is not more rational than the opposing position. It’s not a matter of opinion.
I don’t believe you to be “irrational.” I’m saying that the basis for your argument – that your position is more rational than the opposing position – is false.
In all cases it was because they wanted a family friend or minister, who understood they were atheists but was a spiritual guide when they were younger, to perform the ceremony rather than the impersonal JoP thing.
As an aside, hooray for the UUs for thinking that was cool.
I think we should totally do this, except rather than trying to rob people of a culturally ingrained term that they have always used, we just call the union formed by the government “marriage” too.
Oh, wait, we already do this.
You are confusing two different issues. One is the desire to have the state call gay unions “marriage” specifically and the other is having the state consider gay and straight unions equally. Most of the “furor” is over the fact that by calling them two different things, it creates a ‘second class citizen’ insinuation for married gays. If all state unions were called civil unions, there would be no second class citizen effect, and no one would care that gay unions were not called marriage since straight ones weren’t either, negating the ‘furor’.
I can pretty much guarantee you that it would actually be harder to convince the US population to make all unions “civil unions” than it would be to convince them to allow gay marriage. All anyone would hear would be “they’re going to take away our marriage!” It would erupt into a boiling mass of panic and protest.
These are not two separate issues. Gay people aren’t looking for an abstract equality. They want marriage, in both fact and in name. Period. Both gay and straight people want to have “marriages.” No one is interested in having a “civil union” for themselves.
This may be off-topic now, but what if a gay couple gets married by a priest/denomination that recognizes gay marriage?
Can they call themselves married, or is there a list of denominations approved to bless marriages?
I don't really understand this. I can understand gay people wanting to have a marriage if straight people can. But I just don't understand what difference the name of the government relationship makes. I understand that any proposal to have separate names for the civil and religious commitments would result in an uproar (although the threat of such a thing happening might make the masses more willing to have same sex marriage), but I don't understand why. Why is the name almost more important than what it represents? Even if it were "civil unions for everyone" that would just be what the government calls it on tax returns and such . It wouldn't mean that you had to suddenly start celebrating your "civil union anniversary" rather than your wedding anniversary, just like people who are not legally married can ( and often do) refer to their husband or wife.