Irrational stance against alternative views on marriage

The LDS continues its irrational stance against alternative views on marriage in a recent press release.

Why does the LDS Church think it has a monopoly on the meaning of marriage? Is it so naive to believe that other cultures do not have a marriage ceremony? Why has it conveniently forgotten its own history on the matter?

Let us not forget, that the Church had an official position on marriage as being between ‘one man and one women’ in its scriptures. This was removed by President Young – whom we are told was a prophet, and we are of course prophets can apparently never led us astray. This very same prophet then continued the practice of plural marriage, which was considered – by a prophet who can never lead people astray – as essential for your salvation/exaltation.

As we know, the LDS Church dropped plural marriage for purely political purposes. Don’t get me wrong, I disagree with it being ‘essential’. Yet the Church still perpetuates the myth (via Official Declaration 1 in its scriptures) that the doctrine was dropped in 1890), when it well knows – as does anyone who is capable of reading about its history – that the practice continued by the highest leadership in the Church (who, don't forget, can never lead us astray). George Albert Smith was the first President of the Church not to practice plural marriage (that wasn’t in last year’s lesson though, because (a) we don’t talk about plural marriage anymore, (b) we don’t want to point out that OD1 is not entirely factual, and (c) a true understanding of our history is apparently not ‘faith promoting’. Know the truth and the truth will set you free make you confused).

What the LDS Church should be stating is this: the State should keep its nose out of all cultural-spiritual matters, and that includes the institution of marriage. The Church should uphold all peoples religious right to marry, and not just pay lip service to endorsing religious rights while actively campaigning to take others away because it disagrees with them.

The State has no business at all defining what marriage is. Marriage is a spiritual matter, not a political one. It only becomes political when the State intrudes into matters it ought to keep out of. Hence, the existing 'political' problem of the unequal political treatment of different spiritual points of view on what marriage is. What should the state regulate next, the meaning of Christmas?

The Church ought to also explain to people why this sacred institution can only have meaning when it is between male and female, rather than just state ‘because God said so’. Because God said so doesn’t explain why it is so. People have a need to know, to understand, and with all the bureaucracy, revelatory gifts, and seership of the Q12+FP you’d think they would be able to meet this desire.

In a subsequent post, I will give my own personal reflections on why, from one point of view, marriage can only have spiritual efficacy if it is between a man and women.