A Marriage License Has Nothing To Do With Sex
| By Rev Ricki Horst - Jan 21, 2010 1:00:06 PM PT |
As a minister, I routinely perform marriage ceremonies. The couple pay for the license at the city hall. I sign it and mail it back to be filed. In between the two actions, I perform a wedding ceremony. I write the ceremony and being a disciple of Jesus Christ, all of my ceremonies are based on a foundation of vows that include a commitment one to the other and a promise of fidelity.
However, it is the piece of paper that makes the marriage a marriage in the eyes of the law. It has nothing to do with what one partner promises the other. It is basically a legal contract that the government collects revenue for and that provides the two parties with tax advantages, medical benefits and protection in the case of a crisis.
As much as I would like it to be about what is promised in the ceremony, it isn't. It is simply a legal document. And everything that this legal document provides for a straight couple, should be provided for a gay couple or a transgender couple. To me that is a given. It is logical. It should be understood that any citizen in the United States should have the same rights as every other citizen, no matter what their sexual orientation is.
What happens intimately between two adults is private and shouldn't be the business of any government agency. It has nothing to do with the legal provisions in a marriage license. Nothing.
A marriage license must be available to everyone, not just a portion of the population in this country!
I have performed wedding ceremonies and I have performed commitment ceremonies. And these ceremonies are all about love and fidelity and promising to take care of each other. But whether a ceremony has that included in it or not, really doesn't matter as far as what a marriage license provides.
A license doesn't guarantee monogomy or "happily ever". It doesn't require fidelity or that you treat your in-laws well. It guarantees legal umbrellas to the two parties who have entered into the legal agreement.
A license is a license and should be available to anyone and everyone who is an adult and a citizen of the United States. Anything less than that is a travesty of everyone's constitutional rights.
However, it is the piece of paper that makes the marriage a marriage in the eyes of the law. It has nothing to do with what one partner promises the other. It is basically a legal contract that the government collects revenue for and that provides the two parties with tax advantages, medical benefits and protection in the case of a crisis.
As much as I would like it to be about what is promised in the ceremony, it isn't. It is simply a legal document. And everything that this legal document provides for a straight couple, should be provided for a gay couple or a transgender couple. To me that is a given. It is logical. It should be understood that any citizen in the United States should have the same rights as every other citizen, no matter what their sexual orientation is.
What happens intimately between two adults is private and shouldn't be the business of any government agency. It has nothing to do with the legal provisions in a marriage license. Nothing.
A marriage license must be available to everyone, not just a portion of the population in this country!
I have performed wedding ceremonies and I have performed commitment ceremonies. And these ceremonies are all about love and fidelity and promising to take care of each other. But whether a ceremony has that included in it or not, really doesn't matter as far as what a marriage license provides.
A license doesn't guarantee monogomy or "happily ever". It doesn't require fidelity or that you treat your in-laws well. It guarantees legal umbrellas to the two parties who have entered into the legal agreement.
A license is a license and should be available to anyone and everyone who is an adult and a citizen of the United States. Anything less than that is a travesty of everyone's constitutional rights.
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The whole debate boils down to the definition of the word "marriage" and who controls that definition.
Marriage as an institution was created by the spiritual/religious quarter of our societies. As such, it is for them to decide what that particular institution is defined as.
I do not mean to say that the LGBT community should not be free to partake of all the legal comforts that a free society promises - far from it. Rather I mean to say that in order to truly win this debate, the goal should be to get the government out of the Marriage business altogether.
When two people - ANY two people - decide to be a legally recognized couple, they should be able to go to city-hall and receive a 'civil-union' license from the government, nothing more, nothing less. By removing the Government from the equation - all couples would be equal under the law. Then those couples would be free to go to any spiritual organization that recognizes their relationship and 'get married' under the auspices of the church of their choice.
The LGBT community has spent too long trying to win an argument that cannot be won. You cannot force others to accept you on your terms. You can only demand from the law that it treat you equally. Let go of the insistence that traditional churches bow to your will and take another tack - victory is a semantic dismissal away.
Equal marriage rights for same-gender couples will only be won by fighting for inclusion in the current definition of marriage. The "protect marriage" lobby would like to make this about protecting the definition of marriage, but they really come out looking like closed-minded bigots. If we turn our sights toward redefining marriage as a "civil union" for everyone, we will be doing exactly what they have been saying we will do...we will be trying to destroy religious marriage for our own inclusion in it's benefits. I think this is a battle we would surely lose.