Mark Thompson: Legality and Validity

Does something become legitimate by virtue of legislative enactment? Does the decision of a parliamentary majority or of a court of law suffice to settle the question of whether a course of action is appropriate, or legitimate or valid? Can Christians recognise the legal or constitutional reality of a situation without for a moment consenting to its reality in a deeper sense — something that legitimately exists in a world constituted by God's word?

Two recent developments in Australia raise this question in stark terms for us. The first is the conduct of same sex 'marriage' services in the Australian Capital Territory last weekend. These services went ahead despite a resolution of the High Court of Australia to reserve its decision on a challenge to the Territory's legislation until 12 December. How are we to view such marriages? Would we view them any differently if the High Court had already delivered its decision and it was in favour of the ACT's legislation?

Words from the marriage service in the Book of Common Prayer (1662) come to mind:

For be ye well assured, that so many as are coupled together otherwise than God's Word doth allow are not joined together by God; neither is their Matrimony lawful.

The more recent Common Prayer: Resources for gospel-shaped gatherings (2012), produced in the Diocese of Sydney, follows the wording of An Australian Prayer Book (1978) in both forms of the marriage service provided:

For be assured that those who marry otherwise than God's word allows are not joined together by God, neither is their marriage lawful in his sight.

Most obviously the intent of these words was never to deny the authority of parliaments and the judicial system. After all, Cranmer, the original author of the words (the 1549 and 1552 Prayer Books are identical in wording to the BCP, with allowance for variations in spelling) was an Erastian who believed very strongly in the authority of the State in religious matters as well as secular matters. Yet not entirely. The king was 'singular protector, supreme lord and even, so far as the law of Christ allows, supreme head of the English Church and clergy' and it is a simple matter of record that the king did not annul his marriage to Catherine of Aragon on his own authority. Cranmer, acting on decisions of a number of convocations of clergy, was the one who declared the marriage invalid on 23 May 1533. The law of the land (in Cranmer's time virtually equivalent to the will of the king) was one thing, but there was a higher authority to whom appeals such as this needed to be made. At the very least the appearance of deference to that authority needed to be preserved.

In the end, it does not matter what authority is used to declare a marriage valid — one of Henry VIII's own arguments was that even the Pope (by the special dispensation allowing Henry to marry Catherine in 1509) could not overturn the teaching of Scripture on the matter — marriage gains its definition and dignity, not from the State or the consensus of the people, but from the word of God. Given the clear teaching of Scripture that homosexual activity (not temptation or orientation but activity) is contrary to the will of God and itself a peculiar expression of that depravity into which the race has fallen by its 'exchange of the truth for a lie', the expression 'same-sex marriages' is an oxymoron, a contradiction in terms. Keep reading

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