Wellard, it would not force the church's hand. The government is not going to tell a church who it must marry. A church can refuse to marry a man to a man just as well as it can refuse to marry a jew to a gentile. The particular churches' rules for marriage will not be affected. True, they may have to look at a gay couple being married across the street at another church, but that's about as much as it will encroach upon the religion.
You mention the picture. Gay couples are just as happy to be wed under the Civil Union in Vermont. In my experience, the legal recognition of a union gets the ball 80 or 90 yards down the field. I think that being able to call it "marriage" as opposed to something else is not as crucial as having the legally-recognized union.
And sorry for the American football metaphor. [img]tongue.gif[/img]
Oh, and if you want to see more emotion, just wait to all those gay marriages become null and void once the CA Attorney General gets San Francisco into court. It's acts are illegal under CA law, and the marriages it is recognizing are no more valid than if it were marrying brother to sister. All such marriages are simply null and void under the law -- they never happened. That's NOT doing these couples a favor, it's using them as a political tool and putting them in the middle of a pressure cooker. I think they will end up suffering in the end because what they think they have will be no more.
Also, offtopic, if you're wondering why the screen looks too big, your posted URL threw the screen size off.
[ 02-26-2004, 10:20 AM: Message edited by: Timber Loftis ]