OK, so just last week I dealt with the religious arguments that might possibly come up in the context of the marriage equality debate. I dealt with those arguments for the sake of completeness. I didn't really expect them to come up in the debate other than as throwaway comments from the NO side. Boy, was I wrong.
A new website has launched called Mandate for Marriage. It is run by a family of Christian fundamentalists from Mayo lead by Sean Burke. The aim of the website is to defend traditional marriage and to show that:
a)Scripture condemns homosexuality and forbids same-sex marriage
b)Marriage equality threatens religious freedom and will have dire consequences for Christians
c)Legalising marriage equality is bad for parents and children
d)Marriage is a mandate given by God which cannot/should not be altered by the State
None of these four arguments really hold up but it surprised me just how badly defended they are on the website.
1. On scripture and marriage
While a lot of the arguments dredged up by Mandate for Marriage have been dealt with in my recent blog post, there are a few new and really awfully made arguments presented in the Scripture section of the Mandate for Marriage website.
The first problem is that the section opens by arguing that the Bible doesn't present homosexuality as a trait which cannot be changed but rather as a sinful act:
"The Scripture never depicts homosexuality as a trait which one cannot change, such as e.g. skin colour. Homosexuality is never assumed to be a genetic, predetermined condition. Rather, it is presented as a sinful practice which can be forsaken by the grace of God. "
Arguing that the Bible doesn't categorise homosexuality as a genetic condition and therefore it is a sinful practice is idiotic. The Bible is not a scientific text and there are abundant examples that the authors of the various books of the Bible had no idea how genetics or biology actually worked. I mean, if they did, we wouldn't have passages like this:
" Jacob, however, took fresh-cut branches from poplar, almond and plane treesand made white stripes on them by peeling the bark and exposing the white inner wood of the branches. Then he placed the peeled branches in all the watering troughs, so that they would be directly in front of the flocks when they came to drink. When the flocks were in heat and came to drink, they mated in front of the branches. And they bore young that were streaked or speckled or spotted."
Genesis 30:37-39
Nobody who knows anything about genetics could possibly think that if you show striped patterns to pregnant cows then you'll get striped offspring.
As it happens, we don't fully understand the actual factors which come together to determined sexual orientation. We have identified genetic factors, epigenetic factors, gestational and otherwise developmental factors which can influence a person's sexual orientation. In fact, pretty much the one thing that science is confident about is that free choice is not likely to be a factor.
Oh, and before anyone decides to point out that the scientific errors in the Bible are an Old Testament problem, don't bother. There are some whopping scientific errors in the NT too. Just like this for example:
"Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches."
Matthew 13:32
Firstly, mustard doesn't grow into a tree, it grows into a shrub with a maximum height of about six feet. Secondly, the mustard seed isn't the smallest seed. It's not even the smallest seed that would have been known to the people of the time. The black orchid would have seeds much smaller than a mustard seed.
The second problem with the Scripture section is the idea that Jesus condemns gay marriage by referring to the destruction of Sodom. There are two problems with this line of argument.
Firstly, as I pointed out in my previous post, the destruction of Sodom had nothing to do with sexual immorality. Ezekiel 16:49 makes it quite clear that Sodom's downfall was caused by inhospitality.
Secondly, the passage in Luke 17:29, used to demonstrate that Jesus approved of Sodom's destruction is equally wrong. If we look at the overall story in Luke 17, we can see that verse 29 is being taken out of context:
"Once, on being asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, “The coming of the kingdom of God is not something that can be observed, nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is in your midst.”
Then he said to his disciples, “The time is coming when you will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, but you will not see it. People will tell you, ‘There he is!’ or ‘Here he is!’ Do not go running off after them. For the Son of Man in his day[d] will be like the lightning, which flashes and lights up the sky from one end to the other. But first he must suffer many things and be rejected by this generation.
