to feel despair at the gay marriage vote

Nelliemoser Some churches won't marry a couple if one of them is divorced and their ex-partner is still living. That was an issue with the Prince of Wales and Camilla Porker-Bowels; the Princess of Wales was dead but the lady's ex-husband was and still is alive. Consequently, they had to have a civil wedding although the act that brought civil weddings into being specifically excluded members of the royal family.

I loved the bonobos as well!

So does that mean Prince Charles, future head of the Church of England, is not legally married?

Riverwalk, I think the legal part of a marriage, be it a religious or civil ceremony is that having met all the conditions, it is witnessed and certified by a registrar. So yes POW is legally married.

Does it matter if he isn't? Shouldn't have thought so.

Should be: would it matter if he weren't?

Answer, so far as I can see: nope.

I don't think the Act was changed and there was a lot of umming and erring at the time. She isn't going to produce another child so it's not an issue (excuse the pun).

Absent, I have just re read your post. So,maybe he isn't legally married if the act said that the royal family could only be married in a religious ceremony ? They still went ahead and did it though so is this another case of certain people being above the law ? Not bothered personally if they are or not.

It would be quite funny though wouldn't it ginny?

Do you think the royals ever describe each other as "my husband or my wife" anyway?

gillybob yes, it would, what a scandal ! Don't forget 'My Husband and I' from Queenie.

Well the whole thing was a bit of a muddle gillybob. Do you remember that they planned to get married in Windsor Castle and then when it was getting near the day, they discovered that if the Castle was given a licence to perform marriages, then they would have to marry hoi polloi there too. Everything was hurriedly rearranged and they were married in the Register Office in Windsor. So who knows?

I have no doubt that the Queen calls the Duke of Edinburgh My Old Man, while he refers to her as She Who Must Be Obeyed.

It's not as if they weren't behaving as if they were man and wife before they were married . So long as they feel married, who cares what the law is? It doesn't affect the succession and if we ever get to a point where the succession is affected, the law will be changed or the monarchy will be abolished. So there isn't a problem really.

By which I mean that a problem is a problem only if it can't be solved. If there are solutions, it ceases to be a problem.

By the way, are there any objections to the gay marriage bill that aren't religious are quasi-religious? i.e. Are there any non-religious objections? I doubt it somehow.

religous or quasi...

oh bother it!

Yes, I do remember there being a last minute change of plan Absent. Heaven forbid any old peasant could get married in Windsor Castle !

Oh yes ginny I had totally forgot the, my husband and I, thank you for reminding me. I can imagine her saying it, with him shaking his head in the background !

Bags I think that there are quite a lot of people who don't want to see any change to a much valued and traditional institution. Others may not regard such objections as valid, but they are neither religious nor quasi-religious.

I see.

Which traditions though? Not the man owning all the property one, methinks. Not the one making women subservient and not equals. Valuable traditions? Pish.

Besides, weren,t those ones written in by religious people, who made up the rules anyway, because it was monks and their ilk who had the power because they had the education and the control of knowledge.

So even the valued traditions go back to religion, or at least religious control.

I get the impression that at the end of the day, the royals will always do just whatever suits them anyway......anyone who steps in their way will probably be sent to the tower or have their head chopped off

Incidentally my mum disagrees with the gay marriage bill. When I asked her why she just said "its just not natural". I do think there are probably people (like my mum) who although they are not particularly religious cannot come to terms with the whole idea of gay people marrying.

A lot of people cannot come to terms with homosexuality in any way but that is their problem.
An interesting aricle I read somewhere - many homosexual men are homophobic and most gay men are actually married to women. I am hoping that the new attitudes will eventually encourage everyone to accept their own sexuality and gay men will not have to live double lives and, very often, ruin the lives of the women they marry. (I have personal experience of the devastation a woman feels when she finds her husband has been having gay affairs.)

I've read all your posts with great interest, fellow-netters. Personally, I feel that if two people of any/either sex wish to commit to each other in a public ceremony, that's fine. What I do find ridiculous, and discriminatory, is that civil partnerships do not exist for hetero couples as well as gays. This is an anomaly in the law that needs amending.
Meanwhile, to any members of your families/friends getting married one way or another this weekend - Mazeltov!

Gillybob, I think they cannot accept a gay relationship at all not just the marriage part. My MIL is one of them and uses the 'Q' word to describe them. I'm sure she thinks they are some other life form. She is unaware that two of our friends are in a gay relationship and she thinks they are lovely. Make us giggle.

It's simple, surely... If you don't like the idea of same sex marriage, then DON'T DO IT. But don't make life a misery for others who don't agree with you.

If homosexual relations were so unnatural, they would not occur in so many species.

It's funny: when some American religious blow-hard fulminates against "the gays", many of us look at one another and take bets on how long it will be before he is caught with a rent boy!