On Gay Marriage

"Gay Marriage" is an ultimate oxymoron, and ultimately so because many individuals who engage in a homosexual lifestyle ultimately do not exchange vows.

The crusade to legalize gay marriage is one more attempt to legitimize a lifestyle which many who have participated in, but have ultimately repudiated.

The marriage ceremony and the commitment pertaining to it should no be under the domains of the state. Since the Second Reich of Otto von Bismarck in Germany, governments have insisted on instituting civil marriages, either as a means of alienating organized religion or broadening the powers of the state.

Instead of legislating to individuals the partnerships which they may enter into, we should invest our time and resources in teaching individuals that identity does not depend on sexuality or psychology.

The crisis of identity which afflicts so many youth, for example, has only been worsened by the false notion that men and women must decide or resign themselves to a set sexuality or set-in-stone sexual characteristics. Nothing could be further from the truth, or more damaging to the unstable circumstance in which many adolescents find themselves, and which many adults have also discovered for themselves.

Marriage is a divine institution can only recognize the union of one man and one woman. The notion that two men, two women, or a community of three or more can "tie the knot" is not possible, feasible, acceptable, or welcome in a society which thrives on liberty based in stability. Such religious ceremonies deserve to be recognized. The state, even with the best of intentions, has very little efficacy when it comes to bolstering and maintaining the holy sacrament of matrimony, and so should impeded or affect it as little as possible. The full implications of transforming marriage  back into a private and local matter does bring up the issue of the welfare of children in the marriage. The state does have a vested interested in the youth in our society receiving the best care and rearing possible, and to turn marriage into a private matter may engender more common law marriages, shacking up situations, and would endanger the well-being of our youth. Still, the state has done a poor job in compelling morality, and the growing value of marriage as a private ceremony, honored by the state, deserves greater scrutiny.

Nevertheless, the proper course for citizens today is to discourage the false bases for identity and intimacy in our culture. However, for the state to invest itself in policing every consensual relationship only causes greater harm to those who carry themselves with integrity while burdening our overtaxed courts and criminal prosecutors.