“Just as it was in the days of Noah, so also will it be in the days of the Son of Man. People were eating, drinking, marrying and being given in marriage up to the day Noah entered the ark. Then the flood came and destroyed them all.
“It was the same in the days of Lot. People were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building. But the day Lot left Sodom, fire and sulfur rained down from heaven and destroyed them all.
“It will be just like this on the day the Son of Man is revealed. On that day no one who is on the housetop, with possessions inside, should go down to get them. Likewise, no one in the field should go back for anything."
Luke 17:20-31
The reference to Sodom in this passage comes from a question from the Pharisees about the coming of the kingdom of God. Jesus uses the examples of both Noah and Sodom to show that when God acts, there is no prior warning. He states that people of Noah's time and people in Sodom carried on about their business oblivious of the impending doom and so it will be with the coming of the son of Man. Not only does Jesus not approve the destruction of Sodom in this passage but nowhere in this passage does it claim that Sodom's destruction was due to sexual immorality.
The only passages which claim this are those written by unknown authors (i.e. 2 Peter, Jude, 1 Timothy) or by Paul, a man who never actually met Jesus. So the idea that we can know whether Jesus would have or ever did actually condemn gay marriage is ridiculous.
Finally, there are two interesting side notes to be made about the Scripture section. Firstly, the section quotes Leviticus 20:13 as a condemnation of homosexuality but conveniently leaves out part of the verse which states that homosexuals should be put to death. Secondly, the last sentence of the section states that Jesus approves of Leviticus through Matthew 19:19, so expect them to call for tattoos, pork, shellfish and astrology to be made illegal any day now.
2. On marriage equality and religious freedom
The main thrust of the religious freedom section of the website is that the rights and freedoms of Christians will be damaged by marriage equality. Putting aside for the moment that the rights and freedoms of LGBT people are already being infringed, the examples of these persecutions presented are somewhat less than compelling.
a) Brian Barkley, Yorkshire, UK
Brian Barkley, according to the website, is:
" a 71-year-old senior volunteer with the Red Cross, was sacked from his job in November 2014 for holding a placard stating ‘No Same Sex Marriage’
The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, for those who don't know is an organisation dedicated to carrying out humanitarian work worldwide. It was originally founded as an organisation for treating wounded soldiers on the battlefield regardless of whose side they are on. Since its inception in 1863 the Red Cross has been dedicated to a mission of aid to all people regardless of their views or backgrounds. As such in 1965, it outlined its core principles which include:
Humanity
The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, born of a desire to bring assistance without discrimination to the wounded on the battlefield, endeavours, in its international and national capacity, to prevent and alleviate human suffering wherever it may be found. Its purpose is to protect life and health and to ensure respect for the human being. It promotes mutual understanding, friendship, cooperation and lasting peace amongst all peoples.
I don't see how holding a one-man protest against same-sex marriage could in any way be construed to be compatible with the principle outlined above, especially those sections highlighted. Neither for that matter is it compatible with this principle:
Neutrality
In order to continue to enjoy the confidence of all, the Movement may not take sides in hostilities or engage at any time in controversies of a political, racial, religious or ideological nature.
It seems quite clear from the principles above that the views of this volunteer were incompatible with the operating principles of the Red Cross. This could lead, not only to damaging the reputation of the Red Cross, but also negatively impact the ability of the Red Cross to carry out their core mission (i.e. loss of funding).
b) State churches, Denmark
Another example of this threat to religious freedom is that experienced by state churches in Denmark:
Another example of this threat to religious freedom is that experienced by state churches in Denmark:
"All state clergy in Denmark, following a law enacted in June 2014, must now allow their churches to perform same-sex ceremonies, regardless of their objections."
I shouldn't need to point out why this argument fails. Under Section 4 of the Danish Constitution, the Evangelical Lutheran Church is established as the state church (referred to as the people's church in the document) and receives state support and funding. As such, there isn't a separation of church and state in Denmark and any changes to law in Denmark automatically affect the Churches. There are two reasons why this cannot happen in Ireland.
