theophiles.org - Cheney Comes Out of the Bunker for Gay Marriage, State-by-State

Cheney Comes Out of the Bunker for Gay Marriage, State-by-State

Written by laika

Monday, 01 June 2009 23:04

At The Washington Post:

Former vice president Richard Cheney waded into another simmering public debate today, suggesting he supports legalizing gay marriage as long as the issue is decided by the states rather than the federal government.
Cheney, whose youngest daughter is a lesbian with a longtime partner, said during an appearance at the National Press Club that "people ought to be free to enter into any kind of union they wish, any kind of arrangement they wish."

Comments

laika

|2009-06-03 15:49:59

Quote:

"people ought to be free to enter into any kind of union they wish, any kind of arrangement they wish."

absolutely anything goes, according to this guiding light of the GOP. one wonders to what degree this represents a new tack for Republicans: extreme libertarian pretenses conveniently hobbled by the old states rights ruse? pretty clever, actually. pretty darned clever.

emperorbma

|2009-06-03 16:03:25

I dunno. I, for one, don't believe that the government should even be in the business of dictating what marriage is. The rite of marriage is an institute of the Church and it should be dealt with on a religious level.

metallurge

|2009-06-03 21:01:31

Yeah, good luck with that one. Whenever the secular courts stop being clogged by divorce proceedings and child custody disputes and child support disputes and the like, then I guess the state will maybe start to think that they don't have skin in the game.

And, of course, the Church wants to generally wash its hands of divorce. So this will always fall to secular courts to handle.

Besides, there are way too many important nonreligious things tied to marriage (like spousal healthcare) for marriage to ever become a purely sacramental matter.

One interesting idea is to abandon the word and institution of marriage to the secular, and create a new legal class of marriage called covenant marriage (wikipedia).

grizzly - re:

|2009-06-04 02:01:22

metallurge wrote:

One interesting idea is to abandon the word and institution of marriage to the secular, and create a new legal class of marriage called covenant marriage (wikipedia).

Or, reclaim the word marriage to mean the religious sacrament, and label everybody else as a "civil union", including all the people who got "married" at the courthouse by a JP.

This is one case where I actually agree w/ Obama. Give everyone, including gays, civil unions (which are the legal equivalent of marriage). He may be more "nuanced" than this, but the basic premise works for me.

Entity

|2009-06-04 09:02:18

OK, since a civil union apparently has nothing to do with procreation, like marriage is supposed to, should a civil union be open to anyone?

For example, people under 18 can get married in many jurisdictions. Should civil unions be allowed for people under 18? Should there be a minimum age and, if so, what?

Should civil unions be open to siblings or parents and children? A civil union doesn't mean they are having sex, just conferring rights.

Should a civil union be open to three or more people? Or can one person be in more than one civil union?

I don't see a compelling interest for the state in blocking any of these.

laika

|2009-06-04 09:28:29

Entity wrote:

OK, since a civil union apparently has nothing to do with procreation, like marriage is supposed to, should a civil union be open to anyone?

according to the former Vice President, yes:

Richard Cheney wrote:

"people ought to be free to enter into any kind of union they wish, any kind of arrangement they wish."

Entity wrote:

I don't see a compelling interest for the state in blocking any of these.

then you are in respected and powerful company.

Entity

|2009-06-04 10:05:32

I suppose I should be more clear about my last statement. Since the state has presumed to say it has no moral authority in defining what constitutes a marriage, it certainly would not have any moral authority to say what constitutes a civil union. However, it also has no moral authority to say that I have to recognize marriages or civil unions of any or a particular sort.

If the state wants to separate church and state, it gives up any benefits that having them acquainted gains it.

emperorbma

|2009-06-04 12:43:29

Quote:

If the state wants to separate church and state, it gives up any benefits that having them acquainted gains it.

There are those who would argue the benefits of the separation outweigh the costs, particularly as far as the Church is concerned, since it is no longer sundered with the non-spiritual concerns of politics. I think, also, those not of the Christian religion probably want the government to be secular for fear of what the history books tell them about when Christianity was dominating politics.

grizzly - re:

|2009-06-05 15:09:53

Since a civil union is a contract, I would set the minimum age, on a per-state basic, to the minimum age that the particular state allows individuals to enter into other contracts.

Some of the rights conferred by a civil union may include conjugal visits when one member is in prison. So, sex is (or can be) involved. Also, since the rights conferred are similar to those in families (hospital visitation rights, property inheritance, etc.), I would exclude family members from joining in civil unions.

Entity wrote:

Should a civil union be open to three or more people? Or can one person be in more than one civil union?

This, I'm undecided on. I think not for the first, but would allow the second.

