Fairfax, VA, USA. It is past time for a crucial American reform. We need to separate the functions of the state (civil unions) from the functions of religion (marriage). Both are entitled to their separate places: one under Caesar’s law, the under under God.

The institution of marriage in America is an ill-fit application of often overlapping and contradictory laws, coupled with wildly different cultural views.


If one citizen asks another: “Are you married?”, the answer can take vividly different forms, depending on the respondents location and frame of reference. For many, a religious ceremony can suffice. The officiators are empowered by their religion and licensed by the state to create the marriage, and do both at the same time. For same-sex couples, the acts of religious marriage and civil unions are entirely separate matters.

Even in those states that allow same-sex marriage, religious leaders can decline to “marry” people if they object on religious grounds. The state should not be allowed to compel anyone to perform a religious ceremony that violates the precepts and practices of their religion. However, no duly licensed civic official should be empowered to decline a lawful and legal civil act.

We find ourselves in this situation because civil unions and religious marriage have become so entwined that any attempt to reform one immediately affects the other.

Something similar has happened before.

Earlier in our history, the clergy often acted as the custodians of birth registries. If they did not exist, then baptismal records permitted reasonable inferences as to dates of birth. If you did not belong to a church, you might not be counted as born at all – a sinister threat to a representative democracy.

The passing of America’s colonial period and the closing of the western frontier gradually eliminated such practices. It led to a more orderly, accurate — and fair — system of civil record keeping to serve our burgeoning population.

Opponents of same-sex marriage quite rightly object to any attempt by the state to dictate terms on who they may or may not marry. Those same opponents are quite wrong to assume that their views on religious marriage must prevail and in so doing distort the orderly conduct of civil society.

Proponents of same-sex marriage can be ardent in their desire to share equally in the prerequisites of society, but often omit discussion of the very real responsibilities imposed by full participation.

All sides can prevail in this debate by stepping back from the argument

It is time now to clearly separate civil unions and religious marriage. Doing so can reduce conflict, promote rational decision making on the proper form of civil unions, and protect religious believers from participating in religious practices they object to on doctrinal grounds.

Eliminating the overlap between civil unions and religious marriage will permit unmuddled decision making on our civil institutions and avoid the temptation of the state to interfere in matters of religious doctrine.

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