October 2, 2006
Part 4
Q. "Why can't we all just get along by having religious marriage and civil marriage?"
Marriage is an institution which superceeds both religion and the law, according to Mr. Stanton, we don't draw a distinction between a couple who is legally married and a couple who married in a religious ceremony. I agree with Mr. Stanton, a good example is the refusal of the Catholic Church to acknowledge remarriage after divorce. Their refusal, does not in any way diminish the existence of the marriage.
What is it the institution of marriage creates that superceeds law and religion? Marriage forms a bond between two individuals which cannot be established by any other contractual arragement (except perhaps, adoption). Austin Cline refers to this bond as "kinship" in his article on about.com
"Kinship is an important thread in the social fabric. It isn’t an “institution” like marriage because there are generally no specific legal, religious, or social rules regulating it. Kinship is, instead, an amorphous creation of many other institutions which help people structure their relationships with one another."If you know that someone is your kin, you know that you have different legal, social, and moral obligations to them than you do to total strangers. If you know that two people are kin, you know that they not only have different obligations to each other than they do to you, but also that you have different obligations to them as a group then you would to them as individuals if they weren’t kin.
"Marriage establishes a relationship which does not and cannot exist for people who are simply living together. However much a cohabiting couple may love each other and however long they may have been together, their relationship is not such that it can be described as “kin” and, as a consequence, they cannot make any legal, social, or moral claims on others to treat them individually and jointly as if they were kin."
Along with this bond, married couples enjoy far more advantages than unmarried couples. From hospital visitation, to immigration rights to pensions, married couples benefit where same-sex couples are not allowed to. A better discussion on these topics is available here
Posted by Anna at October 2, 2006 12:32 AM