CoffeeZombie

|2009-06-04 09:06:44

IIRC, in the early Church, the couple to be wed would first go get the legal proceedings out of the way, and would then come to the Church to have their marriage blessed by the Bishop.

The Church did not perform legal marriages at least until St. Constantine legalized Christianity, though it may have been later than that.

emperorbma

|2009-06-04 12:38:39

I wonder how the Jewish people conducted marriages under Roman law... did they have to go to the Roman magistrate or was the Temple Priest (or, later, synagogue leader) sufficient?

From what I'm aware, there was a rather limited presence of Roman authorities in the Judea/Galilee area until 70 AD. At any rate, I think that the Apostolic Church probably shared a similar position to them...

WebbedFeetOfClay

|2009-06-04 13:39:20

ish. No one performed marriages really in roman law, it was simply two individuals contracting with eachother. with or without the legal aspect a christian marriage was basically the couple receiving the eucharist together, not a separate rite. it was emperor Leo VI who required that all (free) marriages be church marriages and everything got muddled up with the legal end of things (it's also why the orthodox have a separate ceremony for weddings now where none existed and have an additional non-eucharistic rite for legal marriages that didn't quite pass muster on all theological grounds.)
I've got notes from a nice lecture given by Bishop Basil and a copy of Marriage: an Orthodox Perspective by Meyendorff, I'd be glad to send you the book ( i don't know if my notes would be decipherable.)

/ramble

laika

|2009-06-03 16:13:06

emperorbma wrote:

The rite of marriage is an institute of the Church and it should be dealt with on a religious level.

yeah. i'd be happier if those who agitate for other arrangements wouldn't co-opt our terminology, though. notice Mr. Cheney had the delicacy to refer to "unions" and "arrangements." that's a nice touch.

WebbedFeetOfClay

|2009-06-04 13:47:51

"our terminology" has already been co-opted long ago. (probably before it was ours for that matter) a Christian marriage is the union of two people in Christ, joined by God. legal marriage is not that, and really has never been that in this country and so long as we're comfortable sharing language with "marriages" that have no religious implication whatsoever this seems like an odd time to start having trouble with one term having different meanings.

Entity

|2009-06-04 14:19:11

I believe legal marriages have always been 1 male and 1 female. (Polygamy is multiple marriages, not multiple people in one marriage.) Attempting to define it as anything else - 2 males or 2 females or 3+ people - is co-opting a term. While the laws pertaining to marriage - number of marriage, age of marriage, consanguinity - have changed over the years, the definition - 1 male and 1 female - has not.

WebbedFeetOfClay

|2009-06-04 16:26:26

historically that's not entirely correct. exceptions are admittedly rare but historically documented. though all the same, that's not my point. if we're speaking of sacramental marriage as the only licit use of the term, we should also be concerned by the many unions which clearly don't fit our sacramental criterion using the term marriage. If we can accept the idea that a godless marriage is still a "marriage" then it seems odd that we would be particularly flustered by a same-sex union being called a "marriage". Point being, I think we're adult enough to recognize that the same word can mean different things and that use of said word in one context/definition doesn't necessarily apply to all other uses of the word.

emperorbma

|2009-06-04 16:47:03

Well, I think the implicit assumption is that any non-Christian marriage is still operating under the same theological value even if it's not done by Christian worshipers of God. That's why the Church won't recognize unions that are contrary to its teachings as valid, but it will recognize unions that are in all respects reflective of its teachings despite being done by those outside of the Christian faith.

In short, an atheist man marrying an atheist woman is still valid in the Christian theological understanding of marriage whereas a Christian man claiming to "marry" a Christian man is still invalid.

laika

|2009-06-05 09:19:16

WFC wrote:

If we can accept the idea that a godless marriage is still a "marriage" then it seems odd that we would be particularly flustered by a same-sex union being called a "marriage".

even with your "admittedly rare" exceptions, you're making the very point that everyone knows what a marriage is, and a same-sex union is not one. do a word association test anywhere in the west for the last thousand years and the word "husband" ain't gonna produce a response of "husband," but this you obviously know full well.

WFC wrote:

Point being, I think we're adult enough to recognize that the same word can mean different things and that use of said word in one context/definition doesn't necessarily apply to all other uses of the word.

but isn't the better question for adults why insist on calling not-a-marriage a marriage? that's where the co-option comes in. what is so desperately important about using this particular word when "union" is descriptively more useful?

WebbedFeetOfClay

|2009-06-05 21:26:37

commonality doesn't show exclusivity.

