Gay marriage has nothing to do with the human dignity of persons who are gay. It has nothing to do with tolerance. It has everything to do with an attempt to create, by force of law, a moral imperative for society to think a certain way. Ironically, it will actually further undermine the moral imperative undergirding the sociological function of marriage itself.

The human dignity of people who are gay is already protected by the same laws that protect the human dignity of everyone else. Furthermore, homosexuals already have the option of contractual domestic partnerships that provide the same legal rights as marriage, protecting their rights to visit loved ones in the hospital, etc.

But marriage is not merely a contract between two consenting adults; it is a covenant between the couple, society and God.

Leaving God out of it, let’s talk about society and the couple. When you get married there must be witnesses. They are not merely spectators or cheering fans. They are participants, whose presence represents the community’s responsibility – its moral obligation – to hold the couple accountable for their marital vows, and to offer material support and encouragement for the couple to keep their vows. Proponents of gay marriage emphasize the community’s duty to affirm the free choice of the couple, not the couple’s responsibility to keep their vows or the community’s obligation to urge them to stay together. They want only the rights and the affirmation, not the responsibility and accountability.

Perhaps this is because gay marriage does not have the same “oughtness” as heterosexual marriage. When a man and a woman regularly engage in sexual intercourse it is normal to expect the population of humans to increase, and to expect the mother and father to be responsible for raising the child in a stable home. Therefore, the moral imperative, the oughtness of a man and woman being socially bound together by vows enforced by society, precedes the institution of government, both logically and chronologically. Although a relatively tiny heterosexual couples are infertile, same-sex genital intimacy always results in exactly zero children being born. Society therefore has no naturally vested interest in gay marriage.

For this reason, the analogy between interracial marriage and gay marriage is terribly flawed. The inherent validity of interracial marriage is proven by the children who are produced by the union of a man and woman of different races. Those children’s human dignity speaks for itself, demanding that society not only permit, but insist upon the marriage of their mother and father.

The argument that gay marriage could provide stable homes for orphans or foster children inadequately addresses symptoms while institutionalizing the root problem of how so many children came to be without parents. The reduction of marriage to a mere contract between two consenting adults is a major reason for the disarray of our society  rising from broken homes, “blendered families,” and children being born outside the protection of a marriage between their mother and father. We should lament this, and reverse it, not reinforce it. Gay marriage won’t necessarily destroy heterosexual marriage, but by defining the reason for vows out of existence it undermines the moral grounds upon which to restore heterosexual marriage. Legalization of gay marriage solidifies the reduction of heterosexual marriage to the moral equivalent of a domestic partnership that ignores the normative moral “oughtness” of a father and mother raising their child together.

Therefore, “homosexual marriage” is really an oxymoron. Without it, gay couples will continue to have the right to love whomever they wish for as long as they wish. And the rest of us won’t be criminalized for our deeply-held moral and religious beliefs.

Whether or not you believe homosexuality is good, you should be worried about the implications of the government forcing people to participate in that which they morally oppose. No, the government will not make you gay. But it will punish you for refusing to embrace the rightness of homosexuality and actively support it, even against your religious beliefs.

Whatever your view of homosexuality, do you really want the government to create for you a moral obligation to help gay couples make and keep traditional vows?