On Thursday, Bishop Gene Robinson- the first openly gay bishop in the Episcopal Church- was here in Portland speaking about the marriage ballot initiative. I sat down with him beforehand to ask him about the religious aspect of this. Here's what he had to say:
There was a particular part of what he said that struck me as interesting.
I see marriage as becoming more and more of a civil institution as religious affiliation shrinks. The main reason two people become married is for the civil benefits- taxes, health care, transfer of property, and so forth- has become more prominent. Yet religion has become a stakeholder in the institution so much that religious institutions have a seat at the table in debates like this. And so when there is a movement to expand marriage rights to LGBT couples, churches cry foul and stoke fears that they will be required to marry such couples. The same fears were expressed regarding marriages between people of different religions and people of different races.
In reality, as Bishop Robinson said, this is the church imposing its will on the state. "Separation of church and state works both ways." The framing of what he meant is what really caught me: that churches, as he said, are deputized by the state for civil purposes. If you want to get married, you to a church and you get married. Or you can go get a justice of the peace. You can even have a friend become a Universal Life minister just for the occasion. There are lots of ways. And as Bishop Robinson pointed out, when you get a divorce, you don't go back to the church. You go to the courts. But because marriage originated as a religious concept, and because churches and other religious organizations are massive and organized, the church has a seat at the table, and the religious exceptions written into the New Hampshire and Maine legislation has a specific exception for that. So they get to cry foul and people listen to them.
A way to counter that is that religious institutions should not be allowed to say who should and who should not be married outside their doors. Stay out of state affairs. Thus, his frame: that religious institutions are deputized to perform marriages, just as a library is used for a blood drive. But that doesn't mean the library gets to have a say on who shall give and who shall not. Ergo, neither should a church, and separation of church and state run both ways.
The Pan Atlantic (state-based pollster) poll this past week showed 50.0% voting Yes, 42.7% voting No, and 7.3% undecided (albeit a sample size of 110 Catholic voters). Anecdotally, since I've gotten to Maine I have heard story after story of someone's Catholic mom or grandmother who is voting No, in a state where there is a strong Catholic Church presence and the Church has done two collections for the initiative. For me, the jury is out on whether Bishop Robinson's frame is resonating, but I think it's one to push.
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