Why are people so hung up on the term "marriage".

The "marriage vows" one takes in the ceremony have no force under the law.

The only purpose of civil marriage is to lay out the rights and responsibilities which pertain to this civil contract.

Unfortunately, religions have been using the term "marriage" for longer than the state has, the state adopting the term for convenience. For the majority of time this country has existed, there has been little difference between "civil marriage" and "religious marriage". The "civil marriage" automatically being included whenever the "religious marriage" ceremony was performed.

So when homosexuals campaigned for same sex marriage, insisting it be called "marriage", it is not at all hard to understand why religious people saw it as an attack against "religious marriage".  This is where the idea of civil unions came along, the idea to separate the "religious marriage" from the "civil marriage".

As long as we allow the government to use religious term "marriage" to describe the civil contract, there will always be people who will fight, believing that same-sex marriage allows the government to interfere with their religion.


The wages of sin are death, but by the time taxes are taken out, it's just sort of a tired feeling. - Paula Poundstone