Marriage, Back door laws and policies, and tolerance issues

Remove all ads!

Not really. There is a statement in the Constitution (Article X I think) that states that all powers not given to the federal goverment are left to the individual states. Since the word marriage does not even appear in the Constitution, it is something for the states to decide on individually. That's why there is a difference from state to state over the ability get a marriage (Massachusetts), a civil union (New Jersey) or neither (sadly, California) to a member of the same sex.

 

I'm questioning the allegations of abuses made. I knew that Joseph Smith and Brigham Young had multiple wives. I'm just challenging the accusations that the women were not legally old enough when they married the men in question, their treatment, and the accusations that the women were coerced into such marriages. How could a faith built on concepts of marriage and family have survived such hypocritical behaviour of the early prophets?

One, it will contradict the doctrine that we teach our children on the importance of marriage and family. This interferes with our legal right to educate our children according to our faith. Secondly, anti-discrimination legislation may eventually erode our right to refuse such ceremonies and to excommunicate members who enter into such unions if a judge holds such laws to be more important to the nation than the freedom of religion.*

* at least in Canada it could.

Is that a fact like that purple spaghetti monster on the moon? Or is that something you can support with reputable research?

The Scribes and Pharisees of ancient Israel were more like a legislative body, interpreting the laws given to the prophets in a form that the government could enforce. They went into greater detail than the prophets ever did. They were civil authority. They were the ones that interpreted people getting sick from bad shellfish and assumed that it must be an abomination that pissed God off.

 

Oh for the days when homosexuals could be put in asylums and people of differing religions could just be burnt at the stake. It's such a shame that society has moved on from the good old days of lock 'em up or burn 'em because then people wouldn't have to argue and we could all get on with being tolerant and friendly and nobody would have to sit at a computer arguing. In fact, in such a friendly society, we may have all been able to band together, come out from behind the computer screen and change something really important.
I do realise however, that shouting about the evils of gay people and polygamists is much more important than wondering how to help children dying because of wars and poverty so I can really understand where you're all coming from

(I'm fully aware that somebody somewhere is going to be offended by this so please don't state the obvious. Your intolerance has already offended me)

 

But that's the whole thing Gnarff - I don't agree with your initial statement. The government by regulating marriage does not see itself as regulating a religious ordinance. To the government, all marriages are civil. Regardless of where you get the ceremony performed, everyone gets the exact same piece of paper as their marriage license. Because the rules for who can and who cannot get married differ from one religion to the next, it would be impossible for government to legislate without stepping way over the line of spearation of church and state. So the government has instead said: All marriages are civil, and these are the rules in place to meet the legal requirements. Places of worship can place additional restrictions of who can and cannot get married by those of their faith, but from a legal standpoint, these are the only criteria.

If that's true, Joe Smith is DA MAN! I've totally underestimated him. I have to stand back and just admire the ingenuity! He's not getting any from the misses, so he goes to the length of starting a new religion so he can go get some somewhere else, and because of the religious nature of it, it's all OK. He's a genius!

Oh, you're certainly allowed to have that opinion. You're allowed to hold just about any opinion you want, no matter how anyone else feels about it. You're just not in any position to expect your opinion to be legislated onto others.

 

Bolding mine. And as I've said before, no, it couldn't.

Thank you, Gnarff, for starting off my day with a good laugh. That comment, coming from you, is absolutely hilarious!

 

Okay Gnarff -- shall we walk through this?

You started in this thread by claiming divine right to the word "marriage" which I argued against.

Then in post #136 you shifted tactics and claimed marriage was defined by the government and proven by the laws which discriminated against the Mormon church. You repeated that misguided argument in post #228, #326, and #333. In post #336 I finally called you on the issue (and buried you, I might add). You have been continually waffling about the issue without actually answering any direct questions. Instead you choose to pick little points to deflect emphasis on the big points (which you seem to completely miss). So, I'll list them specifically:

1. Have you found any portions of the Laws mentioned (Morrill Anti-Bigamy Law and the Edwards Act) where marriage is defined as between "a man and a woman"?

2. Have you even read either law?

3. Have found any portion of Reynolds v. United States where marriage is defined as between "a man and a woman"?

4. Have you even read the court transcript or opinion?

Based on your previous responses, I'll assume the answer to all of those is a "no."

So, let recap ... you haven't been able to prove divine origin of the word marriage, and you haven't been able to show a definition of marriage to be exclusively as you think it should be. Thus far you're 0 for 2.

Yes, it does. In the United States the Constitution will require it.

