Bill for secular marriages passes in Senead, but it needs to be amended

expectationlost

recedite wrote: »

The accountants could describe their principal object (accountancy) as both secular and ethical. Who wants to be married by an accountant?

if the person was legally recognised as a person to do it why not? how would it be different to a HSE registry clerk, i wouldn't have problem with it being done commerically aslong as it was regulated so that people got what they paid for, spoken oaths and signed documents that recognise a union ( and the benefits and repsonsiblities that come with that.)

but the commerical bodies doing would be another rung on the ladder so lets but that aside.


http://www.groireland.ie/getting_married.htm#section2
Marriage is a solemn legal contract

the rules seem to be about avoiding fraud and coersion, and conflicting contracts and about being eligible.


its about getting the right forms in and having the two parties make sure everything is done correctly, about having people from legally recognising bodies to do that.

again don't see they need for humanist to be specified.

Michael Nugent

Atheist Ireland today wrote to TDs asking them to amend the Civil Registration (Amendment) Bill, which will be debated in the Dail this Thursday, 20 December 2012. We also copied this letter to the Irish Human Rights Commission to ask them to examine the Bill from a human rights perspective, with particular reference to Articles 2, 18 & 26 of the the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and Articles 9, 10 & 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

It would be useful if other people could also email or otherwise contact their TDs between now and Thursday. Specifically we are asking TDs to:

• Amend this Bill to vindicate human rights, including freedom of religion or belief, and equality without discrimination before the law, for religious and nonreligious citizens alike.
• Describe a nonreligious nominating body by using the term ‘philosophical and non-confessional body’, which has legal status under Article 17 of the Lisbon Treaty.
• Define a philosophical and non-confessional body as a body whose principal objects are philosophical and non-confessional.
• Remove all proposed restrictions on nonreligious nominating bodies, apart from those that the Principal Act currently imposes on religious nominating bodies.
• Later, to use the forthcoming review of the Principal Act to apply any proposed new criteria, apply them equally on the same basis to religious and nonreligious nominating bodies, and also allow individuals to nominate themselves directly to the State.

We welcome the intention of this Bill to make our law more inclusive. However, in practice the Bill accepts and further institutionalises discrimination on the ground of religion or belief. It continues the discrimination in the Act that it is amending, which is discrimination in favour of religious people and against nonreligious people, and it adds new discrimination, this time between nonreligious people who have different philosophical and non-confessional beliefs.

If this Bill is passed as it is, Atheist Ireland intends to ask the President to refer it to the Supreme Court to test its constitutionality. If that does not happen, Atheist Ireland intends to challenge the constitutionality of the amended Principal Act. Our basic position is simple: however the law regulates how people can legally solemnise marriages, the law should treat all religious and nonreligious people and bodies equally, and should not discriminate on the ground of religion or belief.

We enclosed the following briefing document for TDs which outlines our concerns in more detail.

Legislating for Equality In Marriage Registration

Submission by Atheist Ireland re Civil Registration (Amendment) Bill
To be debated in Dail on Thursday 20 December 2012

1. It is unlawful to discriminate based on religion or belief

1.1 How this Bill violates human and civil rights
1.2 Articles 2 & 26 ICCPR, Discrimination & Equality
1.3 Article 18 ICCPR, Freedom of Conscience
1.4 Article 9 ECHR, Freedom of Conscience
1.5 Article 10 ECHR, Freedom of Expression
1.6 Article 14 ECHR, Freedom from Discrimination

2. How this Bill discriminates against nonreligious people

Only nonreligious nominating bodies:

2.1 Must have more than 50 members
2.2 Must have specified principal objects
2.3 Must have existed for 5 years
2.4 Must have charitable tax exemption for 5 years
2.5 Have exclusions such as political causes
2.6 Have obvious qualifications selectively applied

3. How this Bill discriminates between nonreligious people

3.1 ‘Secular’ is an inappropriate description
3.2 The definition of ‘secular’ is inappropriate
3.3 The Bill is designed to both include and exclude
3.4 The Seanad debate warned about discrimination

4. What we are requesting TDs to do

4.1 Specifically how you should amend this Bill
4.2 How you should later revise the Principal Act

You can read this document in full here

Legislating for Equality In Marriage Registration

.

expectationlost

oh that's interesting, at the bottom he says they allow people to temporarily authorised to solemnise marriages ie. friend or family http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/2004/en/act/pub/0003/print.html#sec57

so why all these restrictions

i wonder how far the application by community to solemnise marriages went

Peregrinus

expectationlost wrote: »

oh that's interesting, at the bottom he says they allow people to temporarily authorised to solemnise marriages ie. friend or family http://www.irishstatutebook.ie/2004/en/act/pub/0003/print.html#sec57

so why all these restrictions

i wonder how far the application by community to solemnise marriages went

While that section could be used to authorise a friend or family member of the couple to celebrate their marriage, there's nothing in the language to suggest that that's what it's for, or that the Registrar-General would use the section that way. Even to be temporarily registered, you do have to be nominated by a "body", and you have to be a member of that body.

