The "meaning of marriage" problem, again<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Still thinking about marriage, especially in light of some of the comments in my earlier post about divorce and annulments. \u00a0So bear with me if this\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/2015\/07\/the-meaning-of-marriage-problem-again.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The "meaning of marriage" problem, again\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Still thinking about marriage, especially in light of some of the comments in my earlier post about divorce and annulments. \u00a0So bear with me if this\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" 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{"id":2365,"date":"2015-07-08T18:46:56","date_gmt":"2015-07-09T00:46:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/?p=2365"},"modified":"2015-07-08T18:46:56","modified_gmt":"2015-07-09T00:46:56","slug":"the-meaning-of-marriage-problem-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/janetheactuary\/2015\/07\/the-meaning-of-marriage-problem-again.html","title":{"rendered":"The “meaning of marriage” problem, again"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Still thinking about marriage, especially in light of some of the comments in my earlier post about divorce and annulments<\/a>. \u00a0So bear with me if this repeats some ideas from prior posts as I try to assemble things once again.<\/p>\n

On the one hand, you\u2019ve got\u00a0the sacramental marriage: \u00a0a permanent bond, open to children*, and sexually exclusive. \u00a0(* Which implies both a willingness to accept any children that might come along, and the ability, based on the sexual complementarity of the male\/female pairing if not the fertility of the specific individuals.)<\/p>\n

On the other hand, you\u2019ve got the legal structure of marriage: \u00a0a next-of-kin status with certain financial ties.<\/p>\n

Two very different conceptions of marriage, though of course, sacramental marriage includes next-of-kin-ness, and the majority of married couples in the United States experience their marriage as something in-between: most notably, they may not\u00a0view\u00a0their bond as permanent but as, at any rate, a rather serious commitment, and very few, in 2015 at any rate, believe that your spouse is the person you come home to after sexual exploration elsewhere.<\/p>\n

And that\u2019s the core of the trouble.<\/p>\n

If, back at the time that the Massachusetts Supreme Court announced its decision that marriage (or at least the \u201cbenefits of marriage\u201d, per Wikipedia<\/a>) must be provided to all takers on equal terms, the Massachusetts legislature had simply decided not to be in the business of recognizing a legal status of \u201cmarriage\u201d at all, but had declared that, henceforth, the legal name of that next-of-kin and financial connectedness status shall be, say, a \u201ckin-union\u201d?<\/p>\n

Oh, it\u2019d be a mess, for sure, when it comes to the pair\u2019s legal status when they cross state lines. \u00a0And it wouldn\u2019t really solve the issue, for instance, of whether you can compel a baker to make a cake for Adam and Steve when they celebrate their secular kin-union or their Episcopalian marriage. \u00a0But it would make it clear that a \u201cmarriage\u201d is something deeper than a mere kin-union, and yet something that varies by religion or subculture, in the same way as confirmation does.<\/p>\n

And \u2014 staying with the bigger issue of marriage, divorce, and re-marriage (per yesterday\u2019s post<\/a>):<\/p>\n

With respect to society in general, is it at all possible to move the needle on the number of people willing to commit to a \u201csacramental\u201d marriage (regardless of whether they\u2019d speak in those terms)? \u00a0Or, if not, should we encourage kin-union type marriage (that is, not a different legal status \u2014 that doesn\u2019t exist \u2014 but a way of accepting entering into a marriage before the kids are born, if not before they\u2019re conceived), as better than no marriage at all?<\/p>\n

And with respect to those wishing to be married in the Catholic church, does the individual parish have the responsibility to assess whether a couple is truly making a sacramental vow? \u00a0Or would this do more harm than good, if it chases couples away entirely? \u00a0 And if a couple is well-intentioned, but enters marriage with reservations about\u00a0a lifetime commitment, can they grow into sacramentality?<\/p>\n

When it comes down to it, though, I\u2019d really like to come up with some label other than the clumsy \u201csacramental marriage\u201d to at least allow us to talk about these two types of pairings.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"