While we await the Supreme Court’s decisions regarding the constitutionality of the federal Defense of Marriage Act and California’s Proposition 8, which bans same-sex marriage in that state, most observers – indeed most Americans – know that the marriage equality ship has already sailed. That is, it may be awhile before same-sex marriage is legal in most of the country, but the trend is moving inexorably in that direction.
The pace at which attitudes have changed on this issue is astounding. In 2004, gay marriage was a “wedge issue,” skillfully used to swing a very close presidential election in favor of Republican George Bush. Everywhere the matter was referred to voters in the form of a resolution, the result was always in favor of defining marriage exclusively as a union between a man and a woman. Now, less than a decade later, a large majority of Americans favor allowing gays and lesbians to have all the same rights and privileges as their heterosexual counterparts, up to and including the ability to call their civil unions “marriage.”
Part of the reason for this massive shift is generational. Sexual orientation is simply not the hot-button issue for younger adults that it is for those over 50. So as time passes, the number of people for whom marriage equality is a non-issue naturally increases. Another reason is that gay and lesbian couples are no longer living in the shadows. Sensing that history is on their side, they have “come out” to their friends and families. This means that for millions of Americans, same-sex marriage has ceased to be an abstract issue and has become deeply personal. A third reason for the shift is the increasingly insensitive rhetoric from those who refuse to budge on the issue. Most thoughtful people do not want to be lumped with politicians and religious leaders who stridently claim that homosexuality is “bestial” and that “God hates fags.”
The latest example of such bigotry came in the state of Montana, where the state legislature recently voted to rescind a law that makes gay sex – not gay marriage, but gay sex – illegal. The law was declared unconstitutional by the Montana Supreme Court in 1997, but it has remained on the books as a rallying cry for cultural conservatives who believe that homosexuality itself should be a crime.
Thirty-four legislators voted to retain the law. Among them was Rep. Dave Hagstrom, who offered this argument in defense of his position: “To me, sex is primarily purposed to produce people...sex that doesn’t produce people is deviate.” When one angry constituent phoned Bagstrom, who has four children, and asked him whether he has had sex only four times, he replied that he has had sex more often, and that he believes sex serves two purposes – procreation and pleasure. I’m sure Rep. Bagstrom wishes he could turn the clock back and state his case more artfully. I’m not sure what he would say, but the kind of bigoted nonsense he spouted on the floor of the legislature has helped to push the country away from his position.
Still, there are millions of committed Christians who are on the one hand inclined to be supportive of their gay brothers and sisters, but on the other hand are hesitant to "change the definition" of marriage. The most persistent argument against homosexuality in general and gay marriage in particular has been that “the purpose of marriage is procreation,” and since a same-sex couple cannot procreate, homosexuality is unnatural and gay unions should not be granted legal status.
If I hear this argument one more time, I’m going to scream. The narrow understanding of marriage as the means of procreation was offensive to me long before anybody was talking about gay marriage. I don’t know anybody who got married for the purpose of having children. Many of them decided to have children as an expression of their mutual love, but many also decided not to, and some – to their grief – discovered that were unable to bear children. If the purpose of marriage is procreation, then why should couples stay together past their childbearing years? Once they’ve accomplished their biological obligation, wouldn’t it make sense for the husband to divorce his wife and go find a younger woman to have more children with?
I often hear Christians defending “traditional” marriage by appealing to Genesis 2:24 (which was also quoted by Jesus in Mark 10:7-8): “A man shall leave his father and mother and cling to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” Hmm. No mention of pro-creation there. In fact, the subject never comes up in the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. The woman is given to the man, not as a baby-producing machine, but as a partner, a companion, and a helper.
The most risqué material in the Bible is the “Song of Solomon,” a rather graphic love song that celebrates human sexuality. It was included in the Jewish Bible by early rabbis as a parable of God’s relationship to Israel, consistent with the prophet Isaiah’s image of Israel as the bride of Yahweh, and New Testament descriptions of the church as the bride of Christ. If the purpose of marriage is procreation, how exactly do those scriptural metaphors work? How does Israel copulate with God, or the church with Christ? Clearly, that’s not the meaning of those metaphors. They are meant to convey the intimate relationship God has with human beings through covenants.
In fact, “covenant” is the primary purpose of marriage. Intimate companionship between two people allows for both to more fully reflect the love of God in each of their lives. An additional purpose of some marriages is procreation, but God’s commandment in Genesis 1:28 to “be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth” has already been fulfilled. There is no urgent need to populate the earth with the human species. If anything, today’s concern is how to reach zero population growth so that life on our God-given planet remains sustainable. Yes, enough female eggs need to be fertilized to perpetuate the species of life that is made in God’s image, but there is no necessity (nor has there ever been, for that matter) for every married couple to produce children.
So could we please lay this silly argument to rest? There is no “definition” of marriage in the Bible, only references to the practice of marriage that indicate how much it has evolved over time. What makes marriage worthy of being compared to God’s covenants with humanity is not procreation, but intimate companionship. God’s reign is not violated if we expand our cultural understanding of marriage to include same-sex relationships. In fact, to expand the covenant of marriage is to further the cause of God’s reign, for covenantal relationships have always been the means by which God seeks to redeem creation.
Copyright 2013 by J. Mark Lawson
Love this!
Posted by: Jen Radcliffe | 04/12/2013 at 08:21 PM
Well said, Mark. Would that I could find a progressive congregation like that of UCC-Bayberry in this very conservative area of the country that I am living in. Miss you all.
Posted by: Peggy Platt | 04/12/2013 at 05:49 PM