Rabbis said to use torture to secure divorces for women

[The Brain]

You don't have to be in a nutty religion. If you are and don't like it then leave. I'd say if you can't take the heat get out of the oven (cause that's usually how I phrase it) but it would have been highly offensive in this particular case.

[grumbler]

Very grumbleresque declaration of victory.

Nice drive-by attack on someone who hasn't even posted in the thread! 

[derspiess]

Well, now you have.

[derspiess]

You don't have to be in a nutty religion. If you are and don't like it then leave. I'd say if you can't take the heat get out of the oven (cause that's usually how I phrase it) but it would have been highly offensive in this particular case.

[The Brain]

Very grumbleresque declaration of victory.

Nice drive-by attack on someone who hasn't even posted in the thread! 

There are a few Azerbaijans.. ians.. whatever, on this board.

[Admiral Yi]

Nice drive-by attack on someone who hasn't even posted in the thread! 

Thanks. 

[merithyn]

Marriage itself is, in many cases, a "religious matter" that is "enforced by the secular legal system". You get married in a Church ceremony, it has "secular legal system" implications - the secular authorities will give that act a legal meaning, indeed "enforce" it, even though it took place in a "religious environment".

So I'm not seeing why this is an issue. Or if it is, isn't having church weddings just as much of an issue? Yet every state allows them.

Actually, what every state allows is for a minister to stand in for a judge or justice of the peace to sign the license. That's the only legal aspect of it. No service is actually required, aside from asking, "Do you enter into this union knowingly and willingly?"

There's quite a difference between allowing a minister to stand in to sign a document that says that the couple is doing it willingly, and making a decision about marital assets and child visitation based on a religious edict.

[Admiral Yi]

I already conceded that point.

Really?

[derspiess]

That or, "... and I'm ready to get a new church should the need arise."

Knowing her, she won't do that.  Her particular church is her life, along with her newly-adopted kids and her odd obsession with Little House on the Prairie.

[merithyn]

You missed Meri's point Malthus, which was that your claim that DG's position boiled down to "i don't like it" was unwarranted.

I already conceded that point.

I must have missed that.

[Malthus]

Marriage itself is, in many cases, a "religious matter" that is "enforced by the secular legal system". You get married in a Church ceremony, it has "secular legal system" implications - the secular authorities will give that act a legal meaning, indeed "enforce" it, even though it took place in a "religious environment".

So I'm not seeing why this is an issue. Or if it is, isn't having church weddings just as much of an issue? Yet every state allows them.

Actually, what every state allows is for a minister to stand in for a judge or justice of the peace to sign the license. That's the only legal aspect of it. No service is actually required, aside from asking, "Do you enter into this union knowingly and willingly?"

There's quite a difference between allowing a minister to stand in to sign a document that says that the couple is doing it unwillingly, and making a decision about marital assets and child visitation based on a religious edict.

Of course there is a difference. The point is that making a Rabbi a presumptive "agent of the state" is making a religious figure, and a religious ceremony (since that Rabbi will only perform a marriage as part of an express religious ceremony), part of the secular legal system. His ceremony matters legally, since it has the power to confer the state of marriage - because the state has delegated him that power.

Child visitation isn't a part of the Ontario statute. Nor is it a correct summary of the situation to say that the Court there is  "... making a decision about marital assets ... based on a religious edict.". They aren't. The decision remains that of the judge and it is not based on the "edict" but on the fact that the guy is demonstrating through his actions that he's an asshole - refusing her remarriage for no reason other than spite (there is no "religious" basis to a refusal to give a get - that is, it is not a matter of "concience").

What they are doing, is obtaining explicit discretion from the statute to strike claims or defences based on an action by the person seeking access to the court - namely, a refusal to grant relief from religious barriers to remarriage. 

[Malthus]

I already conceded that point.

Really?

... you haven't articulated any rules or principles other than those demonstrated to be irrelevant.

[Admiral Yi]

Good lord.

[Malthus]

Good lord.

Hint: I'm not being entirely serious ...

[merithyn]

Of course there is a difference. The point is that making a Rabbi a presumptive "agent of the state" is making a religious figure, and a religious ceremony (since that Rabbi will only perform a marriage as part of an express religious ceremony), part of the secular legal system. His ceremony matters legally, since it has the power to confer the state of marriage - because the state has delegated him that power.

Child visitation isn't a part of the Ontario statute. Nor is it a correct summary of the situation to say that the Court there is  "... making a decision about marital assets ... based on a religious edict.". They aren't. The decision remains that of the judge and it is not based on the "edict" but on the fact that the guy is demonstrating through his actions that he's an asshole - refusing her remarriage for no reason other than spite (there is no "religious" basis to a refusal to give a get - that is, it is not a matter of "concience").

What they are doing, is obtaining explicit discretion from the statute to strike claims or defences based on an action by the person seeking access to the court - namely, a refusal to grant relief from religious barriers to remarriage. 

*shrugs*

And I don't think it should factor into it at all. Not legally, anyway.