Marriage for some, unions for all

I have this suggestion to end all the rancor about gay marriage vs the sanctity of marriage. It's simple, and I think it'll work.

We start off by acknowledging that there's some confusion arising from our using the same word for (a) a civil contract with legal ramifications and (b) a religious rite.

After all, you have to get a civil marriage license and be married by someone with "authority vested in [him] by the state" before it's legal. And all those people back in the Sixties who kept saying they didn't need "a piece of paper" weren't complaining about the church. Any church. And lots of religions allow kinds of marriages the state doesn't. And lots and lots of people get married without bringing any church into it at all. Not to mention all those who get married to people churches don't want them to marry.

To say nothing of those who can't have children (which keeps on being mentioned as the real reason, if not the only reason).

So - let's just say that marriage is this sacred, sanctified, religious institution. And let's call the civil, legally binding one... oh, say, a "civil union".

There. You can have your "sacred, sanctified" institution. Just don't expect the state to give you any tax breaks or inheritance breaks or community property on it. It's religion, after all. And we'll have our civil contract with power of attorney and so on, and we won't ask anybody to call it sacred.

And if someone wants both ... hey, no problem.

Just like now.

Only better.