The Big Lie About Marriage

Last week the majority of voters in the state of North Carolina added an amendment to their state constitution. That amendment assured that the government in that state would continue to discriminate by refusing to allow same-sex marriages (or even civil unions) -- putting their constitution in conflict with the United States Constitution, which guarantees equal rights for all citizens. The excuse used was for the protection of marriage (in spite of the fact that no one yet has been able to explain just how legalizing same-sex marriage would hurt heterosexual marriage in any way).

The fundamentalists want people to believe that the institution of marriage has been unchanged for thousands of years, and has always been between one male and one female consensually. That is nothing less than an outrageous lie. As the chart above shows, the same Bible used by these fundamentalist "christians" contains many examples of (evidently god-approved) marriages that do not follow the template of one man and one woman in a consensual union.

Some may want to point out that all of the examples in the chart above (click on it to get a larger version) are in the Old Testament, and that the "christian" tradition is different. That is also an outrageous lie. The truth is that the christian church has even consecrated same-sex marriage many times in the past -- a well-documented fact that was not uncommon in the early church. Here is a bit of church history for your edification:

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.

Such same gender Christian sanctified unions also took place in Ireland in the late 12thand/ early 13th century, as the chronicler Gerald of Wales (‘Geraldus Cambrensis’) recorded.

Same-sex unions in pre-modern Europe list in great detail some same gender ceremonies found in ancient church liturgical documents. One Greek 13th century rite, "Order for Solemn Same-Sex Union", invoked St. Serge and St. Bacchus, and called on God to "vouchsafe unto these, Thy servants [N and N], the grace to love one another and to abide without hate and not be the cause of scandal all the days of their lives, with the help of the Holy Mother of God, and all Thy saints". The ceremony concludes: "And they shall kiss the Holy Gospel and each other, and it shall be concluded".

Another 14th century Serbian Slavonic "Office of the Same Sex Union", uniting two men or two women, had the couple lay their right hands on the Gospel while having a crucifix placed in their left hands. After kissing the Gospel, the couple were then required to kiss each other, after which the priest, having raised up the Eucharist, would give them both communion.

Records of Christian same sex unions have been discovered in such diverse archives as those in the Vatican, in St. Petersburg, in Paris, in Istanbul and in the Sinai, covering a thousand-years from the 8th to the 18th century.

The Dominican missionary and Prior, Jacques Goar (1601-1653), includes such ceremonies in a printed collection of Greek Orthodox prayer books, “Euchologion Sive Rituale Graecorum Complectens Ritus Et Ordines Divinae Liturgiae” (Paris, 1667).

While homosexuality was technically illegal from late Roman times, homophobic writings didn’t appear in Western Europe until the late 14th century. Even then, church-consecrated same sex unions continued to take place.

At St. John Lateran in Rome (traditionally the Pope's parish church) in 1578, as many as thirteen same-gender couples were joined during a high Mass and with the cooperation of the Vatican clergy, "taking communion together, using the same nuptial Scripture, after which they slept and ate together" according to a contemporary report. Another woman to woman union is recorded in Dalmatia in the 18th century.

Prof. Boswell's academic study is so well researched and documented that it poses fundamental questions for both modern church leaders and heterosexual Christians about their own modern attitudes towards homosexuality.

For the Church to ignore the evidence in its own archives would be cowardly and deceptive. The evidence convincingly shows that what the modern church claims has always been its unchanging attitude towards homosexuality is, in fact, nothing of the sort.

The idea that marriage has always been between one man and one woman (who were both consenting) is simply not true. It is also not true that the christian church has always banned same-sex marriages. Right-wing fundamentalists spread the lies simply to try and justify their own bigotry. It is time for this to stop. It is time to honor the Constitution, and to actually extend equal rights to ALL Americans. Not doing so is not only unconstitutional, it is un-American.