Lets focus on the real problems, and those places where a lot of good religious people will support equality for gay people. As long as it is most substantially equiv in the law to marriage, I don’t care what it is called. And I have proposed to the wife that we get divorced here in MD – It makes perfect sense re estate planing for our situation, but we’d be on the front page for saying we won’t be married until gay people can be married also. BTW, most of the younger str8 people I know ages in the 20s and even 30s don’t want to be married at this point in their lives. Interesting how the churches blame gays for the collapse of the marriage institution – maybe there is as yet a large part of the populace who see the hypocrisy of some churches, and are making a statement about it. How do we harness those people – focus their understanding of what is happening?

Look at Australia (AU)that labored under the conservative antigay government of Bush-like prime minister John Howard. AU could not even get civil unions passed in any of its states until finally in Tasmania. New Zealand (NZ)was ahead of AU in the civil unions department. Civil partnerships with all the rights of marriage if I have that right are the laws of the land in NZ. AU like the USA still has catch up to do.