I suspect it's more for dealing with a circumstance where, e.g., the pastor or minister of a small church has died, and someone needs to be temporarily authorized to celebrate marriages until a new appointment is made, and the new incumbent gets permanently registered.

Michael Nugent

Peregrinus wrote: »

While that section could be used to authorise a friend or family member of the couple to celebrate their marriage, there's nothing in the language to suggest that that's what it's for, or that the Registrar-General would use the section that way. Even to be temporarily registered, you do have to be nominated by a "body", and you have to be a member of that body.

I suspect it's more for dealing with a circumstance where, e.g., the pastor or minister of a small church has died, and someone needs to be temporarily authorized to celebrate marriages until a new appointment is made, and the new incumbent gets permanently registered.

I think it's the former, Peregrinus, although they don't actually say how it is used.

On the official list of solemnisers, they are typically listed with a timescale of one to two months, and a lot of them are international.

The nominating body is typically listed as a religious group or church address in that other country, not in Ireland.

Two of the temporary solemnisers are listed with PO boxes in America and another country (I can't remember which country) as their addresses.

Peregrinus

Oh, right so. Perhaps s. 57 mainly functions to facilitate wedding tourism into Ireland.

expectationlost

i really couldn't argue strongly with a td or with the td's personal secretary who might glance at my email why philosophical bodies should only be allowed to officiate at weddings there's seems some verneer of special hocus pocus that comes with 'solemnising' weddings even in michael's arguments for secularist weddings by 'Philosophical bodies who focus on questions of life meaning, ethics etc,' allowing to celebrate their marriages in a joyful and meaningful way that would somehow be lost of it was done by commerical operator, You're still trying to convince legislatiors that there's something beyond you facilitating the recognition of the seriousness and gravity of the legal commiment you're making

ShooterSF

Any idea why the people who would cry horror and claim the state was changing the meaning of marriage if this was a change to allow gay marriage are rather silent on this change to allow secular groups the same ability to marry people?

I though they opposed any change to marriage as a religious or state event.

Peregrinus

ShooterSF wrote: »

Any idea why the people who would cry horror and claim the state was changing the meaning of marriage if this was a change to allow gay marriage are rather silent on this change to allow secular groups the same ability to marry people?

I though they opposed any change to marriage as a religious or state event.

No. There's nothing in the Christian theology of marriage (or, SFAIK, in the marriage theology of any other signficant religious group in Ireland) which says that it's intrinsic to marriage that it should be celebrated in a ceremony conducted either by a religious minister or a full-time state official. Exactly how you celebrate marriage is a second-order issue that can be dealt acccording to what is convenient, practicable, etc.

Or, to put it more simply; marriage matters, weddings don't.

expectationlost

ShooterSF wrote: »

Any idea why the people who would cry horror and claim the state was changing the meaning of marriage if this was a change to allow gay marriage are rather silent on this change to allow secular groups the same ability to marry people?

I though they opposed any change to marriage as a religious or state event.

as was said for them its managed change, the humanist association and no further, its all in the dail transcripts

expectationlost

dail.tv being discusssed now

expectationlost

smart remarks about elvis weddings is all you get for you work from burton michael she rejected out of hand on the basis of something you weren't looking for

i guess you had some influence between bills, just nominating the humanist association would have been very slapdash but jeez what a prick burton is bringing up adams and confession rather then being serious

Michael Nugent

Here is a summary of the main points raised in the debate that related to the concerns that Atheist Ireland raised:

• Willie O’Dea referred to the definition of the term ‘secular body’, and predicted that the courts will be exercised in years to come in defining what is secular, ethical or humanist.
• Aengus O Snodaigh said that Atheist Ireland is correct that the Bill discriminates against non-religious organisations. He also had concerns about the definition of ‘secular body’. He pointed out that even the Humanist Association of Ireland might not satisfy the definition in the Bill. He referred to the Atheist Ireland’s intention to challenge the constitutionality of the Bill. He said that his preferred position would be that only State officials can solemnise marriages.
• Emmett Stagg said of Atheist Ireland’s proposals that seeking perfection can often be the enemy of the good. He suggested that the equality and constitutional issues raised by Atheist Ireland can and will be dealt with at the constitutional forum convention.
• In closing the debate on behalf of the Government, Joan Burton said that a concern that she had about the Atheist Ireland submission was that an Elvis impersonator in Las Vegas can perform wedding ceremonies. She said this despite the fact that there is nothing in the Atheist Ireland submission that remotely suggests that we are proposing this. She said that the reason why secular bodies are required to fulfill more criteria than religious bodies was that the authority to solemnise marriage should only be granted only to stable, long-standing and reputable organisations.

