by Elizabeth K

I realized a few things while reading an article on marriage from a Christian ministry that I consider trustworthy, but like every spokesperson(s) for God, is also a very far cry from perfect.  No Greater Joy provides profound, biblical, and often unconventional wisdom, especially for families, but there is a string of extreme Christian legalism that runs throughout their publications as well.

While this particular article spoke of the institution of marriage as inaugurated from God Himself in the Garden of Eden, the point was that marriage is between one man and one woman, and, therefore ought to be guarded as such in current American legislature.  The tone was the usual reprimanding of us Christians who have allowed government to have control over the private nature of the marriage covenant; if the state can issue a license for something, it can also forbid or regulate it.

I thought this was an insightful point.

For the first six thousand years of recorded human history, marriage was regarded as a personal decision usually shared with friends and family.  The sanction of the church or the state was never sought until the Roman Catholic church ruled at the Council of Trent that a Protestant marriage is not valid unless performed by a Catholic priest in the presence of two witnesses.  Protestants then looked to the state to confirm their marriages; thus the current marital tradition was born… Read the rest of this entry »