"Union" doesn't typically bear the same legal weight as "Marriage" I don't think either is necessarily more descriptively useful and would think on a personal level that its mostly down to preference and aesthetic, but as it is in most states Union has a specific legal definition that presents significantly limitted rights and it makes more legal sense to seek a place under the heading "Marriage" which bears all the desired rights and priveleges as a technical legal term, than to try to go through the irritating process of redefining Union and it's legal implications.

beyond that...I really don't care and have a hard time seeing why it should be particularly frustrating that people want to call their own relationships whatever they want to call them. "Marriage" clearly doesn't carry the one man one woman connotation for a lot of people and I don't see why it bothers you. In this context...it's just a word.

emperorbma

|2009-06-06 16:48:19

It's basically this: the Church is, by necessity, operating under the practices from the time when marriage was a common law thing. Now that it has entered civil law, it has begun to affect our ability to teach marriage in its Scriptural intent. As for those not concerned with this, I cannot even imagine the motivations... I suspect it's just a nostalgia though.

There are a few ideas to this:
1. Marriage should be inherited by the Church and the civil law construct should be renamed.
2. A parallel structure could be given to both the state and the Church with separate institutes.
3. The common law could reclaim marriage.
4. The Church might have to surrender the word to the civil law definition.

Optimally, it would be nice if we could revert to 3, but that's probably impossible. The fact is, if we are to preserve the Christian understanding of marriage we probably will need to officiate it ourselves or establish a parallel institute to the state that accords with the Scriptural definition. If we merely surrender the definition of marriage to the state, we are undermining the importance of God's Word by surrendering it to those who are against its purpose.

laika

|2009-06-07 00:28:59

empy wrote:

4. The Church might have to surrender the word to the civil law definition.

but if you came up with a new word and successfully invested it with significance, how long would it be before some group felt compelled to rob it of its meaning? that seems to be the way of it in this day and age.

but yeah, i can see how surrendering the word at this point would appeal to you.

emperorbma

|2009-06-07 01:10:54

Quote:

but yeah, i can see how surrendering the word at this point would appeal to you.

Um, what? That isn't even my position. These were mentioned as mutually-exclusive hypothetical scenarios, not intended consequences.

If you continue reading, I say:

Quote:

If we merely surrender the definition of marriage to the state, we are undermining the importance of God's Word by surrendering it to those who are against its purpose.

In light of that statement and since I admitted 3 as a bit of a pipedream, I should hope that it is fairly obvious my position is either 1 or 2. Since that assumption was challenged, I shall make it explicit: I think that the Church should officiate marriage (position 1) even if it was a purview of common law in the past. Now, if push came to shove and the civil realm were unable to be convinced by reasonable means, then it may result in scenario 2 which is also feasible although undesirable. Yet, in either case, I was not by any stretch of the imagination favoring or advocating scenario 4. Somehow I'm not sure how you came to the conclusion that surrender of a doctrine of the Christian faith (i.e. the form of marriage as a Divine rite) is even an alternative in my perspective.

... or was that comment not directed at me? If it was, I can only say that your response is rather unexpected and somewhat alarming since I've made fairly obvious that I reject the idea of homosexual "marriage" innumerable times in the past. Have I really been so wishy-washy that you can see me suddenly turning around and advocating it against everything my that own beliefs teach on the matter? I suppose I could be faulted for not explicitly noting the "few ideas" were hypotheticals rather than personally intended end games, but I was guessing that the fact that they were mutually exclusive and the fact that position 4 is so explicitly contrary to my own position would tell that story already.

Alas, please do not confuse me for Richard Cheney... *sigh*

laika

|2009-06-05 09:46:30

WFC wrote:

of course. for instance, in a wood shop, one might "marry" a mortise and tenon, but it would make no sense whatsoever to marry a tenon and tenon; it totally defeats the purpose of creating a strong join and just wouldn't work.

likewise on the road. you'll hear people speak of "marrying up" a trailer to a truck with a ball and hitch, but how far would one get trying to tow with a ball and ball?

so yeah, "marry" can certainly mean other things, but there's a relation even in the alternate uses.

WebbedFeetOfClay

|2009-06-05 21:40:15

or marrying two pieces of rope by weaving their ends together...
or two pieces of steel with solder
or flavors in a sauce
....if we want to play our verbal games, the term doesn't necessarily carry the notion of complementary opposing or dissimilair things joining, it is centraly an integral joining/bonding of two things. So even here we can see how someone might think it an appropriate descriptor for their joining.

