Split Thread Mormons and marriage

[xjx388]

I think we have to radically reconsider what marriage is, fundamentally, in this day and age. If you see it as a legal contract between two people that affords them basic rights, then what are those rights?

*Custody/decision making for children?
*Decision making for spouse?
*Exclusive sexual access?
*Put spouse on insurance?

I've been married for 23 years, and I'm struggling to come up with many "legal benefits" to being married that I wouldn't have if we simply lived together for that period of time. She could have changed her name, we could have individual insurance with one of us carrying the kids, etc.

There are, however, many religious reasons to get married.

So isn't marriage fundamentally a religious construct? Do we really need the State to recognize that I love this woman and choose to live with her (until I piss her off sufficiently)?

 

[Rasmus]

I think we have to radically reconsider what marriage is, fundamentally, in this day and age. If you see it as a legal contract between two people that affords them basic rights, then what are those rights?

*Custody/decision making for children?
*Decision making for spouse?
*Exclusive sexual access?
*Put spouse on insurance?

I've been married for 23 years, and I'm struggling to come up with many "legal benefits" to being married that I wouldn't have if we simply lived together for that period of time. She could have changed her name, we could have individual insurance with one of us carrying the kids, etc.

There are, however, many religious reasons to get married.

So isn't marriage fundamentally a religious construct? Do we really need the State to recognize that I love this woman and choose to live with her (until I piss her off sufficiently)?

If you don't think you do - just don't get married.
Nobody cares what the religions do - but that should have no bearing on what the state does! (The catholic church will still throw tantrums if one of their little sheep tries to get an inter-faith marriage. Should the state follow that example, too?)

I am glad your marriage hasn't faced any major difficulties - but it will turn out very helpful to have if oyu ever want to visit your spouse in hospital or prison, if you haver should have to testify in court, once one of you dies, etc pp. (And you were lucky from the start in so far as you seem to have had the same citizenship, too.)

Chances are also you'd never have to fight for what would otherwise be her children in case anything happens to her. Neat, that.

 

[Taarkin]

Men on the Moon!
Mormon Prophets claim
the moon is inhabited

Wow, I thought the talk about polyamory and the moon was just a Harsh Mistress joke.

 

[Babbylonian]

So isn't marriage fundamentally a religious construct? Do we really need the State to recognize that I love this woman and choose to live with her (until I piss her off sufficiently)?

It is, but as you note there are societal/cultural advantages to marriage as it's recognized/regulated by the [US] government. Many of those advantages would, outside of marriage, require legal counsel: The preparation of a living will, a contract confirming common financial interests and what those interests would be for each person at the termination of the relationship, etc.

Of course, the major advantage to obtaining legal counsel at the outset (either in place of, or supplementary to, marriage) is that both (all? I don't want to leave out the polygamists!) parties enter the relationship with certain knowledge of their legal rights. At that point, "divorce lawyers" could become "marriage lawyers," which seems like a happier situation all around.

 

[I Am The Scum]

So isn't marriage fundamentally a religious construct?

To some people, it is. To others, it's not. To some people, preparing food is fundamentally a religious activity. It has no bearing on the way others go about cooking their meals.

Do we really need the State to recognize that I love this woman and choose to live with her (until I piss her off sufficiently)?

No, it's not necessary. However, we do live in a society where two people who are married entitles them to certain benefits under the law. Nobody has yet composed a compelling reason why a certain segment of the population should undergo a form of gender discrimination so they won't receive these rights.

 

[Bob Blaylock]

i'd like to hear more about mormon concept of the people living on the moon.

No such concept.

The sole source for the claim is one Oliver B. Huntington who, in 1881 wrote down the claim that in 1837, he was given a Patriarchal blessing by Joseph Smith's father, in which he was told that he would preach the gospel to the inhabitants of the moon.

His memory of this blessing, half a century before, appears to have been rather badly flawed. Records exist that he was given his Patriarchal blessing at that time, by his own father, and not by Smith's father. No details of the content of that blessing remain.

There were apparently rumors going around, in that time, that Joseph Smith had said something about inhabitants of the moon, but nothing about it is found in any of his own writings, nor in the writings of anyone who would have heard it directly from him.


http://www.lightplanet.com/response/answers/moon.htm
http://www.lightplanet.com/response/moonmen.htm

 

[RandFan]

No such concept.

http://www.lightplanet.com/response/answers/moon.htm
http://www.lightplanet.com/response/moonmen.htm

Bob, my link has a photo of a page from the Journal of Discourses. Sorry but your link is demonstrably wrong. Damn those journals. The church tried to supress them at one time. Didn't work.