Firstly, there isn't a state Church in Ireland. Well, there was, or at least the Catholic church once held a constitutionally recognised special position in Irish society. However, this was removed with the Fifth Amendment in 1972.
Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, the State is constitutionally prohibited from interfering in the running of religious denominations.
44.5 Every religious denomination shall have the right to manage its own affairs, own, acquire and administer property, movable and immovable, and maintain institutions for religious or charitable purposes.
c,d) Beulah Print & Ashers Bakery, Ireland
I've decided to group these two stories together because they have one thing in common, both are business which refused their services on the basis of opposition to marriage equality. While this controversy still rages in the media and the courts at the time of writing, I'd just like to point out one thing.
Firstly, in both cases, the service was refused because of opposition to gay marriage. Let's suppose, for example, that the customers in either case were instead of different races. Would we be even having this discussion? Of course not. If you are offering a service to the public then restricting that service for any reason is discrimination. Now sometimes, this discrimination may be justified (e.g. a pub refusing to serve an unruly customer) but we have laws in place to prevent discrimination where the basis for the discrimination lacks any rational basis such as in these two cases.
e) Brendan Eich, Mozilla, California
Unlike the example of Brian Barkley above and the other cases which get trotted out in certain sections of the media, Brendan Eich was not a lowly employee cruelly laid-off by a large and uncaring employer. Eich was the CEO of Mozilla. When it came to light that Eich had given a donation in support of Prop. 8 there was a public backlash. This backlash began to hurt Mozilla's operations and damage Eich's effectiveness as CEO. Consequently Eich made the decision to resign. Now, most commentators on the NO side make a point of how Eich was "forced" to resign. While the degree of public pressure may have reduced his options somewhat, the decision to resign was Eich's nonetheless. However, the important point here is not whether Eich was forced by publicity to resign, the point is that Eich was not ordered or compelled by legislation to resign. The argument being made by Mandate for Marriage is that legislating for marriage equality would mean more cases like Brendan Eich. How? How could allowing same-sex couples to get married effect the public outcry that followed Eich's revelation? Eich didn't fall foul of any equality legislation, he simply made a choice which the majority of people didn't agree with and they made this disagreement well known.
3. On Parents & Children
Unlike the example of Brian Barkley above and the other cases which get trotted out in certain sections of the media, Brendan Eich was not a lowly employee cruelly laid-off by a large and uncaring employer. Eich was the CEO of Mozilla. When it came to light that Eich had given a donation in support of Prop. 8 there was a public backlash. This backlash began to hurt Mozilla's operations and damage Eich's effectiveness as CEO. Consequently Eich made the decision to resign. Now, most commentators on the NO side make a point of how Eich was "forced" to resign. While the degree of public pressure may have reduced his options somewhat, the decision to resign was Eich's nonetheless. However, the important point here is not whether Eich was forced by publicity to resign, the point is that Eich was not ordered or compelled by legislation to resign. The argument being made by Mandate for Marriage is that legislating for marriage equality would mean more cases like Brendan Eich. How? How could allowing same-sex couples to get married effect the public outcry that followed Eich's revelation? Eich didn't fall foul of any equality legislation, he simply made a choice which the majority of people didn't agree with and they made this disagreement well known.
3. On Parents & Children
The argument made in this section is that gay marriage would be bad for both parents and children. Within this section there are a number of specific and demonstrably false claims.
"In marriage between a man and a woman, as ordained by God, both parents have a biological connection to the child, increasing the likelihood that the parents will identify with and sacrifice for the child. This connection also reduces the likelihood that either parent will abuse the child. God established this pattern and we do well to follow it."
The quote above argues that man-woman marriage reduces the likelihood of child abuse. In a word, no.
