what is marriage - warning: controversy ahead

First, let us discard the formality of dictionary and biblical definitions of the word marriage and instead boil down the topic to its most basic form. In other words, what are the implications of marriage? According to scriptures, a man and a woman enter into a relationship before God, are united by God as one body (more a spiritual joining), are to be committed to one another in all matters, and are to be committed to raising their children with love and spiritual guidance. From a legal standpoint it is more difficult to nail down a precise definition since each state has its own laws, and also because most places do not define marriage. However, from the laws we can glean the impact of legal marriage: legally responsible to one another, joined property rights, shared financial responsibilities, legal responsibility for any children, and the availability of myriad shared benefits.

So what does this all mean? Biblically, marriage is about personal relationships and spiritual relationships. Legally, marriage is about rights, privileges, and benefits. Right now, in present day time a person can go before a government judge (justice of the peace) and be married with no religious implications or blessings or ties whatsoever. They could also be married in a church/synagogue/etc by a priest/rabbi/pastor/etc to be joined legally and spiritually with the blessings and implications of their chosen religion. The legal marriage can be defined as a civil union, a legal unity recognized and protected by the local government. The religious marriage can be defined as a spiritual union recognized and protected by the religious group, with the added recognition by local government so as to offer civil union status as well. Following this theory, a religious group does not have to recognize or bless a civil union, since by their standards a spiritual union is the desired relationship. The religious group also does not have the obligation or responsibility to protect the civil union since by the very nature of the union it falls under the responsibility of government.

So here's the crux of the situation, two people care for each other deeply and want to share their lives. They want recognition of this agreement and all the rights and privileges that come with the union of their lives (financial and legal). They want to be able to file taxes together, own property together, perhaps adopt together, have insurance benefits together, have medical visitation and decision-making rights together, and generally have equal legal share in each other's lives. Early in our country's history, if these two people were black slaves the above situation was not possible because they were slaves. Slaves were property and property had no rights. Fast forward to the not too distant past, and even any man and woman getting married regardless of race would not fit that description because men held the power in the country and women had very little real legal rights. In this case, the woman was getting into an unequal union where she was buying into the man's life essentially. In the present day, the situation now unfolds that any man and woman getting married in the country can fit that description (if they choose), but if the two people happen to be two men (or two women) then an uproar ensues. This uproar mostly comes from the continuing education of Christians with poorly translated (and in some cases possibly intentionally mistranslated) versions of scripture. That I won't get into since there are other references out there where you can read pages of analysis of the original Greek and Hebrew words and context. Let it suffice to say that nowhere in the original scriptures is the term homosexual found (the term first appeared in 1869), condemnation of homosexuality on its own is not found either (Leviticus has reference to the act but in relation to pagan fertility rituals), and most importantly Jesus never spoke a word of judgment on the topic except 'love your neighbor'.

So, more to the real point of this post... how loving is it of Christians to mount rallies and protests against civil unions, or any other legislation that merely seeks to grant any two people the right to be identified with each other legally. The government has no legislation forcing the church to submit and recognize the union, and likewise the government has no obligation to recognize a religious marriage unless the ceremony results in signed legal, government paperwork. Jesus didn't send us out into the world to share his message of salvation for all people (except the homosexuals). There were no footnotes that defined which people were our neighbors, and so there should be no footnotes defining who we are called to love. How loving does it sound when you say: love the sinner, hate the sin? Do we shun people who have problems with a fixation on material possessions? "We love you and pray for you, because your need to buy expensive things as a status symbol is a sin and you need to fix that because God hates people obsessed with worldly possessions." Or perhaps this sounds better? "God loves you and cares for you, but he hates the sin you have by obsessing about material possessions and with that sin God's love won't truly reach you." How much more loving do we as Christians sound when we say that we love and care for all people regardless of sexual orientation, but we hate that they practice that orientation and we are going to fight tooth and nail to keep them from having fully equal rights under our government's laws?

Here's a thought - stop protesting and start following Jesus' example. It is not our job to be judge and jury in the realm of sin, that is for God to sort out. Our job is to bring to everyone Christ's message of love for all and God's desire for all to be reconciled with Him. If doing so brings about radical changes in a person's lifestyle, then so be it. If some aspects don't change and you disagree, that is your right but it is not your right to judge them or condemn them. You could engage them in conversation, maybe try to understand where they are coming from and learn something from each other, or perhaps pray for both of your understandings of scripture and God's desires to become clearer. Just a few words... love, invite, accept, engage, converse, educate, learn, encourage... these are the actions Jesus promotes, do we?