Once again, in just two days major advances for marriage and family equality, in Europe and in the US. As expected, the French lower house of parliament today approved legislation for both gay marriage, and gay adoption. In the US, the Delaware House today passed equal marriage legislation, and the Nevada state Senate voted yesterday to repeal the state constitutional amendment limiting marriage to other - sex couples. (The complexity of repealing a constitutional amendment means that the earliest this can be completed, is election day, November 2016). During the Nevada debate, state senator came out publicly and acknowledged he is gay:

For the first time Sen. Kelvin Atkinson, D-North Las Vegas, announced his very personal connection to the debate.

“I’m black. I’m gay,” Atkinson told the assembly, according to the Las Vegas Sun. “I know this is the first time many of you have heard me say that I am a black, gay male.”

Other states also have initiatives under way on gay marriage, either by legislative means, or through the ballot box to overturn existing bans. But perhaps the most interesting news today came from Rhode Island, where a senate judiciary committee is scheduled to vote on whether to send an equal marriage bill to the full Senate. In advance of that committee decision, the GOP senators dropped a bombshell:

In Rhode Island, an entire delegation to the state Senate backs gay marriage — and it’s the Republicans.

Rhode Island Public Radio reports that all five Republican members of the state’s upper chamber will support a bill legalizing same-sex marriage in the state.

The state House voted in favor of gay marriage earlier this year; it’s now before the Senate Judiciary Committee and could see a vote in the full Senate by the end of the week. The regional chapter of the National Organization for Marriage has threatened to unseat Senate Minority Leader Dennis L. Algiere (R) over the vote.

-Washington Post

There have been other Republican politicians previously who have stood up for equality, most famously former VP Dick Cheney, Senator Rob Portman, and presidential candidate Fred Karger, each of whom either has gay/lesbian family member (Cheney, Portman), or is gay himself (Karger). But this must surely be the first time that equality legislation has been backed by an entire GOP delegation to any legislative chamber. In their statement, they have expressed their motive in terms of deeply held conservative convictions :

“Our Senate Republican Caucus is deeply committed to the values of freedom, liberty and limited government. In accordance with those values, we believe that freedom means freedom for everyone, and that every citizen of Rhode Island deserves the freedom to marry the person they love,” the Republicans wrote in a statement Tuesday. “We recognize that there is a national consensus building on this generational issue, and we are glad that support for the freedom to marry is growing within the Republican Party.”

This though, is a fig leaf. More important than the conservative principles of freedom, liberty and limited government, which were as valid as arguments ten years ago, or twenty, is the political expediency in noting that indeed there is a national consensus building - and understanding its importance. Recognizing the emerging consensus has enabled them to downplay certain of their previously proclaimed conservative principles, and emphasise instead some others, which they had displayed less concern about, until now.

Catholic bishops and other designated religious leaders will in time be forced to do something similar. Not only is there a “national consensus” building, there is also a religious consensus, in the Catholic Church and in mainline Protestant denominations. In the early days of the political movement for marriage equality, the opposing sides were often simplistically portrayed as the churches, in defense of Christian marriage, ranged against secular, anti-Christians in search of civil rights. The reality is far more complex. As Mark Jordan points out in his excellent book on the subject, “Blessing Same - Sex Unions”, the early activists for equal marriage preceded those seeking to change the law, and were people of faith, wanting to have their unions recognized and blessed by the Church, witnessed by their faith communities. This desire, furthermore was not simply a modern fad, but picked up on what was once commonly practiced in Christian churches, in both its Western and Eastern branches. Conversely, as Jordan notes “traditional” form of marriage that the conservative forces have been attempting to protect, has little to do with Christian or other religious tradition or belief. The most important presiders over marriage rites these days, he points out, are no longer the priests, ministers or rabbis who conduct the ceremo

ny, but the wedding planners, photographers, caterers and florists. The detailed rituals leading up to the wedding and during the ceremony, furthermore, are not those prescribed by religious belief, but by myths promoted in Hollywood movies and popular novels, and dictated in countless women’s magazines and specialist wedding guides.

The forces ranged in opposition to marriage insist that they are merely trying to protect the institution, by preserving it in its traditional form. We must respect there bona fides, but in fact they are doing nothing of the sort. Extending marriage will certainly not destroy it - but it could do something rather more dangerous to their limited vision. Facing up to the reality of equal marriage, and the sincerely felt desire for couples in faith communities to balance their civil unions or legal marriages with comparable recognition within and from their faith communities, will force many denominations and regions to consider once again the possibility of reviving the ancient practice of Church blessings for same - sex unions. This, in turn could force them to ta

ke a good, hard look at the reality of what marriage truly “is”, and a fuller understanding of it from a theological perspective that goes well beyond the commonplace platitudes to which we have become far too accustomed.