The evidence surrounding the perpetrators of child abuse shows that just over half of all male child abusers are biological fathers (51%) with 20% being non-biological parents (stepfathers etc.) and 25% being non-parents (i.e. teachers, relatives, friends etc.). When we look at female abusers, we see that 86% are biological mothers.
The evidence also shows that one third of male perpetrators acted in concert with the child's mother. In these cases, biological fathers were more likely to act in concert with the mother than other males and that when both parents were involved in abuse, the rate of recidivism (i.e. the likelihood of repeated abuse) was increased.
Male Perpetrators of Child Maltreatment: Findings from NCANDS
"Homosexual couples cannot produce children on their own. This raises the prospect of hopeful couples seeking to “rent wombs” and denying children the right to know their biological parents. This will coincide with the increasing possibility of producing, buying, and selling children because, in addition to adoption, this is the only way in which homosexual couples can have children.
The quote above argues that marriage equality should be avoided because gay couples cannot have children and this will lead to an increase in surrogacy and adoption (which are somehow very bad). There are two problems wrong with this argument.
Firstly, the ability or intention to raise children is not a prerequisite for marriage. Straight couples who are either knowingly infertile (infertility where one partner is unaware is grounds for annulment) or have no intention to have children are not prevented from getting married. So why then should an extra restriction be placed on gay couples?
Secondly, there is the scaremongering tactic of adoption and how gay couples, once married will raid the orphanages and take all the children. This argument is, in and of itself, doubly flawed. For a start, adoptions have been in serious decline for the last three decades:
In 2012, there were just 49 adoption orders granted. Of these, 33 were granted to step-parents (i.e. couples where one parent was already a biological parent). This means that just 16 adoptions were granted to couples where no prior relationship with the child existed. Adoptions in Ireland have been in decline for 30 years with the 2012 level just 4% of that in 1984. This means that those on the NO side are either 30 years behind the times or trying to argue a situation completely unconnected with reality. I'll leave the decision as to which it is as an exercise for the reader.
The other flaw in this argument is the Child and Family Relationships Bill which has just recently passed through the Seanad. This act will update the existing Adoption Act so that same-sex couples can apply to adopt as a couple rather than as individuals under the existing legal framework. This makes any debate about adoption in the context of the marriage referendum irrelevant.
Finally, the adoption statistics above make for interesting reading in more ways than one. Just as adoptions have declined over the last 30 years, the figures show that the number of non-marital births have significantly increased from 5,116 to 25,344. In fact non-marital births now make up 35% of the total, representing a shift away from marriage towards cohabitation. Consequently, I can't see how anyone can argue that allowing a group of people who are clamoring to get married to do so will in anyway have a negative impact on marriage.
"Whether raised by lesbians or by homosexual men, children of same-sex marriages will be denied either a mother or a father. Lesbian mothers say a father is irrelevant to parenting, and homosexual fathers say a mother is irrelevant to parenting. God says both a father and a mother are relevant, however. Two men can never take the place of a mother’s love and two women can never equal a Dad. God intended that every child have a father and a mother who are an example of commitment, care and love. Not only is such a child given a sense of security but s/he sees femininity and masculinity modelled in a complementary relationship. Though separation and divorce are now rampant, and the ideal is becoming less common, society must work towards the ideal rather than work against it.
The quote above while being very careful not to make any explicit declaration, makes the implicit argument that a straight couple is the ideal environment for raising a child and that gay couples lack certain qualities that will result in bad outcomes for the child.
I have dealt with the evidence on this topic in detail in my previous post.
However, there are one further point I want to make about the quote above.
Firstly, its not gay parents who claim that a father or mother are irrelevant. Science does. Just as with much of quantum physics, research on parenting has given us conclusions that are out-of-sync with common sense, and yet they are demonstrably true.
For example, in his book "The Role of the Father in Child Development", Michael E. Lamb states:
"First, fathers and mothers influence their children in similar rather than dissimilar ways.
