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Current Events » in reply to What is intolerant is redefining marriage over the will of the people

You're right: civil disobedience is no way to point out that a law is unjust.
Mary Anne — (archived)

Let's put the Jim Crow laws back on the books. They had majority support. (There was "scientific" evidence supporting black inferiority too.) Those wicked courts and the practicers of civil disobedience gradually eroded the will of the majority. Imagine, sitting in the "whites only" section!

And yet, the world did not come to an end.

Sometimes the majority is wrong.

How about this: "marriage" is performed in a house of worship, and "civil union" is performed in a courthouse. All people who are married in a house of worship must also fill out the civil union papers in the courthouse. No more of this "one-stop shopping", with the two functions being completed at the same time by members of the clergy. The house of worship joins people "before God", and the civil union gives people legal rights and obligations recognized by the state. In order for the state to recognize the union, the papers must be signed.

Maybe there can even be a part of the worship service in which a representative of the state presents the papers and the couple sign before their wedding guests, for convenience, if they would rather not make the extra trip. Or if they would rather not have a religious event cluttered up by a civil representative, they could stop on their way outside, in the vestibule, with their two witnesses, and sign there while the guests lurk outside with rice, confetti, birdseed, or whatever cutomary item is thrown at the happy couple. 'Twould be but the work of a minute.

The houses of worship that already offer a ceremony for same-sex couples can then continue to do so, as is their right, without a Constitutional amendment to cancel out that part of the First that forbids the government from establishing religious ritual and belief.

In that way, the states will not discriminate against same-sex couples, same-sex couples will be able to take care of each other in the event of catastrophic accidents and so forth, and religious groups can continue to discriminate against anyone they don't like without interfering with people who would never come to their services anyway.

Unless the object here is to make sure that certain religious groups interfere with people who would never come to their services anyway.

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