Same-sex Marriages

Where do I lie on this debate? I believe same-sex marriages should be legal; a decision I did not make lightly. For me, mostly it comes down to the question what is marriage? I believe that as far as the government is concerned it is solely a contract of legal partnership. Personally I believe in marriage as a promise to God to love honor and protect the other person for the rest of your life. I am not so arrogant to think that I know what God approves of beyond that agreement.

Keeping in mind that marriage is a social contract of partnership as far as the government is concern, should same-sex marriages be legal? Before I answer, let me tell you a story. My mom is a nurse. When a patient is emitted into a hospital and about to die, usually that patient is not coherent enough to speak; generally they’re unconscious. Immediate family is the only ones allowed to visit that patient. It is up to the family’s discrepancies to allow other visitors into the room. As you can imagine, families do not always approve of their loved one’s homosexual life style. Over and over again, my mom has seen a patient’s homosexual partner be denied the simple request of saying good-bye to that patient. Maybe it is just me but something about that just does not feel right to me.

Now I want to touch on the controversial subject of children. Legalizing same-sex marriages would also be allowing same-sex partners to adopt. I believe men and women have fundamental differences which compliment each other when joined together in partnership. I realize this is a complete stereotype of genders, but I believe that the gender differences make each other stronger as a whole. I believe that men and women are supposed to be partners and children learn best from having both genders as parents. However I am certain that having a loving family, no matter what gender the parents are, is better than no family at all. I am much more concerned with the implications of having a morally sound parent than having a child learn from both genders. As an individual parent, I believe that a homosexual can be just as good of a parent as any heterosexual parent.

On the religious side of the matter, how would same sex marriages affect churches? Personally I see marriage as a government institution different than marriage as a religious institution. I think it is up to each church and each religion individually to determine whether same-sex marriage ceremonies should or should not be performed in their church. It is no different than marriages with multiple wives. Some religions and their churches allow for the union of a man to many wives and some do not. I don’t see the problem in applying that same concept to same-sex marriages. That way we are protecting the legal rights of homosexuals without in fringing on anyone’s religious views within their church community. Everybody wins.