Stated differently, students of socialization have consistently found that parental warmth, nurturance and closeness are associated with positive child outcomes regardless of whether the parent involved is a mother or father.
Secondly, as research has unfolded, psychologists have been forced to conclude that the characteristics of individual fathers - such as their masculinity, intellect, and even their warmth - are much less important, formatively speaking, than are the characteristics of the relationships they have established with their children.
Marital harmony is a consistent correlate of child adjustment, whereas marital conflict is a consistent and reliable correlate of child maladjustment."
This is probably as concise a summary of parenting research and repsonse to this argument as I can think of.
4. On Genesis & The nature of marriage
One of the points that is made multiple times throughout the website is that marriage is an institution established by God (the Christian one) and that the current marriage referendum is just a secular/homosexual campaign to "redefine" marriage. This argument fails for a number of reasons.
Firstly and obviously, marriage wasn't established in Genesis. Although traditional Christian views hold that Genesis was written by Moses sometime around 1700 BCE, modern scholarship tells us that Genesis is an edited work, compiled from a number of different sources around 450 BCE. The established modern theory states that Genesis was compiled from at least four sources, the Jawhist, Elohist, Deuteronomist and Priestly. However, new research suggests that the Elohist is really just a rewrite of the Jawhist, while the Priestly source is intended as a companion work to the Jawhist. This just leaves two primary sources, the oldest of which, the Deuteronomist, was begun no earlier than about the 8th century BCE. So already, Genesis is approximately 1000 years newer than most Christians would like to admit.
Secondly, we have evidence of the existence of marriage ceremonies before the dawn of Christianity, or Judaism for that matter. 1000 years before work began on what would eventually become Genesis a Babylonian king named Hammurabi authored a legal code which would be copied and emualted by civilisations in the region for centuries afterwards. In this code marriage was a legal contract with specific codes relating to dowry, divorce, inheritance etc.
e.g. "137. If a man wish to separate from a woman who has borne him children, or from his wife who has borne him children: then he shall give that wife her dowry, and a part of the usufruct of field, garden, and property, so that she can rear her children. When she has brought up her children, a portion of all that is given to the children, equal as that of one son, shall be given to her. She may then marry the man of her heart."
Thirdly, there is this idea of "redefining" marriage. This argument would only hold if the definition of marriage was always "one man, one woman for life for the purposes of raising children." There are several reasons why this is wrong.
With regard to Genesis above, at no point in the OT is marriage restricted to one man and one woman. In Genesis 4:19 Lamech marries two women with no evident condemnation from God. Among the many polygamists in the OT represent both Jesus' ancestors and key players in Biblical history including Abraham, Jacob, David and Solomon (who had no less than 700 wives and 300 concubines). In fact, God, through the prophet Nathan offers David even more wives in 2 Samuel 12:8. Polygamy is never condemned in the OT and is the dominant family type if you survey all cultures both historically and geographically.
As author Stephanie Coontz outlines in her book Marriage, A History, traditionally marriage had very little to do with love and children and those in the marriage had little or no choice in its formation:
"To understand why the love-based marriage system was so unstable and how we ended up where we are today, we have to recognise that for most of history, marriage was not about the individual needs and desires of a man and woman and the children they produced. Marriage had as much to do with finding good in-laws and increasing one's family labour force as it did with finding a lifetime companion and raising a beloved child"
Coontz goes on to show how much marriage has changed over the centuries. For starters, polygamy as mentioned above was the norm until the Catholic Church eventually prevailed over the monarchies of Europe around the ninth century.
Further, for over 1000 years the early Church didn't even get involved in marriage. Marriage was seen as a private contract between two individuals in which neither the State nor the Church intervened. It wasn't until 1215 that the Church decreed that prospective couples had to post banns or statements of intent regarding future marriages (as a means to cut down on annulments). Up to this point (and indeed for a few centuries afterwards) the word of the couple alone was deemed sufficient evidence of marriage. No ceremony or witnesses required.
