The nature of marriage is both-sexed. It is not about heterosexuality v. homosexuality.

Marriage integrates the sexes, provides contingency for responsible procreation, and combines this into a coherent whole.

That nature of marriage is in alignment, indeed it arises from, the nature of humankind. There is one human race and its nature is two-sexed. The nature of human generativity is both-sexed, not one-sexed. The nature of human community is both-sexed, not sex-segregative. The foundational human community is the family and family is by nature both-sexed.

All sides of the marriage debate ought to drop the hooey about sexual identity politics. That is extrinsic to marriage. While same-sex attraction may, or may not, be inborn, no one is born as this or that socio-political identity.

The problems that the original post referred to as arising from heterosexuality are really problems that stem from the direct attack on the nature of marriage by a libertine culture — i.e. the revolting sexual revolution of the past 40 years. This cultural deconstruction of marriage shifts from the nuts and bolts of human sexuality, human community, and human generativity — it shifts from that to the emotivism that has led to the SSM argumentation.

That argumentation is populated by a littany of false equivalencies, such as the one that is suggested in the original post above, whereby homosexuality is presented as outside of the very society in which marriage serves sex integration and responsible procreation.

If we drop this core of marriage, what is left?

If we replace the core of marriage with the core of SSM, what stands as the substitute?

While it may seem fashionable to criticize people on the basis of sexual identity — i.e. “heterosexuals” — for the weakened state of marriage in our society, it is misleading.

There is no prohibitive sexual orientation test. For example, most of the children, by far, living in same-sex households got there by migrating from the both-sexed relationships, typically marriages, of either mom or dad.

The real test, based on gay identity politics, is one which admonishes people who experience same-sex attraction from remaining faithful to their marriages. The identity trumps marriage. And this is demonstrated in SSM argumentation itself whereby selective sex-segregation is touted as an “improvement” on the most pro-child social insitutition which integrates fatherhood with motherhood.

It is demonstrated when SSMers make the profoundly flawed comparision with interracial marriage; for the bans on such marriages were also rooted in identity politics that depended on the racist filter in just the way that SSM argumentation depends on the gay identity filter.

So enough of this heterosexuals have been so awful while homosexuals (i.e. straight versus gay) couldn’t do any worse. Wherever SSM has been enacted — in whatever form — the participation rates have been dismally low and diminishing. The SSMer would answer that participation rates are irrelevant, however, no one who supports and defends marriage as a social institution can stand by such a claim. For a society to flourish, a foundational social institution needs to exert a strong influence on all of society — even those who might never enter that social institution.

In this instance, marriage channels men and women toward the combination of responsible procreation, integration of the sexes.

Heterosexual this and homosexual that … it is not about those dichotomies that gay identity politics pushes onto the national agenda.

The marriage is not “fraudulent” if sex is not had…that’s ridiculous. Why? We allow people to marry on the onset who will never have sex. An inmate sentenced to life in prison with no conjugal visits will still be allowed to marry. Two quadrapalegics can marry who will never engage in sex any way we may define it.

They are still allowed to marry, and their marriages are not considered fraudulent.

How do you explain these?

We are a culture obsessed with sex, it seems…

Personally, I’d rather not know what most people are or are not doing sexually…as long as they are happy with it, and it is shared by two consenting adults.

You may all recall from the debate about whether Anna Nichole Smith would inherite from her billionaire octogenarian husband, one of the points of contention was whether they had ever had sex.

(and yes I know that not all gay-straight marriages should be assumed sexless – but if one of the parties is known to be gay, the Gov. can use that to support their case that the marriage is fraudulent)

First – marriage is civil, matrimony is religious. I think churches are protecting the wrong thing. They are fighting for the right to control a civil matter (or to control the word “marriage”) when they already are in full control of who is bound in holy matrimony.

Although they pretend not to, I think the Catholic Church already understands this distinction. There are plenty of Catholics whose marriage is recognized by the state but whom the Church does not see as bound in holy matrimony.

Second – the claim made by some anti-gay activists that “you can marry a person of the opposite sex even if you’re gay” is not technically true. True, the church may recognize such a marriage but the government’s base position is not to recognize such a marriage. Most of the time they don’t bother, but if immigration issues or tax issues come up, a sexless marriage is presumed to be fraudulent.

OK … back off unresolvable debate…

All this talk of various forms of love take away from the true legal issues surrounding marriage. It is a civil contract on one hand, and a religious institution on the other. As a civil contract, there are certain rights that are to be given to every citizen…as a religious institution, it is up to those institutions to decide who can or cannot be married in their church and endorsed in the faith.

http://www.lgbtmovement.blogspot.com