put the bible down! step away from the bible!

Here's a link to an interesting Newsweek article - OUR MUTUAL JOY - about gay marriage. It's a well written piece that explores what the bible does and doesn't say about homosexuality, but as far as I’m concerned, it makes no sense to argue for equal rights by quoting the bible.

Trying to decipher an ancient text which has been revised a thousand times by men who want it to reflect their political and judgmental beliefs and then using your interpretation of their hazy tome to prove that we all deserve equal rights is an utter complete abdication of logic.

You can't argue with drunks, idiots, rabid conservatives or religious zealots, especially not religious zealots, so why try? Why allow them to define the discourse by agreeing to allow their dusty old book to determine your talking points? Why? Use logic, not fairytales to define the parameters of your argument.

Rarely can you change someone’s political or religious beliefs. Oh Snap! That's so cynical! I know it is, but I've found it to be true 99% of the time so why bother trying? Walk around them rather than trying to walk through them as you march toward equality. I think I recall a couple of things from government class (which isn't much because my schoolin' style consisted of spacing out during class and then cramming enough into my very short-term memory to pass the tests and then forgetting most of it). Anyway, as I recall, there are certain federally guaranteed inalienable rights in this country – the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I think equality is implied in there somewhere. And if it isn't, then it should be. It wasn’t for African-Americans until the Thirteenth Amendment was ratified. I say go for a U.S. Constitutional Amendment specifically stating that two consenting adults are entitled to enter into a civil union with ALL of the same benefits and responsibilities as a married couple (and that would of course include the right to adopt). Not a California State Constitutional Amendment. The states are legally obligated to uphold the federal constitution, aren’t they? So go for an Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. It’s the only solution.

Civil unions should be a federal matter, not a state matter, not a church matter. Why pursue it in the pew? Pursue it in the Federal Courts and the Legislature. Yes, it might be a good idea to wait until a few more of the Supreme Dinosaurs are replaced. But eventually, once it gets all sorted out and becomes the law, and it will... then deal with your church. And if they say no to gay marriage, find a new church. Easy for me to say having never been gay and having never been part of a religious community but if I was, I would choose one that respects me and affords me the same right to sanctify my union - if I so choose - as it affords every other member of the congregation.

I am anything but conservative, but I honestly think that pursuing the right to civil union is the most important first step in this process. It guarantees equal rights under the law. Less important to me is the right to a religiously sanctioned marriage. It is important to many gay couples. I understand that. But using the term “marriage” has turned the Proposition Eight issue, for example, into a big gnarly cultural semantic Gordian knot. We've glued civil and religious unions together and at this point in time, I don’t think that the two can be reconciled. According to my own personal lexicon, "marriage" is not a civil institution so why are we asking the government to declare that it is? Isn't “marriage” an institution that one pursues within one's church? And a “civil union” is not a religious institution so why ask the religious community to join hands with each other and sanction it? How many different kinds of churches are there in America? How many of them are gonna sanction an “abomination”? Who cares what they think anyway? They don't write the laws.

Now I admit that I'm totally out of touch with the religious world. We had a barefoot pregnant backyard hetero-hippy wedding in the 70's. There was no mention of god. We just recited some organic hyperbolic granola-fueled vows about mother earth and the cosmos, had a group hug and cut the wholewheat wedding cake. I honestly can't remember the process we went through to obtain our marriage license but I'm pretty sure it wasn't religious in nature.

Why not just rename "marriage license" as "civil union license". Couples, gay and str8, can go down, get their license from city hall, thus procuring their legal rights and then from there decide what they want to call it and whether or not they want a wedding ceremony. Let's let the fundamentalists have the word "marriage" stricken from the licensing process. That's our concession. Once we've got the civil union license we can declare ourselves "married" and there's nothing they can do from the pulpit to take that away.

The right to a civil union is fundamental. From there, it's up to the individual couple. They can declare themselves married, they can have their marriage sanctioned by a church (if they can find one that will do it) or they can have a barefoot backyard homo-hippy wedding, cut the tiramisu wedding cake and simply declare themselves married.

End of pompous lecture.