 

[RandFan]

I think we have to radically reconsider what marriage is, fundamentally, in this day and age. If you see it as a legal contract between two people that affords them basic rights, then what are those rights?

*Custody/decision making for children?
*Decision making for spouse?
*Exclusive sexual access?
*Put spouse on insurance?

I've been married for 23 years, and I'm struggling to come up with many "legal benefits" to being married that I wouldn't have if we simply lived together for that period of time. She could have changed her name, we could have individual insurance with one of us carrying the kids, etc.

There are, however, many religious reasons to get married.

So isn't marriage fundamentally a religious construct? Do we really need the State to recognize that I love this woman and choose to live with her (until I piss her off sufficiently)?

I'm happy to get the state out of marriage. Fortunately there are Unitarian churches in ever state waiting for the opportunity to marry gays and lesbians and I'm sure churches will pop up for any kind of marriage.

In any event, there are MANY benefits for those who marry.

 

[xjx388]

If you don't think you do - just don't get married.
Nobody cares what the religions do - but that should have no bearing on what the state does! (The catholic church will still throw tantrums if one of their little sheep tries to get an inter-faith marriage. Should the state follow that example, too?)

[off-topic]My mom and dad got married through the Catholic Church even though he was a non-practicing Baptist; he just had to take the classes. No tantrums necessary.[/off-topic]

But religions have the right to perform (or not) a ceremony on whoever they want to. The Catholic Church will probably never perform a gay marriage. Big deal. I don't believe that the State should encourage or discourage ANY particular form of marriage. All of the benefits of marriage (other than the love part ) are administrative in nature. If the State sees marriage as simply a way to access those benefits, then there is no rational reason to exclude LGBTs from getting their marriages recognized by the State. Or polygamists (in consensual, non-abusive relationships) for that matter. That's what I mean when I say that we need to rethink what a marriage is. It's time to move away (on the official State level) from marriage as an "institution," to marriage as a "legal contract."

 

[catsmate]

Men on the Moon!
Mormon Prophets claim
the moon is inhabited

There's more here, here, here and here

In One-Minute Answers to Anti-Mormon Questions, Mormon author Stephen W. Gibson writes: "

At the present time, man has no scientific or revealed knowledge of whether or not there are inhabitants on the earth's moon. The fact that a handful of astronauts didn't see any inhabitants in the tiny area they viewed when they landed on the moon decades ago certainly gives no definitive information, any more than visitors to earth who might land in barren Death Valley would have any idea of the billions of inhabitants elsewhere."

Brigham Young apparently didn't think the moon was inhabited but did think the sun was:

"So it is with regard to the inhabitants of the sun. Do you think it is inhabited? I rather think it is. Do you think there is any life there? No question of it; it was not made in vain. It was made to give light to those who dwell upon it, and to other planets; and so will this earth when it is celestialized"

 

[bikerdruid]

nothing about it is found ........in the writings of anyone who would have heard it directly from him.

the same has been said about the gospels, yet people still believe them.

 

[bikerdruid]

Men on the Moon!
Mormon Prophets claim
the moon is inhabited

wow.....wondrous woo

 

[RandFan]

Brigham Young apparently didn't think the moon was inhabited but did think the sun was:

If you read it closer and understand the context, Young was responding to criticism that Mormons believed that the Moon was inhabited. He takes them to task and then says that the sun is also inhabited.

 

[Brian-M]

Yeah, we seriously need to puncture the pompous BS that "marriage" was ever sacred. How sacred is it to murder a bride on her wedding night. No, I'm not making that up. Read Deut. 22:13-21 for the nauseating description.

I was going to bring up men selling their daughters into slavery as being treated the equivalent of marriage in Exodus, but hesitated because he's a Mormon.

Do Mormons regard the Old and New Testaments as being an accurate depiction of the word of God, or as flawed man-made document that are now superseded by Joseph Smith's "translation" of the mysteriously vanishing golden tablets?

 

[Brian-M]

I think we have to radically reconsider what marriage is, fundamentally, in this day and age. If you see it as a legal contract between two people that affords them basic rights, then what are those rights?

*Custody/decision making for children?
*Decision making for spouse?
*Exclusive sexual access?
*Put spouse on insurance?