And here is the full text of those extracts:

Dail passes new law that discriminates by religion in marriage registration

Tim Robbins

This is great news. The only good thing about living in Ireland is watching religion fall apart.

expectationlost

something catherine murphy said while she gave a rambling history of irish marriage, she said that marriage is contract most of all, but her main point seemed to be that body's needed to keep good records that that was important for legal and historical reason, now the state keep records of church marriages don't they, so why would any body have to duplicate that process, it seemed like a intellectual bureaucratic excuse for not critiqueing the bill

here's the transcript http://oireachtasdebates.oireachtas.ie/debates%20authoring/debateswebpack.nsf/takes/dail2012122000031?opendocument#Civil Registration (Amendment) Bill 2012 [Seanad]: Second and Subsequent Stages

and the video http://oireachtas.heanet.ie/Dail/ should be thursday 20th start at 3:30

the stat cited by most there was 29% percentage of weddings were civil marriages in 2011

Morag

Looks like the constitutional forum convention will be the excuse de rigueur for the next while.

Michael Nugent

Atheist Ireland has written to the President asking him to to test the constitutionality of new marriage registration law

Our Constitution and laws are not very supportive of freedom of atheists from religious discrimination. However, we are asking him to do so for the following reasons:

• If the Bill is unconstitutional, it should not be signed into law.
• If the Bill is constitutional, then it is in the public interest for this to be clarified, because it is indisputable (and indeed not disputed by the Government) that the Bill discriminates against some citizens on the ground of religion or belief. Furthermore, it both discriminates against nonreligious citizens, and between nonreligious citizens
• Article 40.1 is inconsistent with the principle of non-discrimination, while Article 44.2.3 has to be read subject to the protection of religious interests.
• We suggest that the discriminations in this Bill should be tested against the case law that religious discrimination must be necessary to safeguard or maintain the right to free practice of religion, and the case law that embraces the promotion of social conditions which are conducive to, though not strictly necessary for, the fostering of religious beliefs.

The full letter is here.

robindch

^^^ Great work!

philologos

Peregrinus wrote: »

No. There's nothing in the Christian theology of marriage (or, SFAIK, in the marriage theology of any other signficant religious group in Ireland) which says that it's intrinsic to marriage that it should be celebrated in a ceremony conducted either by a religious minister or a full-time state official. Exactly how you celebrate marriage is a second-order issue that can be dealt acccording to what is convenient, practicable, etc.

Or, to put it more simply; marriage matters, weddings don't.

True. Personally, I don't think any church has the right to restrict marriage between people of no religion or other religion.

I do think that a Christian marriage has different philosophical underpinnings than a non-Christian marriage, but marriage isn't defined exclusively by Christianity.

Mark Hamill

Peregrinus wrote: »

No. There's nothing in the Christian theology of marriage (or, SFAIK, in the marriage theology of any other signficant religious group in Ireland) which says that it's intrinsic to marriage that it should be celebrated in a ceremony conducted either by a religious minister or a full-time state official. Exactly how you celebrate marriage is a second-order issue that can be dealt acccording to what is convenient, practicable, etc.

Or, to put it more simply; marriage matters, weddings don't.

So various religious groups see any marriage as having some aspect inherently under their religious remit, hence it doesn't matter who proceeds over them (they will see a humanist marriage as equal to a christian marriage as equal to a buddhist marriage etc.). But it does matter that those getting married satisfy whatever religious criteria the group holds to (gay marriage is not equal to humanist/christian/buddhist etc marriage)?

Peregrinus

Mark Hamill wrote: »

So various religious groups see any marriage as having some aspect inherently under their religious remit, hence it doesn't matter who proceeds over them (they will see a humanist marriage as equal to a christian marriage as equal to a buddhist marriage etc.).

I don’t want to claim to represent the position of all[/i[ religious groups. But sticking for a moment to Christianity, which is the religious tradition that bothers us most in Ireland, I think the position would be that there’s no such thing as humanist marriage or Buddhist marriage or whatever; there’s just marriage, a universal natural social reality. (There may be humanist weddings, or Buddhist weddings, but they all celebrate the same marriage.)

