You are so right about “irrational” and “non-rational”. I actually wasn’t thinking about irrational as being perjorative; non-rational is actually a far better term.

I have a healthy respect for the part of our brain that does the non-{formal procedural rational} work. Genetic algorithms (which *evolve* a solution) showed me that it is possible to have well-understood processes to come up with solutions that cannot be understood. The non-{formal procedural rational} part of our brain can’t be understood, but that doesn’t mean it isnt doing really good work.

As Rod Dreher’s article pointed out, those in favor of traditional gender roles in marriage (and out) fear being disempowered. That’s a sense that many of those in favor of civil unions and gay marriage share, either because they themselves have felt marginalized in the past or because they are in sympathy with those who have been marginalized. I appreciated Dreher’s observation that, “I may come to debate my opponent feeling no love nor holding any respect for him, but if I behave with good manners, and he does the same, I might glimpse his humanity, and develop sympathy for his arguments.” Acknowledging the humanity of the “Other,” even if that Other seems on the wrong moral side of the issue is a necessary first step toward reconciliation. Unfortunately, it’s a hard one for many people to make. It astonishes me how easy it still is, here in the 21st century, to casually view someone else as somewhat subhuman. Didn’t we learn any lessons from slavery?

I mostly agree with you, but the term in the United States isn’t “civil union”, it is “marriage”.

The word “marriage” pulls double or perhaps quadruple duty: there is the religious ceremony, the legal contract (which frequently is part of the religious ceremony when the officiant acts as an agent of the state), the personal commitment (which is why you can have “common-law marriages”), and the actual shindig with cake and all where the families come together to party.

Even two hundred years ago, I bet you that the ship’s captain was doing a civil ceremony and not a religious ceremony. (I would be amazed if it were religious. Ship’s captains are not ordained.) Marriage and laws have been connected since way before Jesus was born: you have to have some rules about who inherits property, what you are and are not allowed to do with/to your spouse, which children are yours (men were legally the father of all the children their wife bore, unless he could prove she was cheating on him), etc.

Essentially, a marriage is a religious event, yet the state recognizes all marriages as civil unions. There are a bunch of ways you can have a civil union: justice of the peace, common law, ship captain in international waters, etc., but marriage is the only religious event recognized by the state, other than perhaps last rites.

Our extremely Christian founders advocated for a separation of church and state for a number of reasons, but this seems to be an area overlooked, with good cause. Two hundred years ago I suspect even the ship’s captain performed a religious ceremony, and no one changed their tax status as a result. I believe that there should be no discrimination for any civil union, and I also believe the state should not legislate what constitutes a marriage in anyone’s church.

That being said, I can see a handful of scenarios: the conservatives successfully make marriage the only set of civil unions, marriage continues to be a subset of the set of civil unions, or that marriage and civil unions are entirely separate, and if you want the state benefits of a civil union you’re required to fill out the paperwork, no matter how you might have been joined.

This leaves two decisions: what should the state choose to recognize for the benefit of its citizens and what might the various congregations choose to recognize as part of their communities and their interpretation of God’s word.