Defining Marriage

"Intimate glimpse intho the private lives of those who dreamed of marriage in the 1970s, the surviors of the 1980s, the audacious pioneers of 1990s, the tireless soldiers of the 2000s, and the champions who won marriage today. Featuring personsal conversations with Evan Wolfson, Dan Savage, Ken Mehlman, Dustin Lance Black, and many more, Defining Marriage is the story of how people from all walks of life fought to change marriage -- and how fighting for marriage, in turn, changed them."--Back cover.

Until very recently, no society had seen marriage as anything other than a conjugal partnership: a male–female union. What Is Marriage? identifies and defends the reasons for this historic consensus and shows why redefining civil marriage as something other than the conjugal union of husband and wife is a mistake. Originally published in the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, this book’s core argument quickly became the year’s most widely read essay on the most prominent scholarly network in the social sciences. Since then, it has been cited and debated by scholars and activists throughout the world as the most formidable defense of the tradition ever written. Now revamped, expanded, and vastly enhanced, What Is Marriage? stands poised to meet its moment as few books of this generation have. Sherif Girgis, Ryan T. Anderson, and Robert P. George offer a devastating critique of the idea that equality requires redefining marriage. They show why both sides must first answer the question of what marriage really is. They defend the principle that marriage, as a comprehensive union of mind and body ordered to family life, unites a man and a woman as husband and wife, and they document the social value of applying this principle in law. Most compellingly, they show that those who embrace same-sex civil marriage leave no firm ground—none—for not recognizing every relationship describable in polite English, including polyamorous sexual unions, and that enshrining their view would further erode the norms of marriage, and hence the common good. Finally, What Is Marriage? decisively answers common objections: that the historic view is rooted in bigotry, like laws forbidding interracial marriage; that it is callous to people’s needs; that it can’t show the harm of recognizing same-sex couplings or the point of recognizing infertile ones; and that it treats a mere “social construct” as if it were natural or an unreasoned religious view as if it were rational.

This book addresses fundamental questions about marriage in moral and political philosophy. It examines promise, commitment, care, and contract to argue that marriage is not morally transformative. It argues that marriage discriminates against other forms of caring relationships and that, legally, restrictions on entry should be minimized.

This examination of changes in adolescent fertility emphasizes the changing social context within which adolescent childbearing takes place.

The diverse expert contributors to this volume from the fields of politics and law use moral argumentation with respect to same-sex marriage, gay rights in general, and California's Prop 8. The arguments are advanced in terms of the nation's foundational political and legal principles, extending ethical argumentation to important contemporary public policy areas such as marriage, the separation of church and state, and the rearing of children. Several chapters also contest the perceived if not actual establishment in the law and public policy of heterosexist and religious bias that continues to work against full and meaningful inclusion of sexual minorities. This bias is ironically and improperly couched in the language of American political and religious values, and it misunderstands the nation's core principles, or willfully miscasts them as inapplicable to many Americans and their families. Nonetheless, this bias is pervasive in the nation's political discourse, working to deny an important right and the recognition of equality to many citizens. The main contribution ofMoral Argument, Religion, and Same-Sex Marriage is in its direct engagement with the political and legal arguments of the gay community's critics on their own moral and ethical terms. Along the way, important concepts in public discourse--such as governmental neutrality, the right to marry, and religious freedom--are presented and cast in the light of liberal-democratic theory.

Describes what marriage should be according to the Bible, arguing that marriage is a tool to bring individuals closer to God, and provides meaningful instruction on how to have a successful marriage.

Your church or ministry will greatly benefit from the information contained within this book. Learn a practical definition for marriage in the church as well as God's design for marriage. Look at the various stages of marriage and the different forms of marriage. And learn how to use the various components of ministry to marriage, including a structure that will greatly enhance your ministry mix. Topics include: Why marriage ministry? Components of marriage ministry Structuring marriage ministry Connecting points for marriage ministry