Yesterday the UK Government/Westminster Government passed the proposal that will begin the process to redefine the legal registration of marriages in England and Wales.  It has been interesting to see the informal responses of various friends on social media, mostly it has to be said from those who feel this is a step forward.

One of the questions, to which I am not sure we have a proper answer, is whether or not 'marriage' is the correct word.  I nipped into the coffee shop across the road from church as usual, and asked the proprietors what they made of the legislation (they are a gay couple in a CP).  They were quite clear: for them, marriage was not what they wanted, was not how they defined their relationship, but if it was what other people wanted, so be it.  I know a lesbian couple in a CP who do choose to use the word 'marriage' and refer to one another as 'wife'.  I know a lesbian woman 'down south' who was once in a heterosexual marriage and is now in a CP who is adamant that 'marriage' is not a term she wants to use, ever, because it is such a flawed institution.  I also know of, and in the past have known, pairs of people who are neither romantically attached nor sexually involved who were, and who still are, prevented from entering a legal covenanted relationship which would secure certain rights (e.g. tenancy or pension after death of one of them).

A few people up here are openly scathing about the Westminster legislation, pointing out how much better the proposed Scottish legislation is, and that may indeed be true, though I think it is always easy to criticise when you go second (especially if you don't have Henry VIII's church of convenience on statute)... ;-)  There is undoubtedly lots that could/should have been better thought through, but, for example, untangling several centuries of legislation around the C of E in order to make a 'better' law now would not exactly be a vote winner, nor would it be the best use of parliamentary time!

I pretty much know what I think (at this point in time anyway!) about what the word 'marriage' means, but I hope that I am gracious enough to give space and place to those who view it differently.  Given a clean sheet of paper, which will never happen, I would want to find a new name for legally endorsed, coventantally committed human relationships that lacks both the clinical coldness of 'civil partnership' and the historical baggage and presuppositions of 'marriage'.  At the same time I'd like to see a legal requirement for all such partnerships to be registered via a civil ceremony (as in most of Europe) which would then release faith groups to bless or not, as conscience allowed, without undermining important principles of justice in what is, after all, a secular society.

As I mull over how to take forward a Bible study on James 3, and 'taming the tongue' it is perhaps pertinent to pause, fleetingly, to be reminded of just how much 'baggage' and 'expectation' any word carries.