Regarding the Catholic Church, what is even stranger about the Church's historical relationship with marriage, given the current debate, is that for a period of about 600 years, the Catholic Church had official same-sex marriage rites.
"Contrary to myth, Christianity's concept of marriage has not been set in stone since the days of Christ, but has constantly evolved as a concept and ritual. Prof. John Boswell, the late Chairman of Yale University’s history department, discovered that in addition to heterosexual marriage ceremonies in ancient Christian church liturgical documents, there were also ceremonies called the "Office of Same-Sex Union" (10th and 11th century), and the "Order for Uniting Two Men" (11th and 12th century).
These church rites had all the symbols of a heterosexual marriage: the whole community gathered in a church, a blessing of the couple before the altar was conducted with their right hands joined, holy vows were exchanged, a priest officiatied in the taking of the Eucharist and a wedding feast for the guests was celebrated afterwards. These elements all appear in contemporary illustrations of the holy union of the Byzantine Warrior-Emperor, Basil the First (867-886 CE) and his companion John."
When Same-Sex Marriage was a Christian Rite
But, even after we look past the rather fundamental changes in the definition of a traditional marriage we see that, at a practical level, the nature of marriage is constantly changing. As barrister Mark Tottenham points out, the changing legal definition of marriage gives the live to this argument:
Summary
Civil and constructive debate on any topic is good. However, those on any side of a debate should try their best to ensure that their arguments are both logically sound and factual. Mandate for Marriage's arguments are neither of those. Moreover they contain statements which are deliberately inflammatory and of no use in any debate. By all means if someone's got a reasonable argument against same-sex marriage then let's hear it, but you won't find one on Mandate for Marriage's website.
"In marriage between a man and a woman, as ordained by God, both parents have a biological connection to the child, increasing the likelihood that the parents will identify with and sacrifice for the child. This connection also reduces the likelihood that either parent will abuse the child. God established this pattern and we do well to follow it."
The quote above argues that man-woman marriage reduces the likelihood of child abuse. In a word, no.
The evidence surrounding the perpetrators of child abuse shows that just over half of all male child abusers are biological fathers (51%) with 20% being non-biological parents (stepfathers etc.) and 25% being non-parents (i.e. teachers, relatives, friends etc.). When we look at female abusers, we see that 86% are biological mothers.
The evidence also shows that one third of male perpetrators acted in concert with the child's mother. In these cases, biological fathers were more likely to act in concert with the mother than other males and that when both parents were involved in abuse, the rate of recidivism (i.e. the likelihood of repeated abuse) was increased.
Male Perpetrators of Child Maltreatment: Findings from NCANDS
"Homosexual couples cannot produce children on their own. This raises the prospect of hopeful couples seeking to “rent wombs” and denying children the right to know their biological parents. This will coincide with the increasing possibility of producing, buying, and selling children because, in addition to adoption, this is the only way in which homosexual couples can have children.
The quote above argues that marriage equality should be avoided because gay couples cannot have children and this will lead to an increase in surrogacy and adoption (which are somehow very bad). There are two problems wrong with this argument.
Firstly, the ability or intention to raise children is not a prerequisite for marriage. Straight couples who are either knowingly infertile (infertility where one partner is unaware is grounds for annulment) or have no intention to have children are not prevented from getting married. So why then should an extra restriction be placed on gay couples?
Secondly, there is the scaremongering tactic of adoption and how gay couples, once married will raid the orphanages and take all the children. This argument is, in and of itself, doubly flawed. For a start, adoptions have been in serious decline for the last three decades:
In 2012, there were just 49 adoption orders granted. Of these, 33 were granted to step-parents (i.e. couples where one parent was already a biological parent). This means that just 16 adoptions were granted to couples where no prior relationship with the child existed. Adoptions in Ireland have been in decline for 30 years with the 2012 level just 4% of that in 1984. This means that those on the NO side are either 30 years behind the times or trying to argue a situation completely unconnected with reality. I'll leave the decision as to which it is as an exercise for the reader.
