Flanfire

I have always tried to have a gay marriage - gay meaning joyful. Now some folks come along and confuse me with new terminology and new ideas about unions while at the same time half of the babies born in Sweden and about that percentage in this country are born “out of wedlock,” whatever that means. [Does wedlock mean, for example, that those who are wed are locked up together? What a sad concept.]

Anyone who has had a friend in the hospital or in jail but who is not a blood or legal relative knows one of the major reasons why homosexual men and women - and unwed heterosexual men and women - want to have certain rights bestowed via contract, whether it be called a civil union or by some other term. People need access to their loved ones in times of crisis, as well as in times of joy. They also need certainty in inheritance and in business affairs that affect common dwelling places. These are civil matters, and should be addressed via statute.

My chief point here is that civil unions or civil contracts of whatever nature cannot be based on evidence of any sexual activity, because asking such questions of people is an invasion of privacy. Should two heterosexual friends be forced to lie and claim they are homosexuals in order to be able to gain the right to visit each other in jail or in the hospital or to inherit each other’s property? What business does the state have in demanding sexual congress of any two members of opposite sexes who want to enter into such contracts for mutual aid and support?

The spiritual institution of marriage, however, is a far different thing, though marriage differs widely from society to society. In traditional Christian marriage, a man and a woman are said to become one flesh, though that covenant definition is widely ignored or abused. Entering into a marriage covenant requires that both partners be equal and that both partners surrender their rights to each other. Only through a mutual covenant with God can they truly die to themselves and live with Christ for each other’s joy.

In some cultures, however, marriage is little more than a contract between families to transfer possession of the female from her father’s house to her husband’s house. She thus becomes the property of her husband, and is not at all an equal with him. Curiously, many so-called Christian (or plain old American or European or whatever) marriages fall very far short of the covenant ideal (if they even had any pretense of such a foundation).

Today in America, half of all marriages end in divorce, many within the first year or two. Millions of American children are raised in broken homes, often where there is hostility between the parents, sometimes when one parent is completely out of the picture. Other marriages are legally intact, but hardly models of mutual love and respect - much less covenant.

Cutting to the chase, homosexual couples want to join this parade of marrieds and are already doing so where they can find a willing executor of the contract. The very idea of homosexual marriage has freaked out many in our society who find the concept either appalling or at the least just plain confusing. For example, Canada’s new marriage law fails to specify that two people who seek to enter into a marriage contract must be of any specific age, much less sex. Would a revocation of existing marriage laws open the door to adult-child weddings, which are allegedly popular in other nations? After all, men have been arrested in Texas for marrying 13-year-old brides, even though it was claimed that these weddings had been perfectly fine in Mexico. Would they allow polygamists or polyandrists to legally wed? And what kind of event is it when a transsexual weds a transsexual?

Going back to our first point, if sexual orientation were made wholly irrelevant to civil unions or other civil contracts, none of these issues would matter at all to most people. Very few are upset at the notion that a person might want the company in hospital or jail of a close friend or partner who is not a blood relative or traditional spouse.

Separating civil from spiritual unions would also enable individual groups to sanctify or otherwise authorize unions that authorize sexual congress and anticipate child-rearing activities and maybe even include covenanting to love, honor, and cherish each other for life. What this really means is that, for example, the Metropolitan (gay) churches could long ago have performed weddings that had no legal standing but would have had spiritual standing for their members. Mosques could perform Muslim ceremonies that would not require the sanction of any governmental entity in this country. And so forth.

In many places, separate marriage ceremonies are held before both civil and religious entities. Indeed, my own daughter last year was married by a justice of the peace, and later this month will have another type of wedding ceremony in which the government has no part.

Thus, it seems, we have all been duped. Marriage as a spiritual union is wholly separate from civil contracts that address property and visitation rights and other civil matters. Those homosexual couples who have only recently applied for civil marriage licenses could - and may - have been wed in their own communities of faith and support at any time without the state playing any role whatsoever.

There is a third type of contract that may be necessary in this modern age of broken commitments and failed child-producing relationships. Perhaps the time has come for the pre-birth agreement under which both parties agree before the fact on who will raise the child should they later agree to live separate lives. Such agreements could include clauses that restrict access to the child depending at least in part on sexual fidelity, drug-free lifestyle, or even future relationships with third parties. To be sure, in this litigious society, even these pre-child agreements would sometimes be challenged by unsatisfied former partners, but at least the cards would be on the table from the outset, and perhaps the two parents (or even prospective parents) would have an additional incentive to consider the children when evaluating the value of their own relationship and their need to work at it.