But Christians would say two more things about this:

First, marriage is not just a universal natural social reality; it’s a divinely ordained good, part of God’s plan for humanity. (NB for humanity, not just for Christians.) This isn’t a unique or unusual thing to say, of course; the whole of Creation is a divinely ordained good.

Secondly, as between Christians marriage acquires a further significance; It’s a celebration of and image of the relationship between God and his people. (In which light, of course, its procreative dimension acquires a particular significance.) Some Christian traditions - oh, all right, the Catholics - use the language of “sacrament” to express this understanding; others reject that language, but I think still share that understanding. And because marriage has, in Christian eyes, this dimension the religious, liturgical celebration of marriage between Christians is appropriate.

Right. But even if you’re committed to Christian cultural domination through the power of the state, the Christian position is not that everyone should be married in church; it’s that Christians are appropriately married in church. This translates into a demand that the state should recognize church weddings (and not, e.g., require a civil ceremony as well), but not that the state should require church weddings. Hence even the most right-wing and reactionary political Christians have no objection to the state recognizing non-religious weddings, and generally have no preference for non-religious weddings presided over by full-time state employees versus those presided over by licensed celebrants who are engaged by the couple concerned.

Mark Hamill wrote: »

But it does matter that those getting married satisfy whatever religious criteria the group holds to (gay marriage is not equal to humanist/christian/buddhist etc marriage)?

I think Christians would say that their understanding of marriage as inherently opposite-sex in nature isn’t a Christian criterion; it’s an anthropological criterion, which arises from observing and reflecting upon the realities of the human condition. (And they’d point out that it’s an insight shared by lots of non-Christians.)

Obviously, other people observe and reflect upon those realities, and arrive at different insights and understandings. And, at the risk of grossly oversimplifying a huge issue, you might suggest that this arises because of differing emphases; supporters of gay marriage see the unitive, public, committed, mutually loving and supportive nature of the relationship and reckon that’s the essence of the social reality of marriage, and therefore the state should recognize relationships like this - same-sex or opposite-sex - as the marriages they are. Opponents of gay marriage say no, you may have all that in a same-sex relationship but you’re necessarily missing the procreative orientation of the relations, and that’s an essential dimension. Obviously, you may or may not accept that viewpoint, , but it’s not an intrinsically religious viewpoint, and doesn’t become so merely because many of the people who advance it are religious.

Which means that Christians who reject the idea of Christian cultural domination through the power of the state - and, at least formally, that’s all the mainstream Christian traditions in Ireland - may still oppose the recognition of same-sex marriage. In doing so they don’t see themselves demanding that Christian doctrine be embodied in the law; they see themselves as demanding that the law should conform to social and anthropological reality.

recedite

IMO the christian churches are not so warm and fuzzy towards non church marriages as the above posts might indicate.

This opinion is based on a various things, eg the infamous ne temere decree made marriage between a catholic and a heretic invalid (from a RCC point of view) except under certain circumstances, mainly that a RC priest be present at the ceremony, which the priest might only agree to after extracting certain concessions regarding the upbringing of the children. Even though this particular decree is outdated technically, since the 1970's, there is still some other decree in its place.
Also I have often heard of couples being married in registry offices abroad, and when they returned to Ireland their families insisted on them being "churched" to make it "official." The situation here AFAIK is that the State recognises foreign secular marriages as being valid, but the church may not.

The traditional church attitude towards marriages conducted by muslims, scientologists, cannibals etc.. is that they may see themselves as being "married" in some quaint way, but its not a proper christian marriage. Therefore a christian sailor lad could return from the South Seas having been "married" (according to pagan tribal customs) to an island girl for a time, and would then be allowed to marry a good christian girl, as if he was still a bachelor.

Also, the very word for the christian ceremony"holy matrimony" refers to making the woman a mother (latin "mater") which would obviously not apply in a gay wedding.

Just to be clear, what we are mainly talking about in this thread is State recognition of the validity of a marriage, not Church recognition. The Irish State generally recognises foreign marriages as valid if they are valid in the country in which they occurred.
But for a marriage conducted in Ireland to be valid it must be conducted by an approved person, which currently is limited to clergy of a few of the traditional few mainstream religions, plus the civil service registrars. Hence if the ceremony is conducted by someone outside of the chosen few clergy, it is not valid until another ceremony is conducted at the registry office. The chosen clergy are however permitted to enter details into a register directly, in a back room of the church at the end of the ceremony.
So we are talking about possibly adding humanist "clergy" and possibly people who are openly atheist to the approved list.