I'd put it as...

• Automatically recognized as legal guardian of children.
• Automatic power of attorney for incapacitated spouse.
• Automatic shared ownership of property.
• Automatic inheritance without a will.
• Tax and insurance benefits.
• Social Security benefits.
• Immigration rights for non-citizen spouse.
• Automatic recognition as being in a serious long-term relationship by others without need for further explanation when introduced as being your spouse's husband/wife.

There are, however, many religious reasons to get married.

Many religious reasons? The only one I can think of is if you get married via a religious ceremony rather than a simple registry marriage it's supposedly recognized by God, so it's no longer a sin to have sex with each-other. Or something. I'm not really clear on this. Can you list what these many reasons are?

But since marriage is recognized by society regardless of whether or not it's done ceremonially or secularly, then non-religious couples who get married would benefit by having their relationship on the same social standing in a religious community as religious couples who get married.

In any event, there are MANY benefits for those who marry.

I think your link is broken. I just get a 404 error when I click on it.

I could just as easily declare that marriage is between one man and one woman of the same race, or that it is between one man and precisely seven women (however, the man is optional).

Hot damn, I think you're onto something. I hereby declare that marriage is a union between one man and his horse.

 

[Rasmus]

[off-topic]My mom and dad got married through the Catholic Church even though he was a non-practicing Baptist; he just had to take the classes. No tantrums necessary.[/off-topic]

Yes, because it didn't bother him and he took the classes ...

A friend of mine was refused an annulment of his catholic marriage after his secular one had been nulled. (His wife ran off a week after the honeymoon, the marriage lasted for 14 days after roughly as many years in a relationship.)

I know another couple that hadn't baptized their children because neither parent could bring themselves to have the wee ones baptized in the other parent's religion - catholic vs. protestant. I am *sure* that a catholic marriage would only have been given had they both agreed to raise the kids catholic.

But religions have the right to perform (or not) a ceremony on whoever they want to.

Yes, of course.

(Interestingly enough: No. It is illegal in Germany to get married in a Church unless you have a secular marriage first. The Churches here were against lifting that ban, btw.)

The Catholic Church will probably never perform a gay marriage. Big deal. I don't believe that the State should encourage or discourage ANY particular form of marriage.

I don't quite follow your transition here...

All of the benefits of marriage (other than the love part ) are administrative in nature. If the State sees marriage as simply a way to access those benefits, then there is no rational reason to exclude LGBTs from getting their marriages recognized by the State.

Indeed.

But a rational reason doesn't matter: It is gender discrimination, plain and simple.

Or polygamists (in consensual, non-abusive relationships) for that matter.

Here, discrimination would be legal, however.

That's what I mean when I say that we need to rethink what a marriage is. It's time to move away (on the official State level) from marriage as an "institution," to marriage as a "legal contract."

I am not aware of the state viewing it as an "institution" rather than a contract in any meaningful way.

 

[Bob Blaylock]

If you read it closer and understand the context, Young was responding to criticism that Mormons believed that the Moon was inhabited. He takes them to task and then says that the sun is also inhabited.

I guess in Brigham Young's time as well as our own, sarcasm tended to go too easily above some people's heads.

 

[Sword_Of_Truth]

Theocracy isn't exclusive of the 11th article of faith.

Forcing others to undergo our temple rites, as you appeared to be implying, is exclusive of the 11th Article of Faith. It also appears that you have forgotten your Primary lessons on the War in Heaven, or you'd have remembered that forced conversions are considered to be literally satanic under Mormonism.

Incidentally, preserving the Constitution of the United States, necessarily precludes the formation of a theocratic regime.

 

[ponderingturtle]

Forcing others to undergo our temple rites, as you appeared to be implying, is exclusive of the 11th Article of Faith. It also appears that you have forgotten your Primary lessons on the War in Heaven, or you'd have remembered that forced conversions are considered to be literally satanic under Mormonism.

Incidentally, preserving the Constitution of the United States, necessarily precludes the formation of a theocratic regime.

You do not need to force everyone to practice you religion to have a theocracy. See religious minorities in many many places. For example Jews in Rome in the papal states or minorities in various caliphates. This does not mean those are not theocracies.

Sent from my MB860 using Tapatalk

 

[catsmate]

If you read it closer and understand the context, Young was responding to criticism that Mormons believed that the Moon was inhabited. He takes them to task and then says that the sun is also inhabited.

Really? I'll read up some more.