I believe in freedom of
association as the best way of dealing with most social and industrial issues, not
state intervention. What we choose to believe, speak, write down, who we
associate with, and who we choose to trade with should be almost entirely a
matter of personal liberty, not government authority. It’s unsurprising I think
this way, as I believe the state should take a step back out of many things in
which it involves itself, given its mass inefficiency and stultifying mechanisms.
With this in mind, I want
to turn to the subject of marriage. My view is that the state should recognise
that marriage is a Christian union, and Christians should recognise that many
people want to have a union that is not Christian. Consequently, I think there
ought to be two distinct formal unions: one, a Christian marriage and therefore
formally recognised under Christian principles, and the other a civil
partnership formally recognised under whichever non-Christian principles the participants
happen to value.
I’m a Christian, and given
that Christian marriage is a private triangular affair between God and two
beloveds (and by extension, the beloveds’ loved ones, friends and church
congregation), I think it would be highly appropriate and far more spiritually
liberating if marriage became privatised and was no longer under the thrall of
the state. As long as the marriage contract establishes property rights, and as
long as the law still protects children, in that you can only be legally
married at 16, and there are sufficient legal contracts in place to address
matters concerning children, the state is an extraneous element of the marriage
bond. Marriage is a Christian unity; the bureaucratic elements are invented by
the establishment.
Think about what Christian
marriage is; it is two beloveds who love each other, and who love God and want
to put Him first, and promise before Him to be devoted and committed to each
other for the rest of their lives. There is nothing the state can do to ratify
a union that is ordained by God. What legitimises the love is the relationship,
not the paperwork. There are lots of couples who have the paperwork but not the
love and high quality of relationship, and there are lots of couples who have
the love and high quality of relationship but not the paperwork. If a couple
has the mutual devotion and promise each other to put one another first for the
rest of their life, then there is no reason why marriage contracts can’t be
private affairs that are drawn up by the beloveds (or on their behalf if they
choose), and instituted in the church before God.
On a wider note, the great
thing about individual liberty is that there is room for diversity. There is no
pressure for us all to think the same way, and through trial and error we get
to shape society according to complex revealed preferences. In a society where
marriage is private, people would be free to sign marital contracts that best
suit their individual beliefs. But given that Christian marriage is a unique
Christian concept, the church would be able to apply its own articles to the
contracts the beloveds create, and the beloveds would tailor those contracts to
the authority of their chosen church – one that they declare to be sanctioned
under God’s authority.
It’s time that
Christianity wrestled back control of its own institution and reclaimed it as a
purely Christian spiritual union between beloveds before God. You see, the
question must be asked; in the case of the majority of unbelievers - why would
they even want to get married in a church? When the Christian church performs a
wedding for couples who do not share the central beliefs of Christianity, they
are engaging in ceremonies for couples for whom the central tenets have no
intrinsic religious value (it seems these numbers are increasing all the time
too). Of course, non-religious couples shouldn’t be legally prohibited from
getting married in a church if the church consents – but that’s not the point. I
can only wonder why those couples would want to if they don't have any beliefs
that would naturally affiliate them to the church's ethos. That people still do
is, I should imagine, a mere historical legacy of habit that is slowly dying in
out in Britain as we gradually become more secular, and the Church of England
gradually erodes into an even tinier minority.
If my beloved and I didn't
believe in the central Christian tenets, there is no reason why we should have
any desire to get married in a church, mosque or wherever - just as if we were
vegetarians we'd have no desire to go to a steak house for our evening meal. In
changing long-standing traditions and not seeking refuge in the unreliable
legacy of the status quo, we are likely to have a society in which people
choose things because those things match their views and beliefs, not because
history dictates that ‘This is how it has always been done’.
When gay people or
unbelievers seek to defend people’s right to not be discriminated against by
any sectarian faction of the church, I think they are right to do so. But I
think they are arguing in the wrong direction. They act like vegetarians trying
to defend the vegetarians’ right to go into butchers’ shops, when what they
would be better doing is trying to convince more vegetarians to give up
butchers’ shops altogether and seek food stores that better cater their tastes.
I think that numerous people are still getting married in churches simply
because 'marriage' in a church happens to be the oldest ceremonial legacy in
this country, or because society says a church wedding is somehow more exalted
than a civil ceremony, or because of pressure from family, and other similar
reasons. Why would they want to unless they have emotional, spiritual or
analytical affiliation to the church's ethos? Realising this probably is the
best the best way to forward the debate and culturally progress too.
Society needn't be so
polarised anymore, and it will be much less like it in the future; just as we
now have supermarkets in which meat-eaters and vegetarians can happily shop
together choosing only the products that match their tastes, we probably will
eventually evolve a cultural system in which people pick their ceremonial rites
of passage in accordance with their views and beliefs. I understand
non-religious funerals are rising in numbers; in 150 years (maybe sooner) they
probably will outnumber church funerals. Fast forward 150 years and my guess is you'll find church
weddings being almost exclusively chosen by Christians, and the majority of
other lifetime commitments being non-religious civil commitments. We will
probably escape the historical legacies of anti-church discord and well-worn
religious clichés, and live in a society in which chosen rites of passage match
people’s tastes and beliefs, and where those unions are a private affair and
not under the authority of the state.