Hotblack Desiato

I don't know why an atheist wouldn't be happy with the normal civil ceremony, except perhaps for the restrictions on where and when it can occur. The humanist ceremony stuff just leaves me cold.

I have some ideological problems with some of the humanist stuff (people seeking the comfort of religious rites without the religion, it seems to me) but we got married in a civil ceremony. The ceremony was nice. They say they object to 'religious' music. They've no objection to the Ramones though so we were grand


Edit: Friend of mine got married in a civil ceremony a few years ago in Markree Castle (shortly after ceremonies outside the registry offices were allowed.) The castle has a private chapel and the ceremony took place there - they had to close the drapes in the chapel for the ceremony as the stained glass windows behind them had religious imagery it's great imho that the state is, in this small area at least, insisting on a separation between church and state, and that more and more people are availing of non-religious marriage (which in times past would have been regarded as for weirdos, and not 'really' married at all.)

I suspect though that the real reason for the banning of religious iconography/music/readings during civil ceremonies is down to divorced RCC-ers trying it on, hoping for a pseudo-religious second marriage...

Mark Hamill

Peregrinus wrote: »

I don’t want to claim to represent the position of all[/i[ religious groups.

...

...versus those presided over by licensed celebrants who are engaged by the couple concerned.

So that's a yes then?

Peregrinus wrote: »

I think Christians would say that their understanding of marriage as inherently opposite-sex in nature isn’t a Christian criterion; it’s an anthropological criterion, which arises from observing and reflecting upon the realities of the human condition.

I'm not that interested in what christians would say (christians aren't known for being vocally honest about their true opinions), I'm more interested in what their actions, and arguments, say about their true intentions.

Regardless of where it comes from, homosexuality exists, that is a reality of the human condition.

Homosexuals wanting to get married, that is a reality of the human condition.

Arguing that they shouldn't be allowed to get married, because they currently aren't allowed to get married is a tautology, a fallacy.

All arguments against homosexual marriage are predicated on religious doctrine. Supposedly secular arguments, such as the procreation aspect of marriage turn out to be insincere when we see their proponents invariably fail to apply them to heterosexual couples that should also fall afoul of the same propose logic (couples who can't or don't want kids).

Hotblack Desiato

Mark Hamill wrote: »

All arguments against homosexual marriage are predicated on religious doctrine.

Modern religious doctrine.
It was tolerated, if not exactly allowed, in the past.

recedite

ninja900 wrote: »

I don't know why an atheist wouldn't be happy with the normal civil ceremony, except perhaps for the restrictions on where and when it can occur.

Well that is the crux of the matter. A couple should be able to get married on a beach, and at the weekend, if that is what they want. Without having to arrange a private registry office marriage the week before just to ensure everything is legit.
IMO the best way to achieve this is for the State to licence certain personnel (trained, vetted and competent), to do the job, for which they would be paid a fee set by the market. It is basically a legal/clerical exercise to conduct a search of the records to make sure the couple are eligible, and then to fill in the correct forms, follow the prescribed procedure and get the signatures.

I can't see how a same sex couple could be discriminated against in this kind of secular setting, considering their constitutional rights, EU human rights, and other equality legislation.The usual article cited against same-sex marriage in Ireland, as opposed to some lesser "civil partnership" is;

Article 41[1° The State pledges itself to guard with special care the institution of marriage, on which the family is founded, and to protect it against attack.

But I see nothing in that to prevent gay marriage, any more than I see it forcing a heterosexual couple to have children. It is simply a State recognition of a stable relationship, with implications for property (especially "the family home") taxation, social welfare, inheritance etc..
As for a church wedding, if a gay couple want to belong to a church that discriminates against them, that is a conundrum of their own making.

robindch

Mark Hamill wrote: »

All arguments against homosexual marriage are predicated on religious doctrine.

I'd have said that most of them are fear derived from subverting an established authority or tradition, in the sense of Jonathan Haidt's ideas on moral foundations.

The level of signal-related vitriol suggests to me that quite a few people may well have married in order to signal they're not gay, suggesting (see here for analogous behavior) that some of the most vitriolic almost certainly are.

recedite

recedite wrote: »

The accountants could describe their principal object (accountancy) as both secular and ethical. Who wants to be married by an accountant?

Why not?

Lots of marriages happen for accountancy/tax/inheritance reasons.

Sarky

You could be sure they'd dot all the i's. Important in a contract like that.

expectationlost

It is basically a legal/clerical exercise to conduct a search of the records to make sure the couple are eligible

so the humanist society will do this now, do the church do this?