I’m reading these headlines yesterday…

G.O.P.’s Portman, Saying Son Is Gay, Now Backs Same-Sex Marriage

And thinking pretty much what Matthew Yglesias tweeted this morning: “Glad Rob Portman’s for marriage equality, but wish conservatives could muster empathy for problems that don’t directly affect their family.”

On the other hand he didn’t go on a warpath against homosexuality like some conservatives have when they found out they had a gay kid (Hello Phyllis Schlafly…William Knight…Alan Keyes…).   Let me make an educated guess here: Portman thinks love is an integral part of marriage.

How many times have you heard them saying in the kook pews, in the context of arguing against marriage for same-sex couples, that marriage isn’t about love?   How many of those are the sort of people who you would expect to have their eyes opened when a child comes out to them?   At some point you have to conclude that this entire battle has been over the sanctity of love, and nothing else.

All some people seem to be able to see in the trappings of marriage is the authority part.   I now pronounce you… They forget the part about What God has joined… I don’t think you have to be a believer to see the truth in that.   The higher power isn’t in the part played by the clergyman or whoever is officiating at the ceremony.   The ceremony is an act of acknowledgement; a mutual recognition, on the part of everyone concerned, of a fact that has already occurred.   The higher power, the actual presiding authority, has already acted.   Think of the officiator as a conductor for an ancient score.   Public declarations are made, promises sworn between a couple, and between them and their community.   We are here to witness… The higher power is love.   What it has joined, let no one cast asunder.

What sort of person says that love is not the central fact of marriage?   The same sort who throws their gay child out into the streets, that’s who.

[Update…]