Marriage

You might have heard about Donald Trump's recent statement to the New York Times explaining why he doesn't support same-sex marriage:  "It's like in golf ... a lot of people are switching to these really long putters. Very unattractive. It's weird ... I hate it. I am a traditionalist. I have so many fabulous friends who happen to be gay, but I am a traditionalist. "  Wow. What? Talk about a flawed analogy.  Stephen Colbert epically skewered this skewed reasoning on "The Colbert Report" last night.

Peter Sprigg's diatribe against same sex marriage ( "Same-sex marriage is contrary to the public interest," Feb. 2) is so full of contradictions and half-truths that it is difficult to decide where to begin responding. Assuming for the sake of argument that "the public purpose" of marriage is the procreation and rearing of children — although there is no reason to conclude that marriage has any one, exclusive "public purpose" — even Mr. Sprigg acknowledges that heterosexual couples marry for a host of "private purposes" and the state recognizes those marriages as valid even if the couple never intends to nor has children.

As election day approaches, The Sun has embarked on a campaign to discredit those who believe that marriage is between a man and a woman ("Misinformation campaign," Aug. 26). Adam's partner was not a man named Steve but a woman named Eve. That is the pattern that God gave us to live by. Only a man and a woman can procreate. Two men can't procreate. Two women can't procreate. The human race could have never begun except by a man and a woman. So the only natural, God-ordained companions are a man and a woman.

In response to R. Smith's recent letter ("The flawed arguments against same-sex marriage," Feb. 6), it is quite clear to me that the writer has never read the Bible. God made it quite clear that a marriage is not made of two people of the same gender. Specifically, I refer to Matthew 19:4-6, "that at the beginning, the creator made them male and female, and said, For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. ... So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate.

I am writing as a pastor to express my support for Question 6, which allows gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people to be married in Maryland. Biblical scholar John Dominic Crossan explains that the concept of justice in the Bible is not punitive but distributive. Justice is not about punishment but about making sure everyone on earth gets a fair share. No one should be left out. No one short changed. Everyone should have equal access to food, shelter and clothing for sure.

First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes something supernatural in the baby carriage. Just in case you weren't invited to the ceremony, you'll want to know that the vampire Edward and the human Bella get married in "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part I. " Talk about a mixed marriage! Many of the young women in the audience vicariously will imagine themselves as bridesmaids at that unusual event. Although this fourth installment isn't likely to win new converts, it definitely knows how to please its target audience.

If I were running for governor of Maryland, here's a speech I would give this weekend, injecting a fresh idea into the campaign: "I will propose a new law to encourage cohabiting couples to marry. Most out-of-wedlock births are to couples who are committed enough to each other to live together. However, most cohabitations end within 18 months. "The Census Bureau recently reported that 7.5 million couples are living together. This is a seventeen-fold increase from the 430,000 who were doing so in 1960.

By the time you read this, millions of Americans will have risen this morning at an hour best suited for dairy farming to watch wall-to-wall coverage of the televised wedding of Britain's Kate Middleton and Prince William. The TV networks are certainly milking the royal nuptials for all they are worth, having dispatched hundreds of reporters and producers to the scene to capture every pomp and circumstance. It's hard to see the harm in this shared moment of Anglophilia, aside from what envy it may generate from those impressionable youngsters watching it all on the family big screen TV with visions of wedding ceremonies half as lavish.

When women have pre-wedding jitters they shouldn't ignore them, according to researchers at UCLA . New research shows that doubts, particularly the woman's, predicts higher divorce rates and less marital satisfaction years later. “People think everybody has premarital doubts and you don't have to worry about them,” said Justin Lavner, a UCLA doctoral candidate in psychology and lead author of the study, in a statement. “We found they are common but not benign,” he said.

It is not unusual to see art that tackles social and political issues, but there's still something startling about Jeffrey Kent's solo show "Preach!" at the Frederick Douglass-Isaac Myers Maritime Park. The Baltimore artist zeros in on opposition by some African-Americans, especially in churches, to same-sex marriage. Kent employs provocative imagery, including minstrel figures in blackface, and an evocative substance: cotton. The impetus for the recently completed project goes back to 2008.