Someone once asked what happens when the irresistible force meets the immovable object. One suggestion — an indescribable catastrophe! I wonder if that is where we are heading with the debate about the meaning of marriage?
The rhetoric is sometimes bordering on the irrational. Speaking about the age old definition of marriage is now 'hate speech'. People in same sex relationships feel that their love for each other is seen as worthless. So the arguments go on and on.
Marriage, and more broadly any other close domestic relationship, is a fundamental social institution. Its meaning and worth ought not be determined by a poll where whichever side loses is left disenchanted and the other gloats 'victory'.
Is it possible to devise some legislative words that will do justice to both sides of the debate so that a Bill can be brought to the floor of our democratic process and find genuinely bi-partisan support? If we could achieve this, we do not need a plebiscite with the attendant risk of even further social divisiveness and even bitterness and spite, not to mention the cost.
I offer the following as a conversation starter.
When I was in the high school debating team it was impressed on us that it is important to define the terms of the debate. At the moment we are not debating the legal rights of same sex couples. Following legislative changes some years ago they have, in a practical sense, all the rights of married couples.
We are debating the use of the word 'marriage' — how the law ought to define it. It is a symbolic issue. Perhaps the solution needs to be symbolic as well.
Could not the federal legislation move away from defining marriage to a regime where it recognises marriage? It could recognise Catholic marriage (as described in the Code of Canon Law). It could recognise Anglican or Jewish or Islamic marriage and it could recognise secular marriage (which could include a same sex relationship). On this basis the various 'marriages' are different but equal.
"Catholic theology and social teaching about the common good has long recognised that not every activity that it holds to to be immoral needs to be or can be an illegality."
Some basis rules would apply. You have to be 18 years old (no child brides). You have to enter into the relationship freely (no forced arranged marriages). You can only be lawfully married to one person at a