Poems

:)-referring to the post
ps. thanks for your comment:)

thanks for the ideas! :)...it certainly is coming down to the decision...i need to research more.

Who wrote this?

"...for they shall cry unto Jehovah
because of oppressors,
and he will send them a saviour,
and a defender, and he will deliver them."
(Isaiah 19:20)(ASV)-BibleGateway

"...At the time that God
has already decided,
he will send Jesus Christ
back again."
(1Timothy 6:15)(CEV)-BibleGateway

JESUS  DECLARED :
"I have come in My Father's name
and with His power..."
(John 5:43)(AMP)-BibleGateway

"I will come with the mighty acts
of the Lord Jehovah..."
(Psalm 71:16)(ASV)-BibleGateway

your posts are longer than Mrs. Murphy's ack!

In case anyone thinks I am alone in my views, here is a secularist presenting the secular argument against state sponsored civil unions.

Some comments from a German who considers himself a libertarian. Note that even in Europe many (though probably not most) would disagree to my PoV, but that doesn't make it any less my PoV, so here it goes:
First, I don't know the exact situation of gay activism in the USA, but I strongly suspect it is much more radical and emotional than here in Europe.
"Marriage is what it is even if the activists force us to make up a new word for it." — Well, that's a very traditionalist argument. It doesn't make much sense to an unreligious, all-out humanist such as me. To me, marriage is a completely artificial concept. In a German context, it mostly means tax benefits and the right to refuse to give evidence. Following your argument, the metric unit system or, for that matter, SPF shameless plug) are bad because they break with tradition.
If you ask me, official marriage (including any tax benefits or penalties) should be abolished altogether. "Straight" couples don't need official approval, either. Why not have weddings in churches or covens of choice, sign a legal agreement and be done with it? (I'm sure you get the point.) I seriously doubt that "official approval of marriage" poses a significant encouragement for people to have children.
With a fertility rate of 2.01 in 2006, France doesn't have a significant fertility problem, unlike Germany (2006: 1.39). Here in Europe, I haven't heard anyone claiming for a long time that marriage has any significant impact on the probability of giving birth to a child. Rather, one of the most determining factors -- if not the most determining one -- is the level of compatibility of family and career (AKA work/life balance). In Germany, the friendliness of companies towards mothers and their children leaves a lot to be desired, so women often feel they have to choose between pursuing some career or having a child — mostly regardless whether they're married or not. In France, work/life balance is much better for mothers: many companies offer child care facilities, and parental protection laws are better. The same
(BTW, your reference to German chancellor Merkel having seven children is incorrect — she doesn't have any (and is sometimes, though very rarely, criticized for that). It is the secretary of family affairs who does have seven.)

(Oh, and BTW, I'm not gay, if that matters to anyone.)

Well, that's a very traditionalist argument.

The lines are blurry sometimes, and its difficult to make distinctions. The definition of marriage is a matter of precedent, since the definition is a legal definition. Precedent and tradition are both rooted in historic meaning, but they are not the same.

To me, marriage is a completely artificial concept.

Is it? Not really. It is an anthropological or sociological concept, but that doesn't make it artificial. It is based in our common humanity which is one race and two genders, but it isn't 'man made'. No more than any other concept of civilization.

If you ask me, official marriage (including any tax benefits or penalties) should be abolished altogether.

I offer that your lack of value in marriage is simply a lack of appreciation of it.

The "civil union" is a political sleight-of-hand having been created purely for political purposes in order to satisfy a loud and whiny special interest group.

This is because the government has no important state interest in promoting civil unions — "gay marriage” really — which really applies to those types or models of relationships incapable by nature of producing offspring.

Government has no legitimate interest or business either in regulating or institutionalizing the private and personal relationships of consenting adults of these types of relationships, which would include those between friends or partners of the same sex regardless of sexual intimacy. If two people of this type of relationship wish to make a contractual living arrangement between them they can have a legal contract of sorts drawn up by lawyers. There is no reason why society should subsidize or bear the costs of private, intimate relationships that have no compelling state interest.

When people have actively sought to make government stay out of the private lives of consenting adults when government interference was disadvantageous to them, they can't very well expect government to then intrude into their lives just because it would now be advantageous to them. The principle of non-intrusion works both ways.

The government, however, does have an important state interest in promoting the relationships of men and women, since only their relationships are able to produce future citizens. To promote and protect this relationship by institutionalizing it with the advantages and legal status of marriage increases the likelihood of producing and raising offspring in optimal circumstances in order that they become responsible and productive citizens.

The difference between marriage and civil unions, then, is the difference between relationships that have an important state interest and ones that don't.