This is the first story to mention the fact that being married feels different. It does. That’s the privilege, the feeling of being married, the thing we’ll never capture in civil unions and domestic partnerships. What’s being denied us is a status that other couples are allowed to enjoy as though they’d earned it. You don’t earn privilege, but you can certainly withhold it. Meet my guest for today’s Marriage Project:
I believe, that as human beings, we are innately sacred and that love is our divine gift. I believe in the sanctity of marriage, as it is defined by the individuals involved, the union is sacred. Through the ritual of marriage, whatever that ritual is, we are making the ultimate gift of our love. In marriage we bind our lives together through a sacred promise with our partner to strengthen each other with our love, to honor our love, protect it, cultivate it, and to build our lives on its foundation. When we share this ritual with our friends and family we are there to share our joy, celebrate our love and declare that we are dedicated to one another and committed to our union. There is power in this declaration. We find added strength in our community through the acknowledgment and respect they give our union and their support of our love.
To those who say marriage is the foundation of our society, that marriage strengthens our society: I ask what is the foundation of marriage? While I think a huge part of marriage is commitment, ultimately, love is the foundation of marriage. It really is all about the love. Love strengthens and unifies us therefore marriage strengthens and unifies us, and it does, until churches and politicians decide to put exclusionary limitations on the marriages of consenting adults. The argument over marriage equality is only dividing us as a nation; it separates us as citizens, and breeds hate among us. It shouldn’t be an argument at all. We have an inalienable right as human beings to love whomever we love and to express that love through marriage: it is vital to our pursuit of happiness; it is integral to who we are.
I believe in religious freedom as a right in this country. If a person’s religion defines marriage as a union between one man and one woman, they have a right to believe that, and practice that right in their own church, in their church community. They do not have the right to force the rest of society to conform to their interpretation and they have a responsibility to not allow that belief to spread bigotry and hate. I have the right to question the sanity and validity of such a belief and to not adhere to that church’s laws.
Our government has absolutely no right to adopt this religious belief as the basis for their definition of marriage. The definition of marriage as a union between one man and one woman excludes not only our LGBT community but any person practicing a religion that doesn’t agree with this narrow definition. It infringes on our freedoms, undermines our individual liberty and muddles the line between church and state. The government’s role in marriage should have nothing to do with defining it, only protecting it and the parties involved. Marriage laws that were initially designed to protect our children, our rights and our property have been twisted into laws that pardon discrimination. Laws that promote and defend bigotry. Where is the love?
My husband and I have been married for fourteen years. Before we married we lived together for three and a half years. Other than finally having access to the full legal benefits of a military spouse I didn’t really expect much to change when we married, but it did. The shift is difficult to fully describe, you just feel it. It’s subtle and strong and reassuring. Pure joy in the possibilities of a life together. It’s a feeling everyone should be free to experience; it’s something to be shared by all of us. We must allow the love, the commitment to that love to spread. To allow it to live and breathe and grow, in the open, unrestrained. It’s all about love. How is that not beneficial to us all?
Shannon Schwehr Korrell
Fort Worth, TX
