The gay marriage dispute is irreconcilable

The approval by some churches of homosexual marriages, and the view of other churches that this is no tenable doctrine at all, raises an interesting dilemma. Both camps cannot be right, since each says something directly contradicting the other.

One view of marriage or the other is false prophecy, and those on one side or the other of this question false prophets, if we understand prophecy in the sense of declaring the mind of God. Or one idea or the other is a false teaching, and those putting it forth false teachers, if you prefer that term. We can see that there is no middle ground; if a thing is so, its opposite can't be.

Perhaps in our benighted era there are people who believe that a thing can be not so and also so, depending on some subtle idea of context and experience: 'True for you but not for me.' I suggest that relativistic thinking of the kind is incompatible with Christianity. Divine revealed truth is not a matter of what you or I would like. We may come to like it, even love it, after we embrace what it is. Or, for some or other part of the divine lessons, some of us may need to bear our obedience as a cross.

Students of logic and reason will see that as the law of the excluded middle. If A is true, not-A cannot be at the same time affirmed. Affirming two opposites is a contradiction and leads to all kinds of confusion and mess. If a church that marries gays to each other were to release a joint declaration on marriage with a church that will not do gay marriages, it would be a thoroughly incoherent communique.

Two views so completely at loggerheads create a deadlock in discussion. Unity on the point, or even a sensible accord, is impossible so long as both sides persist in their views. The recent push for Christian gay marriage creates disunity because it touches upon a central rite of the church and changes it radically. Those with a mind for church tradition, and those who look to the biblical implications and symbolic significance of the marriage rite, find the whole gay marriage idea absurd at best: One can no more validly say that marriage can be same-sex than one can declare that down is up.

As one version of the wedding service has it:

DEARLY beloved, we are gathered together here in the sight of God, and in the face of this company, to join together this Man and this Woman in holy Matrimony; which is an honourable estate, instituted of God, signifying unto us the mystical union that is betwixt Christ and his Church: which holy estate Christ adorned and beautified with his presence and first miracle that he wrought in Cana of Galilee, and is commended of Saint Paul to be honourable among all men: and therefore is not by any to be entered into unadvisedly or lightly; but reverently, discreetly, advisedly, soberly, and in the fear of God. Into this holy estate these two persons present come now to be joined. If any man can show just cause, why they may not lawfully be joined together, let him now speak, or else hereafter for ever hold his peace.

 As to speaking up to object (something I have never heard done, but the opportunity to do so is in the rite), a traditional Christian could object that the stated conditions are not met if you have two males up there, or two females, the signifying being done is opposed to all accustomed symbolism about Christ and his church, and Saint Paul would certainly not have found this wedding honorable.

So evidently a new wedding service is required that gets rid of inconvenient old words and concepts. That is a sign that the rite itself has changed into a different one. That is just the point. It is no longer what we meant before when we said marrying, marriage and wedding.

This sharp contradiction of meaning forms a permanent divide between those who think gay marriage in the church is okay and those who cannot accept it as a Christian process. Marriage is what it was, or not; you can't have it both ways. There is no resolution to this; none is possible. Those who are on the two sides of this matter have irreconcilable differences.