The other flaw in this argument is the Child and Family Relationships Bill which has just recently passed through the Seanad. This act will update the existing Adoption Act so that same-sex couples can apply to adopt as a couple rather than as individuals under the existing legal framework. This makes any debate about adoption in the context of the marriage referendum irrelevant.
Finally, the adoption statistics above make for interesting reading in more ways than one. Just as adoptions have declined over the last 30 years, the figures show that the number of non-marital births have significantly increased from 5,116 to 25,344. In fact non-marital births now make up 35% of the total, representing a shift away from marriage towards cohabitation. Consequently, I can't see how anyone can argue that allowing a group of people who are clamoring to get married to do so will in anyway have a negative impact on marriage.
"Whether raised by lesbians or by homosexual men, children of same-sex marriages will be denied either a mother or a father. Lesbian mothers say a father is irrelevant to parenting, and homosexual fathers say a mother is irrelevant to parenting. God says both a father and a mother are relevant, however. Two men can never take the place of a mother’s love and two women can never equal a Dad. God intended that every child have a father and a mother who are an example of commitment, care and love. Not only is such a child given a sense of security but s/he sees femininity and masculinity modelled in a complementary relationship. Though separation and divorce are now rampant, and the ideal is becoming less common, society must work towards the ideal rather than work against it.
The quote above while being very careful not to make any explicit declaration, makes the implicit argument that a straight couple is the ideal environment for raising a child and that gay couples lack certain qualities that will result in bad outcomes for the child.
I have dealt with the evidence on this topic in detail in my previous post.
However, there are one further point I want to make about the quote above.
Firstly, its not gay parents who claim that a father or mother are irrelevant. Science does. Just as with much of quantum physics, research on parenting has given us conclusions that are out-of-sync with common sense, and yet they are demonstrably true.
For example, in his book "The Role of the Father in Child Development", Michael E. Lamb states:
"First, fathers and mothers influence their children in similar rather than dissimilar ways.
Stated differently, students of socialization have consistently found that parental warmth, nurturance and closeness are associated with positive child outcomes regardless of whether the parent involved is a mother or father.
Secondly, as research has unfolded, psychologists have been forced to conclude that the characteristics of individual fathers - such as their masculinity, intellect, and even their warmth - are much less important, formatively speaking, than are the characteristics of the relationships they have established with their children.
Marital harmony is a consistent correlate of child adjustment, whereas marital conflict is a consistent and reliable correlate of child maladjustment."
This is probably as concise a summary of parenting research and repsonse to this argument as I can think of.
4. On Genesis & The nature of marriage
One of the points that is made multiple times throughout the website is that marriage is an institution established by God (the Christian one) and that the current marriage referendum is just a secular/homosexual campaign to "redefine" marriage. This argument fails for a number of reasons.
Firstly and obviously, marriage wasn't established in Genesis. Although traditional Christian views hold that Genesis was written by Moses sometime around 1700 BCE, modern scholarship tells us that Genesis is an edited work, compiled from a number of different sources around 450 BCE. The established modern theory states that Genesis was compiled from at least four sources, the Jawhist, Elohist, Deuteronomist and Priestly. However, new research suggests that the Elohist is really just a rewrite of the Jawhist, while the Priestly source is intended as a companion work to the Jawhist. This just leaves two primary sources, the oldest of which, the Deuteronomist, was begun no earlier than about the 8th century BCE. So already, Genesis is approximately 1000 years newer than most Christians would like to admit.
