Separation of church and state

Preparing to get married in the Catholic Church we’ve run up against the idea that although we got married we’re not actually married.  I get that a fair amount of people think it’s pretty arrogant of the church to tell married people they aren’t really married and decide whether a previous marriage had the merit to stand or be nullified but I’m not one of them.

 It occurs to me that using the one word for both a civil union and a religious/spiritual one is what is causing a lot of the controversy surrounding the idea. In my mind they are two distinct things, one is a legal somewhat impersonal entwining answerable to the government.  The other is a very personal bonding and binding experience answerable ultimately to God. 

While it is convenient to have clergy invested with the gov’t power to conduct marriage ceremonies it creates a blurring of lines that I don’t believe ultimately serves either entity.  Nor does the usurping of language better left to spiritual leaders for civil ceremonies. When the judge at my wedding read bible verses and ended with “what God has joint together let no man put asunder” it was rather bewildering. When I booked a civil ceremony I wasn’t seeking God’s representative in the form of a judge.  Mixing the sacred and profane is not a good idea as it waters down both and in order to have one you must have the other.

Obviously divorce happens (as I well know having had two) but for good reason there is no legal manner for priest or pastor to dissolve a marriage. Ministers aren’t charged with dealing in the legalities of absolving a marriage nor need they be as they have plenty on their plates as it is seeing to the spiritual and emotional lives of couples in need of intervention. The Catholic Church does have a process for evaluating marriages for nullification but that has nothing to do with legal standing and everything to do with the standing in the eyes of God. Divorce however is all about legalities. You go to court in order to extricate yourself from the other person not to have your heart ministered to in the wake of a relationship ending.

Maybe if we used clear language by calling one a civil union and the other holy matrimony it would clarify the role of each entity in the lives of those who seek binding commitments.