When the Jim Crow laws were abolished the Mormon church was not required to let blacks into the priesthood -- that change came much later. A religion (in this case the Mormon church) was still free to believe as they saw fit and exclude people based on race. Based on that, there is no reason to assume religions will be under any obligation to recognize marriage of gays. Many religions do not recognize civil marriages -- and they are not required to.

Off topic:

So, when Smith took a 14 year old girl as a wife (which you can freely verify through searching the LDS geneology web site) she must have been very mature for her age.

And to further dispute your claim of limited number of males in the Mormon church I will let the explanation come from Apostle John A. Widtsoe which he wrote in his book "Evidences and Reconciliations":

I'll say it again, you should verify the validity of your argument before you type.

 

The Catholic Church, for example, does not recognize ANY civil marriages. The only marriages recognized by the Catholic Church are those performed in a Catholic Church. (Even in the case if both people getting married qualified for marriage in the Church, but decided to get married outside the Church.)

 

Google 'sex vs. gender.' I do not have access to scientific journals, so I cannot give you someone's thesis on the differences. That being said, the purple spaghetti monster on the moon is just used as a counter-argument for religion... there are no sources that say anything about it; gender vs. sex, however, has plenty (and I am sure you will question their scientificness, but you have also questioned every non-Mormon source of info anyone has put up here, so I guess it is useless to even try to show you something). Google it.

No, YOU tolerate it. Society accepts it. And for the 10^7 time, the rights they should have cannot be granted without such a change, although you cannot seem to see it.

And they saw people getting sick from homosexuality as well? Is that why they made it into an abomination? Or was homosexuality just known to be an abomination, and bad shellfish they had to figure out via getting sick?

Go to Mississippi or Alabama and try to believe that. The man's skin color does matter to some people, despite everyone else already moving on.

 

Ok T2, you want actual legal definitions of marriage
1) the Defense Of Marriage Act - the word 'marriage' means only a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife, and the word 'spouse' refers only to a person of the opposite sex who is a husband or a wife.

2) Including the results of the 2008 general Elections, twenty-eight states have enacted constitutional amendments defining marriage as between a man and a woman, and another twenty states have enacted statutory DOMAs[

So the federal Government & 48 Of the 50 states define marriage as one man & one woman.
Argument null & void, no discussion needed as it is firmly defined.
As i have stated before whats to argue about?

 

The Defense of Marriage Act can, and will, be challenged. It will fall eventually -- it was simply a knee jerk reaction to some states allowing gay marriage and poorly worded. This later definition (which has questionable Constitutionality) has no bearing on the cases presented by Gnarff, though.

 

It's been on the books for 13 YEARS, just how long do you want to wait to try to challenge it?

 

For starters, it would be challenged in the courts. This isn't likely since gay civil marriage isn't legal in too many places. Since the only people affected by the Federal Law would have legally binding marriages, the number of people with grounds to sue is really quite small. A gay couple seeking marriage in a state that doesn't allow it is going to sue their state before they sue the federal government, since the federal government isn't the entity denying them the opportunity to marry.

 

That's actually a really good point. What is the domain of the DOMA? Since there are a few states that allow gay marriage, and a significant number of others that offer civil unions/domestic partnerships/etc., it is clear that the DOMA does not force states to define marriage as between a man and a woman, nor does in prohibit same sex couples for getting some legal protections. If it doesn't have the authority to do that, and it's the state and not the feredal government that gives out marriage licenses, does the DOMA do anything other than allow states to pass their own Constitutional amendments banning gay marriage?

At such a time when three factors are present: 1) An administration that will not oppose the challenge 2) A Supreme Court that will likely rule in your favor and 3) The populace won't have too much of an issue with it.

That is to say, it may be a while yet, because the one of those I think is definitely present is the first. While I do not think Obama necessarily supports gay marraige, I also think he won't be opposed to someone challenging it. TBH, I don't think he gives a crap either way - which is good enough to satisfy the first criteria. For the second point: The SC is still pretty conservative, and the only Justice likely to retire in the next 4 years is Stevens, who is liberal, and would be replaced by another liberal. There are some older conserative Justices as well, but just as Stevens held out for Bush to leave office, I'm sure they will try to do the same and wait for another Republican administration. For point 3, I think the public mindset is turning, and I definitely think that gay marriage is not a major issue for most people (as I've detailed previously, I think most people really don't care). Still, I think that the number of people who will actually support gay marriage is smaller than the number of people who are actively against it. And that might be a problem for the third point.

 

Well, the document is probably just political cover for conservative politcians (some of whom are closet gays anyway).

 

Right - and that's where I'm confused. At the very least Massachusetts and Vermont have different definitions of the terms. I know that state law does not have to match federal law, but it is rare (impossible?) for state law to contradict federal law, and have the state law stand.