Secondly, we have evidence of the existence of marriage ceremonies before the dawn of Christianity, or Judaism for that matter. 1000 years before work began on what would eventually become Genesis a Babylonian king named Hammurabi authored a legal code which would be copied and emualted by civilisations in the region for centuries afterwards. In this code marriage was a legal contract with specific codes relating to dowry, divorce, inheritance etc.
e.g. "137. If a man wish to separate from a woman who has borne him children, or from his wife who has borne him children: then he shall give that wife her dowry, and a part of the usufruct of field, garden, and property, so that she can rear her children. When she has brought up her children, a portion of all that is given to the children, equal as that of one son, shall be given to her. She may then marry the man of her heart."
Thirdly, there is this idea of "redefining" marriage. This argument would only hold if the definition of marriage was always "one man, one woman for life for the purposes of raising children." There are several reasons why this is wrong.
With regard to Genesis above, at no point in the OT is marriage restricted to one man and one woman. In Genesis 4:19 Lamech marries two women with no evident condemnation from God. Among the many polygamists in the OT represent both Jesus' ancestors and key players in Biblical history including Abraham, Jacob, David and Solomon (who had no less than 700 wives and 300 concubines). In fact, God, through the prophet Nathan offers David even more wives in 2 Samuel 12:8. Polygamy is never condemned in the OT and is the dominant family type if you survey all cultures both historically and geographically.
As author Stephanie Coontz outlines in her book Marriage, A History, traditionally marriage had very little to do with love and children and those in the marriage had little or no choice in its formation:
"To understand why the love-based marriage system was so unstable and how we ended up where we are today, we have to recognise that for most of history, marriage was not about the individual needs and desires of a man and woman and the children they produced. Marriage had as much to do with finding good in-laws and increasing one's family labour force as it did with finding a lifetime companion and raising a beloved child"
Coontz goes on to show how much marriage has changed over the centuries. For starters, polygamy as mentioned above was the norm until the Catholic Church eventually prevailed over the monarchies of Europe around the ninth century.
Further, for over 1000 years the early Church didn't even get involved in marriage. Marriage was seen as a private contract between two individuals in which neither the State nor the Church intervened. It wasn't until 1215 that the Church decreed that prospective couples had to post banns or statements of intent regarding future marriages (as a means to cut down on annulments). Up to this point (and indeed for a few centuries afterwards) the word of the couple alone was deemed sufficient evidence of marriage. No ceremony or witnesses required.
Regarding the Catholic Church, what is even stranger about the Church's historical relationship with marriage, given the current debate, is that for a period of about 600 years, the Catholic Church had official same-sex marriage rites.
"Contrary to myth, Christianity's concept of marriage has not been set in stone since the days of Christ, but has constantly evolved as a concept and ritual. Prof. John Boswell, the late Chairman of Yale University’s history department, discovered that in addition to heterosexual marriage ceremonies in ancient Christian church liturgical documents, there were also ceremonies called the "Office of Same-Sex Union" (10th and 11th century), and the "Order for Uniting Two Men" (11th and 12th century).
These church rites had all the symbols of a heterosexual marriage: the whole community gathered in a church, a blessing of the couple before the altar was conducted with their right hands joined, holy vows were exchanged, a priest officiatied in the taking of the Eucharist and a wedding feast for the guests was celebrated afterwards. These elements all appear in contemporary illustrations of the holy union of the Byzantine Warrior-Emperor, Basil the First (867-886 CE) and his companion John."
When Same-Sex Marriage was a Christian Rite
But, even after we look past the rather fundamental changes in the definition of a traditional marriage we see that, at a practical level, the nature of marriage is constantly changing. As barrister Mark Tottenham points out, the changing legal definition of marriage gives the live to this argument:
Civil and constructive debate on any topic is good. However, those on any side of a debate should try their best to ensure that their arguments are both logically sound and factual. Mandate for Marriage's arguments are neither of those. Moreover they contain statements which are deliberately inflammatory and of no use in any debate. By all means if someone's got a reasonable argument against same-sex marriage then let's hear it, but you won't find one on Mandate for Marriage's website.
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