Well -- in practical terms it isn't always very religious no... But
the institution of marriage as a philosophical or social construct has
its roots in our religions. The fact that it's become a practicaly
secular event in recent history doesn't change the history. Any given
individual or pair or group of individuals may or may not place any
religious significance on it, independent of its history. But because
a great many people still do place that religious significance on
marriage, and they have centuries of history to back that up, it's
tough to call marriage a secular institution without creating some
distinction between a secular marriage and a religious/symbolic
marriage. Further, so say "it's a secular institution" and then
produce laws based on that idea infringes on the rights of others to
have their religious beliefs held in the same regard as others'
religious beliefs. This is for 2 reasons -- the first being that any
current marriage law can almost certainly be traced back to a
religious origin, and the 2nd being that any new marriage law made
today will almost undoubtedly be born from if not incidentally fall
in-line with some religious belief. So it's impossible imo to have
laws regarding marriage without it being legalized religious
descrimination.
On the contrary, marraige has its origins in common law, which is a civil
institurion. It goes back to the cro-magnon days (you have seen the cartoons)
where a man "took" a woman as his wife. depicted in the cartoons as a man with
a club and dragging her away by the hair. Conquering nations took from among
the conquered wives as well so as to avoid incest inherent in procreating within
their own tribes.
Religions took it up much later as "holy matrimony" in which conditions were
applied, such as "be fruitful with children, yada, yada.
In the US there are numerous civil benefits, rights and privileges bestowed
upon married couples, as opposed to single individuals. Civil marriage, common
law marriage (still recognized in Texas, for instance) as well as religious
ceremonies.
Nowhere is any of the statutes, including the religious canons was it
specified that marriage had to be between opposite gendered individuals. This
because it was a tradition that marriage was primarily for bestowing legitimacy
and heirship on a couple's children, which could not occur unless they were able
to procreate.
There are those who are demanding that those rights, privileges, etc. be
likewise and equally extended to same-sex couples as well. This is completely
aside from any religious implications, although there are certain faiths that
embrace same-sex marriage, and certain that oppose it, therefore enter the
religion side of the controversy.
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