(You should probably read the full text of the article here: Same-Sex Marriage and Racial Justice Find Common Ground (NYTimes.com) before continuing. All quotes below from that article.)

What is marriage? This is an interesting topic, and not just because I will be performing a wedding ceremony in three hours.

This week, the California Supreme Court ruled that same-sex marriages were legal, based partially on arguments that go back to arguments about interracial marriage. These are arguments that I have heard and made for some time.

If you remove the perceived restrictions of Judeo-Christian faith from the marriage laws of this country where we have laws to protect the church and the state from each other, then what, exactly, is your argument?

Opponents of same-sex marriage say they are uncomfortable with the analogy to interracial marriage bans. “It’s well suited to a sound-bite culture,” said Monte Stewart, president of the Marriage Law Foundation, which supports traditional marriage.

Sloppy writing there, since “traditional” marriage means different things to different people. “Traditional” in this context means little more than “the way we’ve always done it before.”

(At least he did not say “Biblical marriage” which is largely filled with polygamists.)

I presume the reporter meant “…Marriage Law Foundation, which supports marriage between one man and one woman.”

“Sure, it works at the surface level,” Mr. Stewart continued. “But it is actually defeated by the deeper reality of marriage itself. Marriage in its deep logic has nothing to do with race and everything to do with the union of a man and a woman. To apply Perez in the genderless marriage context is actually to betray it.”

It should be noted that Mr. Stewart seems quite well versed in speaking in sound-bites himself. He starts off by saying that he can understand why some people would be swayed by the argument, but claims that it is defeated by the “deeper reality of marriage.” What is the deeper reality of marriage?

Marriage in its deep logic has nothing to do with race and everything to do with the union of a man and a woman.

The argument here seems to hinge on the “union of a man and a woman.”

Let’s look more closely at that.

First, let’s ask: “Why a man and a woman?” Why not a man and a man or a woman and a woman? Does “union” mean something more than a penis entering a vagina? Are we still going to fall back into the understanding of sexual intercourse as basically a means of procreation? (That understanding, by the way, was “traditional” for a long time — does that mean it is better?)

Do married heterosexual couples enjoy the freedom to practice whatever kinds of sexual arousal/stimulation/etc that they both mutually agree to? If so, if we have agreed that sexual intercourse is something more than just procreation, but for shared intimacy and enjoyment, then haven’t we also agreed that “union” means something more than penis+vagina=marriage?

I was at a church-related meeting last fall when I heard a grown man make the argument that because the male genitals and female genitals are “meant to fit together” therefore it is clear that God intended men and women only to get married.

Do we understand “union” as something more than an issue of “plumbing”?

Stepping back further, does the Marriage Law Foundation understand “union” beyond sexual contact?

Do we?

What does union mean?

I’m no expert, but I have 13 years of practice in marriage, and 35 years of observations on the institution. Let me offer that “union” includes what happens in the bedroom, but only as one piece of marriage.

When I come home hungry from a long drive after a long meeting, and my wife offers me the plate of food she had just fixed for herself, she is practicing the union of marriage.

When I come home with both of my knees screaming for relief, only to find that my wife is sick in bed and one of us has to go pick up our son from preschool, and I go to get him, I am practicing the union of marriage.

When my wife goes off to a women’s conference and arranges for a friend to take our son for the night because she knows I have to finish writing a paper for a deadline, we are both practicing the union of marriage, even when we are not even together.

The union of marriage comes from dawn until dusk, in the decisions that we make each day. Will I stay at the office when everyone has gone because it is quiet and peaceful, or will I come home to help around the house? Will she expend all of her energy during the day with our son, leaving nothing left for us after he goes to bed? Will we do a little extra of something that needs to be done to give a bit of relief to the other?

Will we take time for each other, will we go the extra mile for one another? How will we talk to each other? How will we treat each other? How will we think about each other? How will we talk about each other to others?

All of these are part of the union of marriage. All of these symbolize two who have become one, caring for the other as if we were one, not being selfish, but being loving and kind, not be arrogant or rude, but being patient and understanding. Put the other’s needs before your own, not to the detriment of your own health and well-being, not to be walked all over or taken-advantage of, but because we love each other.

(Religious folks might add “…as God has loved us” to some of the above, but none of this understanding of marriage requires a religious understanding of marriage. You might do these things in part because of your religious beliefs, but the things listed above [and others] would be the same for religious, atheists, or agnostics.)

What part of this union involves genitalia? Here’s a hint:

Marriage in its “deep logic” and daily living has nothing to do with race or genitals specifically, and everything to do with the union of two people in the bonds of love that hopefully lasts in sickness and health, for richer or poorer, through expanding waistlines and the ravaging effects of gravity, as long as they both shall live.

It comes as no surprised that those who oppose equal rights for people who are gay or lesbian do not want to be lumped together with those who opposed equal rights for people who were not white. Instead they often try to rest their arguments on their understanding of religion. In the realm of the legal system, those argument are disallowed, so they are encoded with these words like “union of a man and a woman” with the wink-wink of “as God intended.” (Where does the “Marriage Law Foundation” get its funding? I have no idea, but I would not be surprised to find it was a conservative Christian church.)

But is that argument convincing?

If “union” has any deeper meaning than penis+vagina, then the argument about the exclusivity of marriage to the heterosexuals quickly falls apart.

If the “Marriage Law Foundation” and the other “Defending Marriage” people really wanted to offer some real protection about the institution of marriage, how about some better enforcement of the laws against spousal abuse?

How about creating a group that will monitor restraining orders to make sure that they are enforced and that penalties for breaking them are severe?

How about helping to create a culture where it is fundamentally unacceptable to assume that someone might be abusing his/her spouse and not do something about it?

How about making sure that evidence of marital infidelity is always admissible in divorce proceedings?

How about trying to create programs and networks that will help the young and poor in our country who want to get married and support their families and break cycles of abuse, welfare, etc?

How about trying to make sure there are enough well-paying jobs out there that the underlying causes of some cases of abuse and divorce might be addressed and reduced?

How about doing something other than wringing your hands over the fact that there are people who want to get married even though they are attracted to different people than you would be and might do different things to achieve orgasm than you do?

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to unite two people in marriage, a union that will matter in many more ways than just what happens in the marriage bed.

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