(I'll avoid crass retort to tenon talk.)

laika

|2009-06-05 23:36:33

WFC wrote:

(I'll avoid crass retort to tenon talk.)

well, i had to pick one or the other in that example, so if you're more comfortable with mortise on mortise imagery...

ok, WebbedOne, in all seriousness, if marriage and wedding terminology is not readily recognizable as having any particular meaning, what kind of event do you suppose was favored with Jesus' water-into-wine miracle, and what about his use of wedding imagery in his relation to Church, etc? do you think these might be veiled allusions to homosexuality (or, say, hot-air ballooning depending on how malleable you think those words are)?

WebbedFeetOfClay

|2009-06-06 05:48:05

i didn't say it's not readily recognizable as having any particular meaning. context is key, that's how language works.

Just because the meaning of a word isn't set or constant doesn't mean people don't mean something when they say it. I hate to burst your hot air balloon, but none of those were refered to as marriages initially, when we translate we take whole new words for things, loosely deciding which term best fits the context, and beyond that even the equivalents of the word marriage really arne't used much describing relationship of christ and the church as it typically refers to bride and bridegroom.

just because I play boardgames with a die doesn't mean I think I'm risking death with every roll. And just because a few gay couples in a few states use the term Marriage doesn't mean married couples suddenly need to start double checking the gender of their spouse. don't let semantics kill you.

PinocchiosFurniture - Marriage Predates the 'Church'.

|2009-06-14 22:12:58

emporerbma wrongly stated:

Quote:

The rite of marriage is an institute of the Church and it should be dealt with on a religious level.

The rite of marriage is NOT an 'institute of the Church' and never has been.

The 'rite', in fact, predates the Church and predates religion.

'Marriage' is a civil construct in its most recent form and means different things in different cultures and in different religions....and always has.

emperorbma

|2009-06-14 23:04:52

Quote:

The rite of marriage is NOT an 'institute of the Church' and never has been.

Why do you assume I meant that the Church was the definer? An 'institute' does not mean that one performing it is the definer. It is entirely possible that someone can carry out an institute that was defined by someone else. In this case, God is the definer of marriage. Nevertheless, the Church carries out His institution and, therefore, it is indeed an institute of the Church whose authority on the topic is conferred by Christ, the Living God.

Quote:

The 'rite', in fact, predates the Church and predates religion.

If you assume Adam and Eve are not a part of the Church. I didn't make that assumption.

Quote:

'Marriage' is a civil construct in its most recent form and means different things in different cultures and in different religions....and always has.

All the more reason why it is not a civil institute. My point, before you so rudely cast your last two red herrings into the mix, was that the Church should handle its own understanding of marriages, not the civil government. As a matter of fact, civil government should have no part in marriage whatsoever because it is a religiously associated rite.

The pagan world will, inevitably, define as marriage for itself as it wants, and the Church will and must reject that which contradicts Christ's Word. (Due to the communicability of heterosexual marriage to the Divinely instituted rite, nevertheless, the Church does recognize those marriages as valid) To that end, either the Church will institute marriage and others can define something else for themselves in its stead, or we will need an accurately maintained rite that Christianity maintains despite the erroneous views of the world which it keeps separately.

In either case, it is an institute of the Church because it is the religious value of marriage that defines how God sees it for the Christian. It is not merely a cultural accoutrement because Christianity is a faith not merely a culture.

OrionBlastar - This is a complex topic

|2009-06-15 14:06:44

http://www.catholic.com/library/gay_marriage.asp

Basically what I sum up what the Catholic Church says is that they are against gay marriage because it hurts homosexuals and heterosexuals. That homosexuals cannot reproduce.

But here is where it gets dicey:
Homosexuals can adopt children or have a sperm or egg donor and/or surrogate mother to raise children. Not only that but heterosexual marriage hurts because of the high divorce rate and spouses cheating or spending too much money or being abusive to their other spouse.

Not only that but the State and Church are separate and yes the States set the definition of marriage and issue the marriage certificates. So yes the State does have the power to legalize gay marriage.

As I learned in college civil rights laws change and gay marriage will eventually become legal. So in order to avoid problems with homosexual employees and avoid civil lawsuits a company has to pick health insurance that recognizes domestic partnerships until gay marriage is legalized in order to be fair.

So what is the right answer? Do we support gay marriage and if people get hurt we deal with it, or do we not support gay marriage and then get into trouble when it is legalized?

As a Catholic I am taught to be tolerant and kind to homosexuals for we are all sinners and everyone deserves God's love. But does that love extend to supporting gay marriage? Some argue that it should, some argue that it shouldn't?

Personally it does not bother me if gay people get married, and if they are willing to deal with the problems that come with marriage then so should we all. Then we change and adapt society and the secular court and therapy systems to deal with any problems that come up.

As one comedian once said (I cannot remember his or her name) "The best way to ruin a relationship is to get married." :)

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